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The International Journal of Film & Digital Production Techniques

On Our Cover: Notorious bank robber John Dillinger (Johnny Depp) is armed and dangerous in Public Enemies, shot by Dante Spinotti, ASC, AIC. (Photo by Peter Mountain, courtesy of Universal Pictures.)

Features 24 34 44 52

Departments

8 10 14 60 64 68 69 70 72 74 76

Big Guns Dante Spinotti, ASC, AIC arms himself with digital cameras on Public Enemies

Impressionistic Cinema Darius Khondji, ASC, AFC lends lush, romantic look to Chéri

34

Risk and Valor Barry Ackroyd, BSC brings tense, handheld aesthetic to The Hurt Locker

Terror on the Tracks Tobias Schliessler, ASC confronts complex logistics on The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3

44

Editor’s Note Short Takes: Puppy Love Production Slate: Moon and Séraphine Post Focus: Mega Playground’s DP Dailies New Products & Services International Marketplace Classified Ads Ad Index In Memoriam: Jack Cardiff, BSC Clubhouse News ASC Close-Up: Mark Irwin 52

V i s i t u s o n l i n e a t w w w. t h e a s c . c o m

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The International Journal of Film & Digital Production Techniques • Since 1920

Visit us online at

www.theasc.com ———————————————————————————————————— PUBLISHER Martha Winterhalter ————————————————————————————————————

EDITORIAL EXECUTIVE EDITOR Stephen Pizzello SENIOR EDITOR Rachael K. Bosley ASSOCIATE EDITOR Jon D. Witmer TECHNICAL EDITOR Christopher Probst CONTRIBUTING WRITERS Stephanie Argy, Benjamin B, Douglas Bankston, Robert S. Birchard, John Calhoun, Bob Davis, Bob Fisher, Simon Gray, Jim Hemphill, David Heuring, Jay Holben, Noah Kadner, Ron Magid, Jean Oppenheimer, John Pavlus, Chris Pizzello, Jon Silberg, Iain Stasukevich, Kenneth Sweeney, Patricia Thomson, David E. Williams ————————————————————————————————————

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CIRCULATION, BOOKS & PRODUCTS CIRCULATION DIRECTOR Saul Molina CIRCULATION MANAGER Alex Lopez SHIPPING MANAGER Miguel Madrigal ———————————————————————————————————— ASC GENERAL MANAGER Brett Grauman ASC EVENTS COORDINATOR Patricia Armacost ASC PRESIDENT’S ASSISTANT Kim Weston ASC ACCOUNTING MANAGER Mila Basely ASC ACCOUNTS RECEIVABLE Corey Clark ———————————————————————————————————— American Cinematographer (ISSN 0002-7928), established 1920 and in its 89th year of publication, is published monthly in Hollywood by ASC Holding Corp., 1782 N. Orange Dr., Hollywood, CA 90028, U.S.A., (800) 448-0145, (323) 969-4333, Fax (323) 876-4973, direct line for subscription inquiries (323) 969-4344. Subscriptions: U.S. $50; Canada/Mexico $70; all other foreign countries $95 a year (remit international Money Order or other exchange payable in U.S. $). Advertising: Rate card upon request from Hollywood office. Article Reprints: Requests for high-quality article reprints (or electronic reprints) should be made to Sheridan Reprints at (800) 635-7181 ext. 8065 or by e-mail [email protected]. Copyright 2007 ASC Holding Corp. (All rights reserved.) Periodicals postage paid at Los Angeles, CA and at additional mailing offices. Printed in the USA. POSTMASTER: Send address change to American Cinematographer, P.O. Box 2230, Hollywood, CA 90078.

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The ASC is not a labor union or a guild, but an educational, cultural and professional organization. Membership is by invitation to those who are actively engaged as directors of photography and have demonstrated outstanding ability. ASC membership has become one of the highest honors that can be bestowed upon a professional cinematographer — a mark of prestige and excellence.

OFFICERS - 2008/2009 Daryn Okada President

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Richard Crudo Vice President

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MEMBERS OF THE BOARD Curtis Clark Richard Crudo Caleb Deschanel John C. Flinn III William A. Fraker Michael Goi John Hora Victor J. Kemper Stephen Lighthill Daryn Okada Robert Primes Owen Roizman Nancy Schreiber Dante Spinotti Kees Van Oostrum

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Editor’s Note ith HD cameras becoming more prevalent and more sophisticated, the old question “Film or digital?” is taking on a new complexity for cinematographers at every level. On Public Enemies, Dante Spinotti, ASC, AIC and director Michael Mann initially discussed shooting on 35mm film, but ultimately chose HD after conducting comparison tests geared toward the specific narrative and stylistic requirements of the period gangster tale. “With digital cameras, there aren’t any steadfast rules, and I believe that gives me a huge amount of freedom,” Spinotti tells Jay Holben (“Big Guns,” page 24). “The medium is romantic, interesting and beautiful, but it also looks real. And there’s so much you can do in post! Film has a certain kind of quality that cannot be matched by digital technology, but at times, the advantages digital has over film are important for the language and the contents of the story you’re telling, and that determines your choice.” For the romantic drama Chéri, Darius Khondji, ASC, AFC adopted a more traditional approach, composing in widescreen anamorphic (which he deems “wonderful for faces, for intimacy”) and manipulating three film stocks to create the picture’s painterly frames. “I didn’t want the image to be too sharp or the light to be obvious,” Khondji notes in his interview with European correspondent Benjamin B (“Impressionistic Cinema,” page 34). “I wanted very, very soft light, as though it’s filtered through time, like a hazy memory. The light was often bounced or going through two layers of diffusion, and it was always wrapping around.” Barry Ackroyd, BSC took an entirely different tack on The Hurt Locker, a tense war story that follows a U.S. Army bomb squad through a series of nerve-wracking missions in Iraq. To immerse viewers in the hard reality of the soldiers’ experiences, Ackroyd and his operators shouldered 16mm cameras and marched straight into the fray: “I said, ‘Let’s make it physical.’ I figured the cameras would be handheld 90 percent of the time, and they were.” Director Kathryn Bigelow further emphasized the film’s firsthand feel by deploying multiple cameras to capture a variety of perspectives. “That’s how we experience reality, by looking at the microcosm and the macrocosm simultaneously,” she explains to New York correspondent Pat Thomson (“Risk and Valor,” page 44). “The eye sees differently than the lens, but with multiple focal lengths and a muscular editorial style, the lens can give you that microcosm/macrocosm perspective, and that contributes to the feeling of total immersion.” Film was also chosen by Tobias Schliessler, ASC on The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3, a modern update of a memorable thriller from 1974. “Tony came in not to remake the movie, but to retell the story, and he definitely wanted to put his stamp on it visually,” Schliessler relates in a detailed account penned by Douglas Bankston (“Terror on the Tracks,” page 52). “I love the look Owen Roizman [ASC] gave the original film, but we didn’t necessarily reference it. Tony wanted to show the energy of the city, and gritty or not, it feels on film like New York.” Achieving that authenticity involved quite a feat of logistics, according to gaffer Bill O’Leary, who is based in the city: “New York has its own set of challenges, and knowing the ropes makes it easier. In a way, it’s about compromises and playing the hand the city deals you. This job took that to a new level, though. The thick bureaucracy of the MTA and working in ‘The Hole,’ as they call the subway tunnels, were especially tough.”

