Coffeezilla
patreon
Why the $10 million dollar studio is completely dark
🕑 Added 2023-07-26 03:11:18 +0000 UTCPeople are always shocked when they see my studio in person for the first time. "It's so dark in here".
And they're right. Everywhere you look, it's black carpet, black walls, black curtains covering green.
I thought I'd give you guys a little insight into why that's the case: One of the secrets to my production is my obsession with painting with light, and specifically... painting with a blank canvas.
The world of virtual production is endless, there's a million different scenes you can shoot on a greenscreen... but where everyone always messes up is on the lighting...
It's always lit incorrectly, from the wrong angle, or has green spill.
It drives me completely nuts!
The correct way to do a green screen is to achieve two seemingly impossible things simultaneously,
1. evenly light a green screen (as small as possible to avoid green spill but fill the camera frame)
2. light yourself with dramatic lighting that fits the scene.
This is impossible, unless you start with a blank canvas. Otherwise the lights hitting your green screen, will affect you as well.
The solution is complete separation. Meaning your two light sources are completely separate, and there's no outside light influencing the scene. Hence, black everywhere. Now that you have a blank canvas, you can light yourself for the scene.
I shot a quick test to show what a blank canvas looks like when done properly, and improperly, and then how good it looks when you paint with light from scratch.
This took me years to figure out, and I hope I can pass on some lessons, and encouragement. Going that extra mile with such small details is something 99% of people won't notice consciously, but over time they will feel the difference.
Comments
Coffeezilla
I’ve played around with musou black before when I was thinking of using a luma key. Long story short it’s hard to use has a bit of a strange smell and // easy to scuff as well.
Rae Rae
Did you miss the part where student loans are being forgiven left and right?
Janet Johnson
Ooh. Try Musou black paint. The studio will turn into a void.
Nick Cappetti
Coffee… you’re missing the biggest scam of our generation. Joe Biden. Dude lied his way into office saying he’d forgive trillion dollars worth of loans.
Robby Cvejanovich
Here is someone you should do a video on: Charles Ponzi
Ross Vincent
Coffee = black, Zilla = green, gotcha.
Grant
I guess not all of them can afford a 10 million dollar studio either. But this is why you’re the king, Coffee!
Coffeezilla
correct, this is why many youtubers look out of place on green screen.
Coffeezilla
Absolutely correct. Depth of field and matching irl camera settings to your render is key.
Grant
Amazing lighting and scene-setting is like a great bass player. If done properly, it adds to the beautiful symphony of artistic creation. If done improperly, you'll notice it straight away and it's pretty jarring.
Jessica Jeffery
I was about to say “ah, the trick is black screen” when I saw these pictures 😂
Alexandru Tudorica
I think that also the depth of field of the camera being matched in the VFX render has a lot to do with creating a good immersion. I saw other youtubers completely fail to do this, they appear more crisp than objects that should be at the same distance as they are, totally breaking the immersion.
Alexandru Tudorica
No, from my understanding in order to control where the light reflected off the green screen bounces, he has to cover everything else in black, so that there will be no in direct green spill (e.g. light bounces off the green screen and then bounces again off a white side wall to reflect green color on his face. He also mentioned that reducing the green screen to just what are you need for the shot also helps, hence the velvet drape in front of the green screen that he can pull off to only show the size he needs.
Humberto Muñoz
Good insight into the world of coffeezilla. I also like the drink list in the bar, it would be cool to add new drinks to the list as a patreon ester egg
Julian Yong
Does it mean that you record yourself completely in the dark, then add lighting to it in post production?
Nicola Kalderash
Haha! Get those tax breaks Coffee! Hell yeah! $10M rented studio was a momentous investment. 😝🤣
Coffeezilla
Thanks Alexander, appreciate the support, truly. It's amazing to have gathered a group of people who understand the mission and see the value in high effort content.
Coffeezilla
Definitely don't live in a mansion, and not in the house. 😂
Coffeezilla
Btw almost all the pan shots so far have been virtual. Trying to build up to a full motion cap camera workflow to get the full range of motion... but you'd be surprised how much you can fake with camera motion. Mo-Sys is the future of those type of shots tho.
