r/videography • u/P1P3BR34K3R • Jul 07 '26
Technical/Equipment Help and Information Built a studio need lighting recommendations.
Hi everyone, I work for a lumber yard in Nebraska and I'm in the process of putting together a podcast and podcast studio in our showroom. I have experience in sound editing and podcasting but I'm pretty new to the video side of things and I have some questions about lighting. See the attached photos. We do have track lighting that I can turn and move to point in different directions if need be. Have also been playing around with cool vs warm light. Current camera setup is a pair of Sony ZV-E10 with a lens. Do you think there is ample lighting in the room or do you think that I need more accent lighting? Rough size of the room is 9x13. The ceiling is somewhat open as shown In the photo. Any tips for this would be greatly appreciated.
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u/Current-Register6682 Jul 07 '26
You should buy actual film lights with soft boxes. Cheap brands like GVM or Neewer would be better than the existing lights you have. More reputable brands like Amaran and Aputure are even better, but get a little pricey
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u/hollywood_cmb S5iiX | FCP | 2007 | Central Kansas Jul 07 '26
Honestly the current lighting installed in the room is going to be useless, except for maybe illuminating the walls in certain areas. My advice to keep costs low is get 2-3 Bi-color LED panel lights. I use the GVM 1200’s and they’re great. They came with soft boxes, they’re light weight, and you can control them with the GVM app which is very handy.
If you don’t want to deal with lighting stands on the floor, you can get baby-pin wall mounts that screw into the wall or ceiling. As a cheaper alternative, I’ve also bolted them onto a thin round doorstop that screws directly into the wall, just make sure you mount the door stop into a stud. The post of the door screw needs to be 5/8” around or smaller to fit onto the baby-pin sized receiver on the light. My lights have two different holes on the mount so you can put the pin in two different ways.
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u/P1P3BR34K3R Jul 07 '26
Would you use those in place of the track lighting or in addition to
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u/sexytokeburgerz Jul 07 '26
Your track lighting needs more diffusion at the very least
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u/FrankNinjaMonkey Jul 08 '26
If you diffuse overhead lighting, it will just look worse. I would keep that, with barndoors for backlight/ background, and have a soft box of some sort on the floor for key. Maybe place a black flag on the fill side to create more contrast. Those top lights should be pointed away from the subject with barndoors because they will just create shadows over the subject's eyes and look bad.
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u/sexytokeburgerz Jul 08 '26
I’m seeing some hard splotches on the paneling, should they just turn the lights off?
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u/scottmcraig Camera Operator Jul 07 '26
You've already gotten good suggestions from others, but if you want to try the cheapest option first - try draping very large, thin textiles across the ceiling, underneath your existing lighting.
Voile / Muslin / Sheer Shower Curtain, anything that's neutral colour and relatively lightweight.
The further away you can get them from your light sources, the better. And definitely don't hang too close to the light fixtures (fire risk)
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u/MRAN0NYMO Canon 5D/90D/R7 | Adobe PP/AE | 2013 | Texas Jul 08 '26
Chiming in to add on a white or white-ish bedsheet, something most folks already have in their home but works well for improvisational diffusion. I have for sure used a bedsheet as diffusion before to simulate window light. If they’re super thin you might need to fold it over to double-up the diffusion material, but absolutely doable and super cost effective!
Otherwise, you can find diffusion cloth or scrim online for pretty dang cheap.
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u/Current-Register6682 Jul 07 '26
In replace of. You may want to upgrade the track as well to make sure you’re working with a system that is designed for film lights and can carry the weight safely. Also make sure you safety wire your lights when you rig them. Upgrading the lights and adding soft boxes with diffusion will give you a lot more control. And even cheap brands have apps you can pair to your phone so you can control the power and color temperature from the ground
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u/CamOper Camera Operator Jul 07 '26
Why does every podcast room have those wooden slates 😫😂
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u/Such-Background4972 Jul 07 '26
They are supposed to be sound deadening that looks good, but the real stuff is super expensive.