Stephen Pizzello Executive Editor 8

Photo by Douglas Kirkland.

W

Short Takes Shooting Puppy Love With the Red One

Above: In the first episode of Puppy Love, Famke Janssen portrays a woman whose romantic exploits are thwarted by her canine companion. Below: Cinematographer Jendra Jarnagin shoots the Web series with the Red One camera.

10 July 2009

here’s no relationship like the relationship between a dog and its master, a point made by Puppy Love, a comedy series on LStudio.com, an online channel sponsored by Lexus. “The show is about dog lovers and the people who love them,” explains cinematographer Jendra Jarnagin. Each episode of the show, which is set in New York, follows a different cast of characters. The series was created by writer/producer Amy B. Harris and

T

produced by Grace Naughton, who met Jarnagin on the set of the HBO series Sex and the City, where Jarnagin was working as an electrician. Because she was shooting projects on the side at the time, Jarnagin tried to shadow the cinematographers with whom she worked. “I talked to them about their work whenever I could find an appropriate opportunity,” she says. Despite Puppy Love’s low budget, the producers wanted to evoke the look

of Sex and the City by portraying New York in a romanticized way: everything and everyone is beautiful, and colors are bright and saturated. Although the show was conceived for the Web, Harris and Naughton planned to enter individual episodes in festivals as stand-alone short films, so they wanted images that would also look good on the big screen. Jarnagin decided the Red One camera would be ideal; it offered the “cinematic” look of 35mm depth-of-field and an extended dynamic range, could yield high-quality deliverables in a variety of formats, and would work well with Jarnagin’s personal set of Cooke S4 prime lenses. In the first episode, a woman (Famke Janssen) finds her romantic exploits thwarted by her loyal canine companion. “That episode gave us the opportunity to do moody lighting, whereas a lot of the other episodes have normal day interiors,” says Jarnagin. “The first episode has a lot of date scenes and romantic interiors. And Famke is a joy to light.” The cinematographer notes that there are just a few basic differences when it comes to lighting men and women. “People stress the importance of lighting women more carefully because female beauty is so important in our culture,” she says. “Of course, actors are generally conscious of how they look because that’s directly related to their employability. The secret to making someone look his or her best is to really study the face — the way shadows penetrate the face, the way light wraps around the nose, and so on — and notice how those things change when the person moves.” For day interiors, if it was a broadly lit scene, Jarnagin used a “book light,” bouncing a light (often a 1.2K HMI)

Photos by Meg Schrock, Jason Reilly and Jendra Jarnagin. Photos and frame grabs courtesy of Jarnagin.

by Iain Stasukevich

Right: Jarnagin strove to keep the actors in backlight and expose for the highlights whenever day exteriors couldn’t be staged in the shade. Below: Jarnagin (standing on dolly) and director Amy B. Harris (center) plan their next move.

into a beadboard and through a diffusion frame between the bounce and the actor. For low-key night interiors, she used 4-by-4 Kino Flos and Fresnels with Lee 250 or light grid diffusion in front of them to give the light more directionality. “Famke can take directional light very well,” she notes, “and I like using light grid because it diffuses the most with the least loss of light.” She recalls that the Red One’s extended dynamic range really came in handy for shooting outdoors during the day; she shot these scenes in the protective shade of trees and buildings, or backlit her actors and exposed for the highlights. “The Red’s range meant I could bring up the shadow areas. I asked our Red technician, Sam Kretchmar, to do a curve in the RedAlert software that would bring up the faces, so in the QuickTime dailies, we could see the

12 July 2009

image the way we intended it to look.” “We didn’t always have the guns to match the exteriors,” adds gaffer Meg Schrock. “We tried to augment sunlight rather than try to beat it. We’d soften it up with a 1.2K HMI and light grid.” Sometimes, the only way to get light into an actor’s eyes was to walk next to the actor with a bounceboard. The core production crew on the series comprised Jarnagin, Kretchmar, Schrock, key grip John Shim, two best boys and two camera assistants. Jarnagin often did her own operating and came to rely on Shrock’s ability to anticipate the next lighting setup. “Meg and I had a good understanding of each other’s taste,” says the cinematographer. “Most of the time, I’d outline what I was looking for and trust her to figure out how to do it.” Schrock adds, “Jendra is really good about communicating.

She allows me to do my own thing, and if she doesn’t like it, she’ll tell me. There were very few situations where we didn’t get what she wanted.” One thing Jarnagin found herself wanting was an optical viewfinder, the absence of which is inherent to most digital cameras. Even at 720p, the Red’s monitoring output is only a fraction of the resolution of the 4K image, which makes judging the image quality difficult. This led to a few surprises at the color-correction stage, when Jarnagin noticed that the image tended toward the sharp side. “I think it plays into the level of detail you’re capturing,” she says. “With film, you get random, organic grain patterns that average together for a smooth look. With digital, you have very precise points of light and color that are repeated frame by frame, leading to a harsher and sharper look.” To counteract this, she used a ½ Tiffen Soft FX filter in front of the lens for close-ups. “Soft FX filters look natural — they don’t give themselves away,” she observes. “They don’t diffuse the light as much as the detail.” Puppy Love was graded on a Scratch system at Offhollywood Digital in Manhattan. With colorist Robbie Renfrow at the controls, Jarnagin supervised the color-correction of the entire series. “We took a pretty straightforward approach,” she says. “Our main goal was to use Power Windows to finesse the things that were rushed on set. We never put a heavy hand on things. The look is supposed to feel natural but bright and happy.” The series was shot at 4K in 16x9 using the Redcode 28 setting. Even though the Redcode 36 codec is less compressed, Jarnagin decided 28 would be more flexible. “At the time we shot the series, you couldn’t shoot 4K in the 16x9 aspect ratio to compact flash cards at 36. If you wanted that, you had to shoot directly to the Red Drives. “Every camera and format has its strengths and weaknesses — there is no such thing as a perfect camera,” she adds. “But in terms of the evolution of digital cinema, Red is on the right track.” I

Production Slate Cerebral Sci-Fi and Painterly Drama

Clones in Space by Patricia Thomson On Moon, his first theatrical feature as a director of photography, Gary Shaw confronted challenges that would make most first-timers blanch. For starters, the set, built at England’s Shepperton Studios, was “a white box” built with fixed walls and 8' ceilings. Even

14 July 2009

more daunting was the overall mission: shoot a science-fiction film featuring motion-control, CGI and miniatures for $5 million in 33 days. Fortunately, both Shaw and the director, Duncan Jones, had years of experience with visual-effects work — they had met on a Carling beer commercial that presented CG robots kicking back in a practical pub. Jones had made

a name for himself as a commercials director, and Shaw had a long track record as a commercials cinematographer, with stints at The Mill Motion Control Studio and Geoff Axtell Associates in London. Jones wrote Moon with a costsaving premise in mind: The story is about clones, so one actor would play multiple roles. In the film, which is set in the near future, Lunar Industries is mining the moon for Helium 3, which has become Earth’s primary source of energy. Manning the base is a lone astronaut on a three-year contract, Sam Bell (Sam Rockwell), who is assisted by a robot named Gerty. After an accident strands the astronaut in his lunar Rover, another Sam Bell is activated and rescues him. Back at the base, there is tension between Sams 1 and 2, who were previously unaware they were

Moon photos by Mark Tillie, courtesy of Sony Pictures Classics. Sprog photo courtesy of Cinesite.

