The 'movie cloud' solves Hollywood’s worst lighting nightmare with a portable artificial sky

There’s a new tech gadget that’s become a real lifesaver for Hollywood filmmakers who have to shoot movie scenes indoors, solving a problem most audiences don’t even know exists.

It’s incredibly expensive to buy – and often even pricier to rent – but it’s worth every penny.

Insiders call it the ‘movie cloud,’ a name that clicks once you understand what it does.

And it’s yet another example of how filmmaking challenges are often completely counterintuitive from the audience’s perspective.

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This is how the ‘movie cloud’ works

Someone invented a special type of soft-light rig that Hollywood filmmakers call the ‘movie cloud’.

The problem that filmmakers face when filming public indoor spaces such as airports or malls is that these are full of overhead lights, reflective glass, and harsh color temperatures that cameras can’t catch and balance properly.

The ‘movie cloud’ helps counteract this by spreading light evenly across frames, surfaces, and faces.

As a result, you get cleaner, sharper shoots.

This soft-light rig costs a fortune to operate – four or five figures a day – but it saves time, and time is money in Hollywood.

So, all in all, it’s probably what you’d call a solid return on investment.

Why filmmaking challenges often feel counterintuitive

Scenes that audiences assume are incredibly difficult to shoot are usually a walk in the park, at least from a purely technical perspective, while things that seem simple can be surprisingly hard to capture properly.

For example, Lee Child, author of the Jack Reacher series – now a hit show on Amazon – once offered the simplest explanation for why some of his novels are impossible to adapt into a show.

Child once explained that 61 Hours – one of the best-reviewed books in the series – is unlikely to ever be adapted into a show because of the landscape.

“61 Hours is a book [I’d really like to see adapted], but the snowbound landscape is very difficult and expensive to create,” he explained in an interview with Fortress of Solitude.

“It is also impossible to do take two, because take one has already put footprints in the snow, [so] you can’t do take two.”

So, apparently, filming characters dangling from helicopters thousands of feet in the air can sometimes be easier than a simple walk through pristine snow.

The more you know.