Capturing The Color Of Mardi Gras

In the spring of 2019, we chose e-colour+ #5085 French Lilac as our Rosco Color of the Week. Tying the French Lilac to the French Quarter – we decided that the theme of that week’s post would be the color of Mardi Gras and we scheduled it to go out just before Fat Tuesday. The image featured one of our Mardi Gras Mask gobos that we projected with the purple E5085 gel.

Shortly after we posted the graphic onto Instagram, New Orleans-based filmmaker Tanner Short commented “Is there a way for me to dial this into my DMG Lumière SL1 MIX?” Apparently, he was about to shoot a Mardi Gras promo for Mimosa Jewelry to promote their Mardi Gras mask necklace designs, and he wanted to work the purple hue of E5085 into the shot using his SL1 MIX LED fixtures. We responded that the easiest way to create the color was to use the Capture feature in the myMIX app.

“The process of selecting the color for the clip was extremely easy,” said Tanner.

  1. I took a screenshot of the post.
  2. I opened the myMIX app on my phone and selected COLORS at the top.
  3. I tapped the CAPTURE icon next to color bar, then “Photo Library,” then I selected the screenshot I had taken of the post.
  4. I tapped on the same area of the post that was displayed as “French Lilac,” and then tapped APPLY.
  5. Once I had the color loaded into my light, I increased the saturation level to 100 percent to achieve a deeper color

After creating the color, Tanner explained how he created his lighting setup. “I positioned the light on a C-stand arm over the table I was shooting on, illuminating the Mardi Gras beads that were hung on the wall and the mask necklace in the foreground. The effect that the color had on the mask necklace added contrast to the material and complemented the gold color of the necklace.”

To see more of Tanner Short’s work, you can visit his website: tannershort.com, follow him on Instagram: @tannercamera, or go read the Spectrum article about how he and fellow filmmaker Philip Roberts made a spec. ad. for their SL1 MIX lights. If you’d like to learn more about the light Tanner used in this promo, please explore the SL1 MIX product page on the DMG Lumière by Rosco website.

Find out what it's like to Capture the colors in your photos. Begin by downloading our free myMIX app and then you can explore how those colors render as light using our DMG Lumière MIX fixtures, or our new MIXBOOK™ Digital Swatchbook.


Sara Leeper February 20, 2020 Questions?

About Sara Leeper

Sara Leeper is founder & owner of Walk the Moon Media, where she serves as storytelling consultant, writer, producer and video strategist. Sara transitioned into video production after more than a decade in Public Relations working both in-house and on the agency side with a focus on content development. Her career portfolio includes strategizing for companies including Red Bull, Disney Store and Nestle Crunch. Most recently, she was a communications manager at General Motors and oversaw media relations, social media and events for the western US.