Right: Astronaut Sam Bell (Sam Rockwell) uses his lunar Rover to investigate a mission problem in Moon, shot by Gary Shaw. Below: Model photography supervised by miniatures specialist Mark Talbot produced convincing shots of the moon’s surface.

Left: The sterile, retro aesthetic of the moon base emphasizes Bell’s isolation. Below: Shaw eyeballs a setup.

clones. Ultimately, they form an alliance to change their fate. In developing a look for the picture, Jones sought a retro aesthetic that would recall films such as 2001: A Spacey Odyssey, Silent Running and Outland. Production design centered upon a sturdy, concrete look rather than the sleek touch-screen technology of today. “We decided to shoot most of the movie on the most readily available but soon-to-be-discontinued film stock we could find, which was Kodak [Vision 200T] 5274, because we wanted the image to have that ‘older’ look,” says Shaw. Jones wanted a widescreen aspect ratio to provide an epic feel, so Shaw shot 3-perf Super 35mm. “That gave us a feel that was as close to anamorphic as we could get without spending the money to shoot anamorphic,” says the cinematographer. A Panaflex Millennium XL was the main camera; an Arricam Lite facilitated handheld work; and an Arri 435 was used for high-speed work. The lenses comprised Primo primes and Primo 4:1 (17.5–75mm) and 11:1 (24–275mm) zooms.

To give the white set a wide variety of looks, Shaw used colored gels, perforated metal grills, layers of light and dark in adjoining work-bays, and practical lighting accents. His more specialized skills came into play in the creation of multiple Sams. In addition to sharing the screen, Sams 1 and 2 physically interact — playing Ping-Pong, fighting and so forth. “We wanted it to look believable, not tricksy,” says Shaw. Some shots were accomplished with a double and clever camera angles;

others required frame-accurate motioncontrol. However, because the budget allowed only five days with a motioncontrol rig, the filmmakers devised a “poor man’s motion-control” for the rest of that work, which required very precise camera operating from Shaw. The tight quarters called for the smallest mo-co rig possible, and visualeffects supervisors Gavin Rothery and Simon Stanley Clamp brought in a new, portable model, the Sprog. Shaw had previously worked with the portable

American Cinematographer 15

Top: Rockwell and director Duncan Jones parse the script. Middle: Bell examines the church from a neighborhood model he has painstakingly constructed in his spare time. Bottom: As his three-year lifespan winds down, Sam 1 begins to deteriorate physically.

Milo system, and he found the Sprog to be even handier. “Because it’s based on a Panther dolly central column, it’s pretty unique and very quick to use,” he notes. “Operationally, the Sprog seemed very intuitive,” says Clamp. “Gary was able to drive the unit using hand wheels to control the remote pan/tilt/roll head, with the grip performing tracking dolly moves — all recorded for consistent repeat action for the multiple passes necessary for the clone and Gerty shots. The servos made a really cool sound when the unit reset to its start position, so much so that the sound department recorded it to use as an element for the Gerty robot traveling around the moon base.” In scenes with the two Sams, Rockwell would first perform whichever character drove the action. An improvi16 July 2009

sational actor, he was given a loose leash on this first pass. Then, Rockwell would change his makeup, rehearse to playback on a video iPod, and perform the other Sam utilizing marks and precise eyelines. Clamp used Apple Shake on his laptop to create simple, temporary composites for editorial. For the poor man’s motioncontrol, Shaw would mimic the earlier passes manually, looking at a monitor and concentrating on the background rather than the actor when doing the moves. “We had to be very strict about how we moved the cameras, knowing what the consequences might be,” he says. “We didn’t want the effects team to have to do any zooms or changes of perspective.” Clamp notes, “Although [zooms] aren’t impossible to deal with as software improves, it adds huge overheads to postproduction.” To help facilitate visual-effects work, Shaw always shot clean plates. “It takes me a minute to do it, and it can keep [the effects team] from spending days trying to fix something,” he says. “You just need to get everyone off the set for 10 to 15 seconds to shoot a clean plate. You might also shoot an overexposed pass and an underexposed pass, or some light movements. It’s simple to do and can save serious time and money.” “Gary is always thinking ahead,” says Clamp. “He knows I’ll always want a clean pass under exactly the same lighting conditions as the principal plates, and that tiles of the scene are useful. It’s so hard to go back and replicate the lighting at a later stage. Also, we shot HDRI [High Dynamic Range Imaging] and chrome-sphere plates for lighting reference, and Gary never struck the lighting until they had been shot. He also shot lens grids for all the lenses, which helped us put distortion into our CG and helped with tracking calculations.” Several scenes in Moon occur on the moon’s surface, when Bell exits the base to check on the helium harvesters, and the filmmakers used greenscreen and miniatures to realize them. The most important lighting reference for

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Above left: Bell begins to question his sanity as events aboard the ship take a mysterious turn. Above right: The astronaut’s only companion on the mission is a robot, Gerty. Below: To achieve shots of the two Sam clones interacting in the relatively cramped set, visual-effects supervisors Gavin Rothery and Simon Stanley Clamp employed the Sprog, a new motion-control rig.

18 July 2009

these scenes was Michael Light’s book Full Moon, which features NASA photos from Apollo missions. To re-create the stark light that is unfiltered by atmosphere and surrounded by darkness, “we used a single 20K lamp,” says Shaw. “It had to look unrelenting, quite hard and nasty. There were a few supplementary pieces and quite a few practicals inside the Rover; we used flashing lights, a very small Kino here and there to fill in, and the odd bit of poly to bounce it back.” Shaw’s biggest challenge with

the greenscreen work was not losing Rockwell in his reflective helmet. “It was like a chrome bowl covering his entire head, and it took a lot of flagging to keep the green off it,” says the cinematographer. “We brought in big blacks and isolated the area where Sam was. That was the only way to do it.” Miniatures specialist Peter Talbot was brought in for five days of model photography, and for that work, too, harsh light was paramount. “Having studied just about every photo

and footage of the moon’s surface, I knew I’d have to achieve long, hard, deep shadows to emphasize the clarity created by the lack of atmosphere and the sheer distance of the sun,” says Talbot. “Naturally, that’s the hardest thing to create in a studio. Standard Fresnel studio lamps don’t give the hard, sharp light, especially at close-up inspection. In lunar photography, there is no atmosphere to create fill, so the sun’s light is the dominant source, and any fill comes from the moon’s surface. The high contrast ratio was a very delicate balance.” When lunar vehicles drive to the dark side of the moon, that balance shifted. “There, I used a soft, overhead key light with a slightly higher-thannormal fill ratio to bring out the subtle tones and deep shadows,” says Talbot. “Although a soft light was used, it had the appearance of a hard light source, so visually, the moon’s surface was slightly darker than the millions of stars and galaxies visible in the sky. Scenarios like that are where Kodak [Vision3 500T] 5219 comes into its own.” Talbot photographed all the miniatures work on the new 500-speed stock. “The moon’s surface, having a monotone texture, needs a film stock that has an incredibly clean tonal range, from the deepest black to the brightest highlight, without contaminating the scene with colored

