Filters for reflections from metal surfaces?

[Sam Sharpe]

Hello,

I am a graphic/3D designer, i've just finished working on artwork for a foot tunnel in Vauxhall, SW London. The artwork has been produced on Vitreous enamel steel panels, which are proving difficult to photograph/video as they are highly reflective. The panels line each side of the tunnel and are about 2.5 Meters tall starting just above floor level. The tunnel is about 60-70 Meters long and very open at each end.

I was down there this afternoon and its very hard to see detail in the artwork on the footage because of reflections.

I was wondering if the use of a Neutral Density or other filter would help in reducing the reflections on the panel surfaces? I am not sure if an ND filter would be much help in dealing with metallic reflections, do they only help reduce reflections off transparent surfaces such as glass or water?

Lighting:
Might make some difference to problem so i'll include a rough guide:

The artwork is capped by side facing strip lighting giving good even illumination across the panels surfaces, but this does result in big specular highlights about 3/4's of the way up each panel. The tunnel has a barel vaulted cealing uplit by groups of di-chroic lights. (these give off a nice blue light)

Im shooting on my JVC GR-PD1 (PAL version of JVC-HD1) on a PAL 720 X 576 Progressive MPEG2 stream.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Sam Sharpe

Graphic Design / 3D Animation
Meerkat
www.meerkatdesign.com

P.S. This may be the longest section of Vitreous Enamel Artwork in the world, I am trying to find out.....

;-)

[Rob Wilson]

Sam,

What you need is a good polarizing filter. Should do just what you're looking for by reducing the reflected light.

[Sam Sharpe]

Thanks mate!

[Frank Granovski]

A linear or circular polarizer for your video cam.