# Need some lighting help



## Chuck (Oct 10, 2009)

Here is a picture of my front yard with my attempt at lighting this year. I did not like it last year as it looked to festive with a mix of green and red. So I nixed the green.

What do you think I can do to improve this? I am so-so with it so far, but it is missing something.


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## Frighteners Entertainment (Jan 24, 2006)

what is your goal or theme?


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## Chuck (Oct 10, 2009)

Just an overall spooky feeling. It is a grave yard scene, so eerie is good. There is a crypt for the fcg back in the corner that is not finished yet.


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## Frighteners Entertainment (Jan 24, 2006)

Then for me I would for go the other lights. Use overhead lighting if you can. Blue works pretty good for moon light.


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## Frighteners Entertainment (Jan 24, 2006)

It also casts great shadows if you have nice limbs in the trees.


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## hedg12 (Jul 6, 2008)

I agree with Jeff, it needs more overall lighting. The accent lights look great, but it looks a little dark overall.

Great looking display, btw.


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## Chuck (Oct 10, 2009)

Overhead lighting will be difficult. I have a tall palm tree on the left and that's about it.


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## Chuck (Oct 10, 2009)

Ok, so I had room to put one overhead light. I also changed the contrast of red on the house to blue on the house and moved the red to flood the front with individual blues on the tombstones. I also added the fcg and finished the roof of the crypt.

I think it is getting better.


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## Lunatic (Oct 3, 2006)

Thats looking better. You could go with a little splash of a green spotlight somewhere. Maybe behind a gravestone or something to add a little more ground color and depth to the graveyard scene. I use green spots in front of my graveyard and throughout to cast shadows and such. I do wish I had some more colors though but the green/shadows looks nice and creepy.


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## pagan (Sep 9, 2009)

If you have trees behind or next to your house, you might consider putting a red flood light on the roof shining up into the tree to create some height and depth in the scene.. That looks like the shadow of a large tree on the left of the house, might be worth a try. 
It would be kind of cool to see the front of the house washed in shadow, you have some cool props and a great tree in the front. If you placed a couple of floods out near the fence pointing towards the house I bet you could get some cool shadow detail..
Looking at the pics, you are definitely moving in a good direction.
Good luck.


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## pagan (Sep 9, 2009)

Rob brown has a really good lighting tutorial http://www.robertdbrown.com/haunt/


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## debbie5 (Mar 2, 2007)

Huge improvement from 1st pic to 2nd! Good job.


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## Lunatic (Oct 3, 2006)

Tree up-lighting is good, too.


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## Todd (Sep 1, 2007)

Hi Chuck,
I would like to see the display without the blue tree lights. Try moving them both out to the front along the fence like the red one. 
Also take some aluminum foil and loosely wrap it around the base of the fixtures creating an extended "cone" around the bulb. 
Now fold the foil over in front of the bulb so you can block the light from flooding up onto the house. This will really intensify the shadows that the stones provide.
This also will eliminate the bright backlight from the bulb that is seen by the viewer.

I have used this technique for years and it really works well.

You might also try adding a dimmer switch into the mix to back off on the intensity of one or all of the lights if necessary.

Hope this helps, 
Todd


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## Chuck (Oct 10, 2009)

pagan said:


> Rob brown has a really good lighting tutorial http://www.robertdbrown.com/haunt/


I have been looking for that pdf a few weeks now. I have a very bright streetlight on the right that washes the yard in an amber hue, and I knew this pdf addressed that. Thanks for the link.

Also, that tree on the left is a tall palm tree. Oh what I wouldn't give to have a large oak tree over there instead of a palm tree. When was the last time you saw a palm tree in a cemetery.



Todd said:


> I would like to see the display without the blue tree lights. Try moving them both out to the front along the fence like the red one.
> Also take some aluminum foil and loosely wrap it around the base of the fixtures creating an extended "cone" around the bulb.
> Now fold the foil over in front of the bulb so you can block the light from flooding up onto the house. This will really intensify the shadows that the stones provide.
> This also will eliminate the bright backlight from the bulb that is seen by the viewer.


I have a few clamp style hood lights that I can use. I am also going to move them to the other side of the fence to try and cast the fence shadow as well.

Right now, I think there are too many lights, I am going to try to eliminate some and see how that goes. I will also take pictures with a better camera to give you a better feeling for what everything looks like in person.

We'll see, I am going to play with the lighting again tonight.


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## Chuck (Oct 10, 2009)

OK, so here is the third night of moving lights around. My wife came home with a couple of bails of hay, so I created a scene for the JOL's. I moved the lights around a bit. I moved the red from the corner and put it behind the coffin facing left to light up the JOL scene with a blue pin spot on the skeleton. I also moved the blues to the corners and put a green flood in the middle.

I also used a different camera that will give you a better idea of the street light invading my scene. As you can see, it is BRIGHT. I still need to hide the backs of the floods as you can see in the pictures.

So here are some shots of the setup so far. I threw in some additional shots of some individual props


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## camsauce (Oct 16, 2009)

Looks good Chuck. I actually like the orange coming from the street light. I've seen some people work out a theme with Palms, think scary Tiki's, volcanos, etc.


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## Todd (Sep 1, 2007)

I love the gargoyle and pumpkin displays( are they as dark as the picture shows?? If so they are perfect) 

Can we see it without the blue light in the tree and can you tone down the bright purple around the web? Try the foil hoods around the spots I realy think it will help take the illumination off the house..

And hopefully the street light will meet an untimely death.

I hope I dont sound to harsh,,,, you did ask


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## Pumpkin5 (Aug 8, 2010)

:jol: Chuck, I think the lighting in the last picture posted looked pretty good. I like the red and blue and orange of the pumpkin lights. I have amber spotlights on my front of my porch, and though they light everything up so you can see it, it doesn't wash it all out like white light does. Also on in the light fixture I switched out the 60 watt clear candlebra bulbs to amber 40 watt bulbs. My graveyard is spotlighted in blue (blacklight) and greens and I will also add the battery operated LED lights to illuminate tombstones and graveyard ghouls. P.S. Love your yard! It is Halloweenrific!


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## pagan (Sep 9, 2009)

Wow.. You aren't kidding about the streetlight. It seems there was a post here a couple of years ago where someone suggested calling the city and asking then to turn it off for a few hours, and someone else suggested masking it with foil (climbing those things ain't easy)..


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## SoCal Scare (Aug 3, 2007)

1" pvc a few elbows , Ts, couplers and a black plastic bag and you can cover the street light temporarily and be able to take it down at the end of the night with no issues of damage. I made a square big enough to hold the plastic bag tightly opened and put it on the end of a couple lengths of 1" pvc painted black. I then I get my ladder out, stand on it and put the bag over the light and just leave the pole hanging there. (its high enough that most people dont see it) then at the end of the night you just take it off the light and no one is any wiser that you covered it up.

















The first picture was 2 years ago before covering the street light and the second one was the next year when I got smart.


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## Chuck (Oct 10, 2009)

I found a solution on another forum a little while ago and forgot about it. I am going to build one similar to this, because I have the same style streetlight. 
http://www.halloweenforum.com/tutorials-step-step/99660-street-light-defeated-halloween.html


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