grain artifacts,” explains Talbot. “By adding subtle colors of occasional sun flares on the camera lens, we delivered a very realistic visual experience.” Talbot also devised a solution for visually conveying the moon’s gravity, which is 1⁄6 that of Earth’s. “Because all miniature photography relies on a scale film speed to neutralize and bring the scale size back to full size, a new mathematical formula had to be devised,” he explains. “I came up with a formula utilizing 1⁄6 gravity and combining it with the regular scale–speed formula. This new formula could be altered, depending on which scale model we were using. Of course, the effect resulted in a considerably higher-than-normal shooting stop, even for miniatures. As a consequence, all the vehicles were fitted with highpowered LED technology; that was the only way the vehicle headlights would expose comfortably with the lunar sunlight. The space-station building was fitted with low-voltage dichroics, which scaled well to industrial practical-lamp fittings. Both LEDs and dichroics have a unique color temperature and are a perfect match to vehicle lights and interior light fittings, eliminating the need for any color-correcting filter.” Shaw says Moon prompted him to take his career in a new direction. “Before we did the movie, I wondered if I really wanted to spend 33 days working on one thing,” he recalls. “I thought it might feel like working in a factory, going in there every day. But at the end, I was sorry it was over! I was a changed person.” TECHNICAL SPECS 2.40:1 Super 35mm (3-perf) Panaflex Millennium XL; Arricam Lite; Arri 435 Primo lenses Kodak Vision 200T 5274, Vision3 500T 5219 Digital Intermediate Printed on Kodak Vision 2383 ¢ 19

20 July 2009

Outsider Art in France by Jean Oppenheimer The drama Séraphine was unlike any project Laurent Brunet, AFC had ever undertaken. “It was really an experiment for me,” he confesses, speaking with AC by phone via a translator. Despite an extensive list of credits, including La Belle Personne (2008), Le Fils de l’épicier (2007) and five films with Raphaël Nadjari, Brunet had never worked on a

ity, with darkness often dominating the frame. Brunet says this was not a conscious attempt to imitate a particular artist, and director Martin Provost, in a separate interview, concurs. “People didn’t have electricity back then, so they used sources with a limited range, like candles and oil lamps, and I wanted to remain true to that,” says the director. Brunet’s lighting package comprised 6Ks, Jokers and Lucioles, which are lighting cubes made by Maluna. Although they have yet to penetrate the American market, Lucioles have become increasingly popular in Europe, according to the cinematographer. “I chose the smaller sizes in order to avoid spilling light all over the place,” says Brunet, “but getting the right level of warmth was very important. I went with 250-watt bulbs.” He points to a late-night scene that shows Séraphine climbing the stairs in her rooming house. It’s pitchblack except for a small oil lamp she carries that provides the faintest outline of her. The scene was shot on a practical staircase, with two Lucioles suspended above the actress. “The cubes were on boom sticks held by two electricians, and the 250-watt bulbs were on dimmers,” recalls Brunet, adding that he often shot wide open. At that time, people made do with whatever natural light came through windows and doors during the day; as a result, day interiors could be quite dark. Similarly, Brunet relied on the light coming through the windows, always exposing for the outdoors. “That was one of our guiding principles, and with 500-ASA film, you can manage a lot of shots with natural light,” he notes. An example of this is a late-afternoon scene that shows Séraphine rifling through papers on Uhde’s desk. The scene plays out in one shot. “The desk is right in front of a window, and I relied solely on the light coming through it,” says Brunet. “She is opening his notebooks and entering his world for the first time, and I wanted to suggest a certain intimacy. Exposing for the outdoors put Séraphine in silhouette, creating just the ¢ ambience I wanted.”

Séraphine photos courtesy of Music Box Films.

Above: Séraphine (Yolande Moureau) brings one of her new paintings to German expatriate art dealer William Uhde (Ulrich Tukur). Below: After the war, Uhde tracks Séraphine down to see if she is still painting.

period piece. “Trying to feel and recreate another time period [forced me] to think about lighting in a way I never had before,” he says. Based on the life of an obscure 20th-century French painter who spent the last decade of her life in a mental institution, Séraphine won seven Césars last year, including Best Picture and Best Cinematography. “On one level, the film was quite easy technically,” notes Brunet, explaining that he used one camera, a few lenses, a single film stock and a modest lighting package, and finished the picture photochemically. Budgetary constraints definitely influenced creative decisions but rarely compromised them, he adds. The film begins shortly before World War I, when Séraphine (Yolande Moureau), a devout Catholic, begins housecleaning for William Uhde (Ulrich Tukur), a German émigré and art dealer. At first, Uhde is unaware that Séraphine is an artist — she claims to have taken up painting at the behest of her “guardian angel” — and when he sees her canvases, bursting with colorful but disturbing images of fruit, flowers and plants, he is stunned by their primitive beauty. He offers to pay her living expenses so that she might devote herself full-time to her art, but war intervenes, and although Séraphine eventually enjoys some success as a painter, her deteriorating mental state soon gains the upper hand. Séraphine has a painterly qual-

Top left: The artist at work in her home. Top right: Séraphine stops in to pick up some art supplies. Below: César Awardwinning cinematographer Laurent Brunet, AFC (left) and director Martin Provost on location.

22 July 2009

One daytime sequence that takes place inside Uhde’s living room covers several hours and is intercut with other material. Uhde is seated at the piano in the foreground while a friend stands to the right of the piano. Further inside the room is Uhde’s sister, Anne-Marie (Anne Bennent). Natural light coming through French doors illuminates the room; the doors are not visible in the shot, but when we revisit the scene a short time later, we see that one of the French doors has been opened. “There was a lot of sun that day, and I worked with reflectors set up on the lawn,” says Brunet. “I considered supplementing with a 6K, but it wasn’t practical or, in the end, necessary. Whatever fill light

there was came from natural light hitting the reflectors and bouncing into the room. We simply moved the reflectors to suggest the passage of time. “Martin wanted a very simple mise en scène, and he was reluctant to use too many close-ups,” continues Brunet. Most of the close-ups show Séraphine as she paints, and these scenes presented some challenges, given that she usually placed her canvases on the floor and painted on her knees. One of the most complex scenes of her painting was conceived and filmed as one shot, but was later cut in editing. “In her tiny room, which was a practical location, we had two Lucioles provide backlight. The camera is suspended from a mini jib arm I was holding. We start on her back, then swing around slowly to reveal the shrine she maintains for her guardian angel. The camera turns back toward her and goes over her shoulder, settling on her hand as she paints. At that point, the film cuts to a close-up of her face that pushes in ever so slightly. We really get into her emotions in those tight shots.” Aside from these intimate moments, the camera maintains a somewhat observational distance from its subject. Provost explains that he wanted to emphasize Séraphine’s piety, not her hysteria. “I didn’t want to exacerbate the tragedy, and I certainly didn’t want her ever to look pathetic,” he says. “I was trying to show that this woman is reaching for something that’s just escaping her.” Her inner world is expressed most directly through her artwork, which features deep reds, blues and oranges