Coffeezilla
Mostly in post actually, so you would lose that bet! 😅 I find that real-time doesn't quite look good enough for me. Bc i don't livestream there's not much reason to do it as well.
Alexander Demers
Wow I never would've expected it to be that dark but it makes sense. You truly make some of, if not the best content on the internet. The amount of detail you put into every upload, from the cases to the video about them, is unmatched and there's a reason all of your videos get millions of views. Keep it up Stephen. You're truly helping people.
Nicola Kalderash
Did you build you studio in your house or rent a space? Because this is awesome but if it's in your home, unless you live in a mansion (which all the humbleness would state otherwise) I can't imagine Mrs. Coffeezilla is very happy about eating up half the home/garage.
Coffeezilla
Of course he is, he hangs out at Balmers Peak, short flying lambo ride away.
Zack Pittman
Are you doing real time VR (like a disguise or Pixera Media Servers) when you shoot and just recording the composited output? or are you doing it all in post? but I've seen panning shots???? NVM spotted the MO-SYS system! unless you are just using that tracked data movement in post for generation... I would take a bet you are doing that in real time?
Joel Goodall
What, the robot bartender isn't a real physical entity? Lol.
LaunchDude
Nice! My co-producer just picked up a FX3 last week and it’s SICK! I’m still rocking a A7RIII and will for a while… considering I only have 1000 subscribers right now lolol 😭
Coffeezilla
Appreciate it Mason. I like the current 1 tier system where people get everything at a single tier, but depending on how our content changes I'm open to anything. Truth be told as I get older, I just love diving deep into crazier investigations. 😂 Might need a way to fund the wilder ideas at some point, but for now this works.
Joshua Duarte
Thanks genius, I could have never guessed!!
mason geloso
Also add some extra tiers to Patreon. I am sure many, including myself, would be more than happy to give more every month : )
Coffeezilla
FX9 actually. Way overkill, but I needed GenLock for a production pipeline problem. FX3 is still my favorite, and the main thing I shoot with. It's the perfect camera imo. FX6 I've heard good things about, but don't need the ND filter at all ... so.... 🤷♂️
LaunchDude
Uhhhh the entire point is to support the channel and work he performs….. 🤷♂️
Joshua Duarte
Thanks man, appreciate you considering our feedback. Have a great rest of your night!
mason geloso
FR! Thanks for the reply and keep up the good work my man.
Coffeezilla
Thanks for the feedback Josh, I'll consider this.
LaunchDude
Are using a Sony FX6? It’s crazy how important and hard lighting is to nail down in talking head segments to make them buttery and delicious!
Coffeezilla
Yes. But when I'm less focused on Coffeezilla. Podcasts sound great on paper, but are distracting and pull away your time.
Joshua Duarte
I mean even the night before or a few hours before like most others do would be nice. I understand the time sensitivity issue though, unfortunately that’s not something I have experience with so I couldn’t offer any guidance on what works best. :(
Coffeezilla
Happy it helped! There's precious little information out there on the RIGHT way to do green screen. I messed up a LOT.
Coffeezilla
😅
Coffeezilla
All the big investigations, like the one I'm working on now, will be early access. But it doesn't make sense more news/time-sensitive content. I've been trying to to experiment with a balance. <3 Hope that helps.
Tohir Tillyaev
I can see every cent of that 10M was spent well.
Wesley Patrick
Oh this is perfect!!! Thank you I have been looking for an answer to this problem of greenspill on my own project! Thank you for this lovely coincidence!
Bill Sourour
This is amazing. Love this kind of info. Thank you for sharing!
Akash Patel
Thank you Steven for doing that EXTRA MILE for us!
mason geloso
This studio is wild. Been watching for well over 2-3 years and it is amazing to see how much your production value has increased. Would you ever consider making a podcast? (Probably a common question but genuinely curious)
Joshua Duarte
I’m just wondering why we as patrons don’t get exclusive access to the latest videos anymore, what’s the point of being a patron anymore?
Coffeezilla
trial and error + reading + watching what professionals do.
Alan Goldstein
Where did you learn this? A class or trial and error?
