Tip of the Week - Shadow Density

Following up on last week's Tip, today I'll discuss a similar topic. Shadow density refers to the color density of an object's shadow . This shadow is usually created by using a shadow alpha created by your rendering package, or even by simple roto. The colors of a surface under shadow can vary greatly, so take great care in analyzing reference of similar shots, or similar areas in the frame that contain shadows. There are different methods of getting an accurate shadow, and using the technique of gaining our black point is probably the quickest way of getting a shadow value. Just sample the colors that fall under shadow, and dial your artificial shadow values in to match!