— the only bold colors that appear in the film. Brunet shot the picture on Fuji Eterna 500T 8573. “I knew [I needed a fast stock because] we wouldn’t have many lights, and we would be shooting all day and into dusk, usually in very small spaces,” he explains. He tested several stocks but liked Fuji’s color the best, particularly as rendered by Cooke S4 prime lenses. “The S4 series has a kind of softness and gentleness but still remains sharp,” he observes. He did his own operating, usually using a 32mm or 40mm lens. The only visual reference Provost gave Brunet during prep was a book of contemporary Russian photographs taken by a man who took his camera through the most impoverished areas of his country. “Martin said, ‘This is what I want the film to feel like,” recalls Brunet. Provost adds, “I wanted to avoid the beautiful ‘historical reproduction’ that so many period films have. There was something about Laurent’s previous work that was a bit on the rough side, and that corresponded exactly to what I wanted.” TECHNICAL SPECS 1.85:1 35mm Arricam Lite Cooke S4 lenses Fuji Eterna 500T 8573 Printed on Kodak Vision 2383 I

Big

Guns Dante Spinotti, ASC, AIC captures period action digitally for Michael Mann’s Public Enemies. by Jay Holben Unit photography by Peter Mountain rojects such as Miami Vice (AC Aug. ’06), Collateral (AC Aug. ’04) and television’s Robbery Homicide Division have cemented Michael Mann’s reputation as an advocate for digital capture, but when he began discussing his latest picture, Public

P 24 July 2009

Enemies, with cinematographer Dante Spinotti, ASC, AIC, the director was inclined to shoot 35mm. “In our early discussions, Michael mentioned several times that he was thinking of going back to film,” recalls Spinotti. “He was considering it, I think, because he initially envi-

sioned classical, more set-in-stone kind of imagery. We spent a lot of time discussing the pros and cons.” Spinotti had recently used high-definition video (via the Panavision Genesis) on the features Deception (AC May ’08) and Flash of Genius, but his previous feature

Photos and frame grabs courtesy of Universal Pictures.

collaborations with Mann — The Insider (AC June ’00), Heat (AC Jan. ’96), The Last of the Mohicans (AC Dec. ’92) and Manhunter — were all 35mm productions. Just prior to Public Enemies, Spinotti and Mann shot a commercial on HD using Sony’s CineAlta F23, a 2⁄3" 3-CCD 1920x1080 camera that records 4:4:4 RGB or 4:2:2 Y/Cb/Cr to HDCamSR tape. (The camera has a 2⁄3" bayonet lens mount, and the SRW-1 deck can be mounted directly to the camera, like a film magazine.) “Michael likes images to be sharp, and he likes shooting with smaller chips because he likes the deep depth of field, so we became fans of the F23

on that commercial,” says Spinotti. For Public Enemies, Spinotti decided to shoot side-by-side comparison tests of HD and Super 35mm, using an F23 for the digital work and Kodak Vision3 500T 5219 in the film camera. He set the two cameras up in the parking lot behind Mann’s office and started shooting in the early afternoon, using stand-ins attired in period wardrobe and several period cars; the testing continued through twilight into night. The digital and film footage were taken all the way through post, with Stefan Sonnenfeld handling the color-correction at Company 3. The 35mm material was scanned at 2K,

color-corrected and recorded back out to film; the filmmakers dialed in look-up tables to match the final filmout to what they were seeing on the monitor. They decided to compose the film in 2.40:1, which meant the F23’s 1920x1080 resolution had to be cropped to 1920x800, costing a little over 25 percent of the vertical image information. Despite that slight loss of resolution, “the footage from the F23 was very, very sharp,” says Spinotti. “It didn’t have the full tonal range of film, but its response to the night material was very interesting. Digital cameras read into the shadows very differently; there’s an

Clockwise from opposite page: Federal agent Melvin Purvis (Christian Bale) pulls the trigger during a gun battle with gangsters; America’s “most wanted,” John Dillinger (Johnny Depp), takes aim from the running board of an automobile; Dante Spinotti, ASC, AIC brandishes his weapon of choice while harnessing the sun’s rays.

American Cinematographer 25

Big Guns Right: Dillinger’s gang piles into a getaway car during their bank-robbery spree in the Midwest. Below: The outlaw spares some time for romance with Billie Frechette (Marion Cotillard).

incredible elasticity there that you don’t have with film — you can adjust gamma curves and gain and really gain incredible control over the image.” In the end, the F23’s rendering of night scenes sealed the deal. “This movie has a lot of night action, including a lot of gunfights on city streets, so the digital camera’s higher sensitivity and ability to see into shadows was a major benefit,” says Spinotti. “Also, we believed digital would facilitate a more dynamic use of film grammar while giving us

26 July 2009

a hyper-realistic look.” (Ed. Note: Some visual-effects work, supervised by Robert Stadd, was shot on 35mm.) Set in the 1930s, Public Enemies follows charismatic bank robber John Herbert Dillinger (Johnny Depp) and his gang as they rob banks all over the Midwest and try to evade the authorities, who are led by federal agent Melvin Purvis (Christian Bale). “We wanted the look of Public Enemies to have a high level of realism, not an overt period

feel,” notes Spinotti. “Among the historical aspects are a lot of action, romance and drama, and Michael and I talked about achieving an immediate feel. “One thing you can do with a digital camera that you can’t do with film is shoot with a 360-degree, or no, shutter,” he adds. “We tested that with gun-muzzle flashes from the machine guns and some flares that we planned to use to light a few scenes, and the 360-degree shutter had a really great look in those situations.” The filmmakers also found that shooting digitally enabled them to make the most of zoom lenses, which they used for most of the picture. “There are a number of zoom lenses for digital cameras that are around a T2 but also compact enough for handheld camerawork,” says Spinotti. The production’s camera package, rented at Fletcher Camera in Chicago, included two sets of Zeiss DigiPrime lenses, but Spinotti was so impressed with the capabilities of the Fujinon HAe10x10 10:1 (T1.8) zoom that it became his main lens. “Its sharpness was unbelievable,” he attests. “I’ve found that when shooting digitally, I rarely have to go to primes because

the digital zoom lenses are so sharp, fast and compact. We had some very complicated handheld moments where we’d be following the gang in an action sequence, and the operators would have to jump on the sideboard of a car and drive away with them. These cameras and lenses were great for that. “We shot most of the picture using three F23s, but we also had a Sony F950, which we used with the T950 adapter, and a Sony EX1; we used those as D cameras for action pieces and in tight spaces — the EX1 was especially great for car interiors,” he continues. “In terms of image quality, the cameras were very, very close. There was a little difference in dynamic range, but we could easily smooth that out in post. Once the images were colored, the exposure was enhanced, the grain was minimized, and the details were enhanced, the images were indistinguishable from each other, and the footage intercut perfectly.” (The project’s final DI workflow, carried out at 2K, comprised the scanning of 35mm material at LaserPacific, a digital grade at Company 3, and a filmout at EFilm. Release prints were made at Technicolor.) Mann chose to stay in the Rec 709 (ITU-R BT.709) color space as opposed to shooting in a film rec. “We prefer shooting in video color space because we can always see on

