shooting in the snow.....at night

I am doing some pre-production on a rather big shoot I have coming up this winter. I am doing principal photography on the East Coast. I have a few (non-dialogue) scenes that will take place at night in the snow. Essentially, the main character will be walking down various streets towards a bar. I want to show that the neighborhoods get crummier and more decrepit as he walk into a working class neighborhood. So.......how do I light these scenes????? In the area that I am shooting in, there are street lights, but I tend to not like the way the light bounces off the snow on the ground......should I shoot in darker areas? And use actual lights? Are there any lighting kits that have lights you don't need to plug in? Please help!

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Re: shooting in the snow.....at night

A lot of the answer here depends largely on your budget. They do make battery powered lights that don't have to plug into A/C power. You can also get a car battery and a D/C to A/C inverter that will allow you to power some lower wattage lights. Since the scene is non dialogue you could also run a generator and pull your power from there. You can get fairly small generators at almost any hardware store that will allow you to pull 5000 watts.

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