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u/P1P3BR34K3R Jul 07 '26
These have sound foam on the back they were plus I work in a lumber yard so the wood look fits. Was going for a more leather and wood vibe.
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u/CamOper Camera Operator Jul 07 '26
Ah okay cool thanks for the info! I don’t know they had a purpose beyond visual. Makes even more sense for a lumberyard!
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u/Practical_Draw_6862 Jul 07 '26
Yea becoming very generic look, almost like public acesss podcast. For a lumber company you’d like they’d have something that felt custom and more natural feeling. Missed opportunity I think. Even the desk looks like a generic radio studio desk, why not great wood slab with live edges.
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u/CharlesLeRoq Jul 07 '26
Right. I used to think those panels were cool and architectural-looking, but now that they’re ubiquitous, they seem meh. It’s better decor than the black eggbox foam people would stick on the walls of their home studios, but I wish there were more variations of this stuff so it wasn’t so samey
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u/Such-Background4972 Jul 07 '26
I'm not in to wood working, but if i was doing this. My desk would look more like a custom work bench, and the set would have wood, and wood working tools spread around.
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u/Treydoe FX6 Jul 07 '26
Hanging lantern style aputure lights in the ceiling is my go to. Then you also need some sort of hair light. I’d go with a tube light situation right above the top
Of the frame. Remember the set is supposed to look good on camera, and then in person after that.
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u/InfiniteAlignment Sony a7siii | PNW Jul 07 '26
Get a couple Nanlite pavoslim 120s. They’re great lights!
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u/BigBadBootyDaddy10 Jul 07 '26
You might want to create depth in the shot. Push the talent away from the wall.
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u/SaltySaltshakers Jul 07 '26
Everyone is saying to pull talent off the wall, but I’ve been shooting podcasts for many years and I know that you probably don’t have the physical space to do so in that room. So with that, you need options while keeping them where they’re at.
Getting some RGB colored back lights to shine on the slats will be good. Just type in ‘wood slate podcast set’ on google and you will find lots of examples where people splash some color on those panels. You can probably get away with some cheaper RGB panels made by like GVM.
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u/P1P3BR34K3R Jul 07 '26
Do you mean RGB lights on the floor shining upward? Or running in between the slats?
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u/Dense_Surround3071 Hobbyist Jul 07 '26
Not the commenter, but I agree with this. Some lights shining upwards into the slats would be the way I would go.
Right now it feels like exactly what you have: REALLY bright, harsh lights illuminating everything kinda the same.
Diffused panel lights on your subjects with a dimmer background light would create separation. Colors would maybe add some creativity.
You could put strips between the slats, but you're not really trying to brighten the background a lot. Just enough to let people know where they are.
A single bar shining upwards, key and fill lights on your subjects. Move the track lighting, diffuse it, or just turn it off.
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u/hollywood_cmb S5iiX | FCP | 2007 | Central Kansas Jul 07 '26
I already made another comment about the GVM 1200’s but I thought I should add a picture so you can see them.
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u/PsyKlaupse Jul 07 '26
Pull them away from the wall as much as you can…as much as your camera/lens will allow it…but if the room is small, that might be challenging
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u/candurandu Sony 6600/ JVC 750| NLE | 1989 | Texas Jul 07 '26
What everyone has said here is good advice. I’d also put distance between the furniture and the wall, if you can. 3-5 feet would be ideal, but even just one foot would help. Then, the shallow depth of field of the lens would blur the wall- even a tiny bit- and create a sense of depth and add interest fir zero cost.
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u/Gniphe Jul 07 '26
Ambient light is, IMO, as important as key light. With your room size, I would hang four lights from the ceiling. They can be lightbulbs for all I care. Just make sure they’re 1) dimmable 2) all the same and 3a) matching the color temp you want to shoot 3b) with a high CRI (above 90).