set exactly what we’re going to get,” says Public Enemies co-producer Bryan H. Carroll, a longtime collaborator of Mann’s. “The monitor shows us the final image, and that allows us to bulletproof the system more easily. Being able to see the final image on set means you can push the medium further than you would otherwise, because you can see exactly when certain image characteristics start to become undesirable.” The filmmakers decided to establish the story’s period primarily through the use of practical locations. “In addition to period wardrobe, vehicles and props, practical locations add heavily to the atmosphere,” says Spinotti. “By shooting digitally, we were able to work with the existing lighting at

many locations and maintain a level of realism that is very hard to achieve with movie lighting. Very few things suggest an atmosphere better than a real location; the way things are painted, the relationship between interior and exterior, and all of the other physical details tend to establish visual truth in a very tangible way. Shooting digitally, you see locations in a different way. When you walk into a location and know you’re going to shoot film, you have to set little rules — for example, you’ll need to get an exposure here that’s at least T2.8 at 500 ISO — but not so with digital.” The production traveled to many of the actual sites where Dillinger and his gang had their exploits, including the Little

A road flare illuminates Dillinger’s arrival at an airport after he is captured by the authorities — a major news event that draws a media throng. Spinotti explains, “Our prop master, Kris Peck, found a 1933 newsreel about Dillinger’s gang and broke it down frameby-frame, and we discovered that they lit some of the news scenes with large flares — road flares, basically. Our special-effects coordinator, Bruno Van Zeebroeck, tracked down some very bright military flares that created a light that was quite beautiful.”

American Cinematographer 27

Big Guns Top to bottom: Purvis strides into action with a supreme sense of purpose; Purvis consults with FBI director J. Edgar Hoover (Billy Crudup) on the steps of a courthouse; crew members capture two angles of the scene, one with a handheld camera and another with a Steadicam.

28 July 2009

Bohemia Lodge in Wisconsin, where they hid out for a period of time. Purvis planned to ambush the gang at the lodge but lost the element of surprise when some of his agents opened fire prematurely. A brief but fierce gun battle broke out, and the outlaws managed to escape. Re-creating the famous battle at the actual location posed a number of logistical challenges for Spinotti and his crew. Most of the gun battle takes place outside at night, and it is followed by a car chase that covers nearly 2 miles of forested road. “It was a very challenging scene,” says Spinotti. “For the lighting along the main stretch of the road, Bob Krattiger, my gaffer, suggested the Bebee Night Light, which I hadn’t used before; it’s very versatile and has a huge amount of power. We put it on a nearby hilltop and allowed the light to filter through the trees to cover 200-300 yards of road. When we initially scouted the location, in late February or early March, the foliage was pretty sparse, but when we arrived a couple of weeks later to shoot, it was shocking to see how much the trees had grown in! I was afraid we wouldn’t have enough light to punch through the leaves, but the Bebee has a lot of flexibility. We turned the camera shutter to 360 degrees and increased the gain to +3dB, and it worked fantastically. You really don’t need a lot of light to get the right density on your waveform with these cameras.” Spinotti’s crew positioned a second Bebee Night Light about half a mile down the road, but instead of aiming the fixtures at the ground, they pointed them at the night sky. The existing cloud cover and humidity enabled them to achieve a soft, ambient glow over the entire area. “We actually didn’t do much lighting of the road — I called it ‘black-hole lighting,’” laughs Spinotti. “To light the actors, I really wanted the muzzle flashes and car headlights to do most of the work.”

The escape sequence required coverage both inside and outside the cars, as several of Dillinger’s gang members stood on the car’s sideboards, firing back at the federal agents as they made their escape. Taking a page from the playbook ASC members Paul Cameron and Dion Beebe used on Mann’s Collateral, which features many scenes inside a taxicab, Spinotti used Rosco LitePads, thin squares and rectangles of plastic with hundreds of dimmable, color-corrected LED lights, inside the car. “The ELD panels they used on Collateral created really beautiful light, but they required a lot of equipment, converters and extra car batteries,” notes Spinotti. “The Rosco LitePads did the job in a very interesting way with precise dimmers, and they were easy to gel and didn’t require additional power sources. We could tape them up anywhere.” For shots looking back at the drivers of the cars or the men riding on the sideboards, Krattiger mounted Kino Flo Diva-Lites to the car bumpers as a bit of augmentation. “We mounted the Divas horizontally to just lift the levels enough to get details in the actors’ faces and eyes,” says Spinotti. “We kept them low to play them as the car headlights reflecting off the road.” Krattiger replaced the headlights on many of the cars with stronger, dimmable lamps that were controlled from inside the vehicles; most of the main cars were rigged with these stronger lamps, and when the camera was inside the car and shooting through the windshield, the electricians ramped the headlamps up to full to light the road ahead. When the camera was looking at the headlights directly, the crew dialed them way down so they would read realistically. Spinotti used some lessorthodox lighting techniques as well. He recalls, “Our prop master, Kris Peck, found a 1933 newsreel about

Top to bottom: A sharpshooter has Dillinger’s crew in his sights; the robbers return fire; the gunmen take cover behind human shields.

American Cinematographer 29

Big Guns

Top left: A 360degree shutter was used to lend a dynamic look to gun-muzzle flashes. Top right: Baby Face Nelson (Stephen Graham) bites the dust during a shootout at the Little Bohemia Lodge. Right: Purvis briefs his men before attempting to ambush Dillinger at the Biograph Theater in Chicago.

30 July 2009

Dillinger’s gang and broke it down frame-by-frame, and we discovered that they lit some of the news scenes with large flares — road flares, basically. Our special-effects coordinator, Bruno Van Zeebroeck, tracked

down some very bright military flares that created a light that was quite beautiful. They threw off a lot of smoke, and we had to stop down quite a bit so you could actually see the flare, but the look is really beauti-

ful. We used them for the scene when Dillinger lands at an airport and runs into a large group of journalists waiting for him. It’s a spectacular scene; the flare light is dynamic and very dramatic, which really adds energy to the story.” Spinotti and Krattiger worked with production designer Nathan Crowley and set decorator Rosemary Brandenburg to select practical lighting fixtures for each location that could serve double-duty as decoration and principal lighting. “Rosemary did an incredible amount of research on period lighting fixtures, and we collaborated to see what worked best,” recalls Spinotti. “Bob and I did a lot of work on the practicals to make sure they had the ideal intensity, shape and

Fletcher and PACE Congratulate Michael Mann, Dante Spinotti, ASC, AIC Bryan Carroll, Julie Herrin and the rest of the production team. Thank you for allowing us to support your camera production needs.

Big Guns

Director Michael Mann grabs a piece of the action.

32

control. We used them as keylights on main players and for filling in the darker areas [of the scene]. We wanted to massage the practicals so that we could keep our Hollywood lighting absolutely minimal. We designed some practicals to have open tops that would spill a certain amount of light onto the ceiling; that light would then bounce into the room and add just the right detail in

the shadow areas. We did as much as we could with practicals and then added a little extra to make the scene, but not so much that we were overpowering the real atmosphere.” The cinematographer used a number of classic sources at each location, and for fill light, he repeated a technique he devised on Deception: stringing tiny Christmas lights across empty 8'x8' and 12'x12' frames. “We might have bought out all the Christmas lights in town, but the result is an amazing, golden fill light — sometimes even a key — that has a wonderful energy to it,” he says. “It’s not just a soft light because there are hundreds of tiny, sparkling bulbs, and it has an organic feel. I tried using them for some of our night exteriors, but the cars gave us so many reflective surfaces we couldn’t keep the reflections out of the cars! They are really wonderful, lightweight sources that you can tuck in a

corner or even shoot through for a great effect.” For a scene in which Dillinger’s girlfriend, Billie Frechette (Marion Cotillard), visits him in jail, Spinotti’s initial plan was to use a soft toplight. To keep up with the demanding schedule, the production was leap-frogging sets, with a pre-lighting crew working ahead of the principal unit and then striking the previous location when the production moved forward. Spinotti and Krattiger often led the pre-lighting crew, and when they arrived at the jail-scene location, Spinotti realized that soft toplight wasn’t the right choice. “It just didn’t work — the scene is very emotional, and the toplight felt boring to me,” he recalls. “The location was very small and had blue tiles on the walls, and it was difficult to come up with an alternative lighting scenario.” After some experimenting,

Spinotti pulled out a Source Four HMI ERS and bounced it into the tiled wall. “Suddenly, the light was very interesting. It bounced off the tiles and felt like light coming through the door; it was crisp but also somehow soft. It played great on the actors’ faces and was extremely effective. Michael really loved it, and we ended up shooting the scene with that single source. As we moved around for coverage, Bob [Krattiger] would adjust the light right and left, according to the angles.” The scene in which Dillinger and Frechette meet was shot at Chicago’s historic Steuben Club. “Unfortunately, the location is so historic we couldn’t mount anything to the walls or alter the existing lighting, and the camera was looking everywhere,” laments Spinotti. “It was a very tricky situation, but Bob and I came up with a solution.” They hid an 8'x8' frame of full gridcloth and an

LCD crate behind a pillar in the location, then placed a Source Four (warmed up to match the practicals) behind another pillar, projecting the light across the room into the diffusion. “That gave us a very thin piece of equipment that could be hidden, and by using the Source Four from a distance, we could keep all the hardware out of the shots,” says Spinotti. “With digital cameras, there aren’t any steadfast rules, and I believe that gives me a huge amount of freedom,” he concludes. “The medium is romantic, interesting and beautiful, but it also looks real. And there’s so much you can do in post! Film has a certain kind of quality that cannot be matched by digital technology, but at times, the advantages digital has over film are important for the language and the contents of the story you’re telling, and that determines your choice. “I always emphasize to

students that the technology is only a minor part of the job — and it’s the easy side, really. The hard part is the art of storytelling. Once you work out how to tell your story, the rest is just putting that plan into action.” I

TECHNICAL SPECS 2.40:1 High-Definition Video and Super 35mm HD: Sony CineAlta F23, HDC-F950, PMW-EX1 Fujinon and Zeiss lenses Super 35mm: Arri 435, 235 Cooke S4 lenses Kodak Vision3 500T 5219 Digital Intermediate

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Impressionistic

Cinema

A doomed love affair takes center stage in Chéri, directed by Stephen Frears and photographed by Darius Khondji, ASC, AFC. by Benjamin B

34 July 2009

héri begins with a humorous voiceover by its director, Stephen Frears, who describes famous French courtesans as the Parisian celebrities of the early 1900s. During a phone interview, Frears laughs and admits, “I am, as it were, Maurice Chevalier in Gigi,” referring to the lighthearted 1958 musical set in the world of Parisian courtesans. But Chéri is no Gigi, and Frears’ deceptively breezy introduction leads into a nuanced film about an impossible love between a middle-aged woman (Michelle Pfeiffer) and a man (Rupert Friend) roughly 30 years younger than she. Léa de Lonval (Pfeiffer) is a courtesan in the waning days of her career, and Chéri (Friend) is the dissolute son of a friend and retired courtesan, Charlotte Peloux (Kathy Bates). The story, based on two novels by Colette, begins with Chéri’s seduction of Léa, and the couple continues to live together happily for six years, until Charlotte arranges a profitable marriage between her son and the teenaged Edmee (Felicity Jones). The film intercuts between the lovers after their painful separation, with Chéri setting off on a hon-

Photos by Bruno Calvo. Frame grabs and photos courtesy of Miramax Films.

C

Opposite: Chéri (Rupert Friend) makes his move on longtime family friend Léa (Michelle Pfeiffer). This page, top: This frame grab, showing Léa and Charlotte (Kathy Bates) entering a garden, is “the most impressionistic shot in the film, and for me, it creates a whole world of imagery,” says Darius Khondji, ASC, AFC. Middle: In this unit-photography shot of a later moment in the same scene, Charlotte explains that she has arranged a marriage for Chéri. Bottom (left to right): Khondji, director Stephen Frears and camera operator Alastair Rae discuss their approach.

American Cinematographer 35

Impressionistic Cinema

Above: Léa and Chéri enjoy another happy morning together. Below: Chéri and his young bride, Edmee (Felicity Jones), pose for a wedding photo with guests. Both of these shots are unit photography.

36 July 2009

eymoon and returning to dissatisfying married life, and Léa trying to banish her sorrow with a young suitor in Biarritz. When Léa returns to Paris, it looks as though she and Chéri might renew their relationship, but Chéri cannot hide his newfound sensitivity about their age difference. Frears previously worked with Pfeiffer and Chéri screenwriter Christopher Hampton on Dangerous Liaisons (shot by Philippe Rousselot, ASC, AFC; AC May ’89), and although that film and Chéri are both period love stories that play out in opulent settings, Frears succinctly differentiates the

two: “Liaisons is a melodrama; Chéri isn’t. Colette was an impressionist.” He describes choosing Darius Khondji, ASC, AFC for Chéri as “pure instinct.” The challenge of filming this story, he continues, lay in finding the right nuances of lightness and gravitas. “A lot of the film has to do with tone because it deals with someone who is frivolous and, as it were, tragic underneath. I was constantly trying to get the tone right.” Explaining Chéri’s richly textured look, Khondji says the idea “was to have an impressionistic touch. I didn’t want the image to be too sharp or the light to be obvious.