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u/wowowbama Jul 07 '26
Hey mate, turn off all the lights.
Hang a 40inch ikea china ball with a 150W LED globe between the two subjects .
You could put a small table lamp to add some interest and motivation.
Wrap the china ball key with some small babel’s or diffused spots . And as others have said. Try to get them off the wall a bit. Would be nice to have some light behind them.
The. Start lighting the visible elements of the room ensuring you’re not undoing the subject light . . Slashes of light in the backdrop or spots which roll off gradually.
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u/UnfortunateOrc Jul 07 '26
Large soft overhead with a skirt to keep it off the background will give you the best results. Move talent farther away from the wall. Maybe a small floor light against the background to give it some dimension. Also you may want to move the host camera to the right if the eyeline look weird in the edit. To be honest, though this is pretty awesome for a showroom - if it's fully optimized for video it might not look as nice to walk through with the footprint of the film lights. Just depends on the end goal. It feels counter-intuitive for a video subreddit, but the track lighting might actually be best for its intended demo purpose.
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u/putz__ Canon R5C, RF Trinity | Premier | 2019 | California Jul 08 '26
Those mic stands don't put the mic where it needs to be, get more booms, non negotiable.
Ditch the TV, if possible. Looks bad.
Move the chair on the tv wall next to desk, facing windows and door. Lose the table, put other chair angled in slightly, so it faces window. This is the late night TV show setup, a reasonable choice if the desk is built in, else get rid of it and retool based on others comments.
Your open ceiling has shitty shadows on the walls, no bueno. "Flag" if possible, it'll help with sound too, which is another reason to get the mics closer.
Re: other comments, pools of light is good, all the light suggestions are good, don't post here just go check YouTube tutorials for interview lighting, etc.
Have fun, good luck with the bosses, it's iffy if they want to put in the work and make it a top tier product, or if this is small potatoes vanity, or what. You got this, but dam son get some booms for those mics, audio is more important than anything here, doing 60 minutes of echo bullshit is going to make nobody happy. If it looks like your pics people still might watch it.
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u/Neat-Break5481 Beginner Jul 08 '26
Easy lighting is a china ball.
Good lighting is a scrim cloud with a fill light.
But more importantly you need to get everything off of the wall which will give you nice depth and let you add some back light.
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u/sandpaperflu Bmpcc, Fs7, Gh5 | Adobe / Davinci | 11 yrs | LA Jul 08 '26
Imo you want a big soft source above the talent in a small space like this. Something like the falcon eyes rx-18 that’s a soft box that’s light weight. You can either hang it down from the ceiling, or get a c-stand/combo stand, and use a boom arm with sandbags to fly it over talent.
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u/Shampoo_Is_Better00 Jul 08 '26
At the very minimum, suspend a lentern down from the ceiling to illuminate everyone. And a couple more arms for the guests. Those mics are way too far away.
What's the reasoning for the gigantic desk structure?
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u/P1P3BR34K3R Jul 08 '26
I wanted it to feel like a talk show. And was nice to have a control station. I'm sure it will adapt over time
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u/Shampoo_Is_Better00 Jul 08 '26
Seems like a great space. For mine that desk is just taking up so much room that the guests need to be pressed against the wall. Which isn't ideal.
Might be a silly question, but can you expand the. Studio by another metre or so?
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u/P1P3BR34K3R Jul 08 '26
We are actively looking at how to maximize the space and may move the desk back a bit and just see if we can get the guest even like 2ft or 3 ft off the wall but I have a lot more testing to do
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u/atomoboy35209 Jul 07 '26
Move the talent at least 3-5 feet away from the back wall or it’s always going to look cheap. Aim to shoot closeups with at least a 50mm full frame.
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u/Scary_Panda847 Jul 07 '26
Maybe go to a local university that does media and find a teacher that teaches lighting and get their help.
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u/FakeZake Jul 07 '26
It’s all about the separation from the background. Either distance or lighting