I wanted very, very soft light, as though it’s filtered through time, like a hazy memory. The light was often bounced or going through two layers of diffusion, and it was always wrapping around.” Khondji combined and varied lighting, lenses, film stocks and processing to modulate the picture’s subdued look, which he developed in concert with production designer Alan MacDonald and costume designer Consolata Boyle. With few exceptions, the soft lighting of the interiors has a limited range of tonal values from dark gray to muted whites. Khondji shot principally with Cooke anamorphic prime lenses, which he chose in part for their rendering of faces, and for their softness. He opted for Fuji negatives, using mainly Eterna 250T 8553, which he sometimes pull-processed for additional softness. He used Eterna 400T 8583 when he wanted to reduce the contrast in day exteriors or heavy-backlight situations, and occasionally used Eterna 500T 8573, which he sometimes pullprocessed for additional softness. 1st AC Vincent Gallot tested three sets of anamorphic lenses provided by Panavision Alga Techno in Paris: Technovision/Cooke Classic, Cooke Xtal Express and Kowa. Gallot laughs as he recalls telling Khondji about the loss of definition when the lenses were wide open. “Darius said, ‘That’s what I want.’ That’s when I realized it was all about the imperfections. I was trying to find matching lenses, but Darius actually wanted to have different looks.” Khondji ended up using a mix of lenses but favored the Classics, which, he notes, are steeped in cinema history, housing 40-yearold glass that was used by Italian directors Visconti and Antonioni in their later films. Frears readily accepted Khondji’s suggestion to shoot in the anamorphic format. “I’m quite inexperienced with it, but when I

look at the film, I’m thrilled,” says the director. Khondji notes that anamorphic “is wonderful for faces, for intimacy.” He accentuated the lenses’ shallower depth of field by shooting between T2.8 and T4, thereby isolating the characters even more from the backgrounds. “I wanted to observe the main characters like fish in an aquarium and make the background watery and subdued,” says the cinematographer. “I felt their psychology changed between the beginning and end of the film, the way light and color change on fish as they move around in the water. And the anamorphic frame was like a long, horizontal aquarium.” For Khondji, the anamorphic format is “often more powerful” than spherical ones. “You can open up the frame with a landscape, or you can close it with people in the foreground or elements in the set. You can make the frame intimate and close it with two characters together. You can carry that from scene to scene, and then suddenly open the frame into a vista of Paris or a cliff by the sea. Then you can go back into a room with faces … and ¢ the aquarium.”

Charlotte’s conservatory is the setting for a few key scenes in the film, two of which are depicted in the top and middle photos. Top: A unit-photography shot of one of the film’s first scenes, when Chéri interrupts Léa’s visit with his mother. Middle: A frame grab of a later scene depicting a strange tea party. Bottom: Dinos through white silk provide consistent lighting in the conservatory.

American Cinematographer 37

Impressionistic Cinema These frame grabs of two different scenes — Charlotte’s lunch with Léa (top) and Chéri’s breakfast with his mother after his honeymoon (bottom) — illustrate Khondji’s approach to Charlotte’s home, where the goal was “a gaudy and dark interior, slightly on the cool side,” says the cinematographer. Relying on hues a bit warmer and a bit cooler than the 3200°K rating for his Fuji film stock, Khondji used amber background practicals to complete the color range. In the top frame, note the gleam of sunlight on the wall at right — the only touch of hard sunlight in the room.

38 July 2009

Khondji acknowledges many painterly influences on the pictorial style of Chéri, and a couple of sequences readily evoke painters of Colette’s era. A brightly colored sequence with world-weary Chéri seated in the famous Maxim’s restaurant reminds one of Renoir, and when Charlotte and Léa walk in a lush garden, it looks like a Monet. “That shot in the garden was found by Alastair Rae, our camera operator,” recalls Khondji. “He went scouting with his finder, and when he showed it to me, it was wonderful! It is the most impressionistic shot in the film. For me, it creates a whole world of imagery.” Gallot adds, “That shot was so beautiful and so strange that the lab called me

to ask how we did it. I told him it was just an old 75mm Kowa!” Khondji enhanced the softness of the image by shooting at a wide-open stop with an ND.9 filter on the lens. The difficulty with lighting Maxim’s restaurant was that the camera moves freely about, turning 360 degrees in a room full of mirrors. Khondji and his gaffer, Franck Barrault, decided to create toplight with dozens of household bulbs strung on wires overhead. “It’s the principle of the Dino or the Wendy Light: shadows don’t exist because there are too many sources,” explains Barrault. The bare bulbs were dimmed down, providing a soft, warm light that was supplemented by the practicals on the tables.

Chéri’s seduction of Léa takes place in Charlotte’s glass-enclosed winter garden, or conservatory, which is also the setting for a bizarre tea party later in the movie. The challenge for Khondji was to provide consistent lighting in the conservatory throughout the lengthy dialogue scenes, and to handle varying backlight. He had the offscreen part of the conservatory covered with a white silk through which he shone several Dinos gelled with ¾ CTB, providing soft, slightly warm daylight that was partially compensated for with an LLD filter on the 75mm Classic lens. The outside lights could be dimmed or increased to follow the weather. The seduction scene also has a few strokes of bright sunlight on the

couch and plants; these were created with MoleBeams and Xenons. Khondji comments that the second conservatory scene, the tea party, “reminds me a little bit of Visconti — there’s a richness, almost a decadence. I was happy to film it with the lenses he actually used in his later films.” To reinforce the strange mood, he created no spots of bright sunlight and added a bit of smoke for depth. He shot both conservatory scenes on the 400-speed Eterna because he found its lower contrast could better handle variations in the weather. “Stephen uses anamorphic to its full advantage — he fills the frame up without a problem,” he adds. For a scene showing Léa entering the hotel dining room in Biarritz, Khondji had to contend with a bank of large windows. He opted to put up a wall of Dinos to provide directionless fill. “I didn’t want to make it lowkey,” he notes. “I like coming back to an era when the lighting was a little flatter.” He had some of the windows fitted with hard ND gels to bring down the outside when the sun got bright. He also added a touch of smoke to give the restaurant a threedimensional quality. The film’s dominant mood is defined by the subdued interiors:

dining rooms, bedrooms and boudoirs. MacDonald’s production design favors cool pastels in Lea’s house and gaudy hues at Charlotte’s. When Léa comes to Charlotte’s for lunch, the contrast of the frame is limited. 4K open-faced Goya HMIs with Lee 129 Heavy Frost diffusion shine through the windows to evoke gloomy northern light; Kino Flos, also through Lee 129 diffusion, provide a soft, underexposed key on Bates; a touch of orange is provided by a practical on a dimmer; and a MoleBeam creates a single gleam of hard sunlight on the wall. Khondji describes his goal as “a gaudy and dark interior, slightly on the cool side, slightly purple.” After Léa learns of Chéri’s engagement, she shares a meal with

him at her house, a scene dominated by pastel, silvery colors. “There is something very sad, very faded there,” notes Khondji. “It’s the sadness you have in middle of day, with a dying sun behind clouds. It’s not contrasty … a little timeless.” In lighting the interiors, Khondji and Barrault always began by imagining where the sun was, and for this scene, they settled on “cool northern light,” says Khondji. The soft light falling on Léa is without direction, and she doesn’t seem lit, which Khondji attributes to both the level of the lighting and its diffusion. “At a certain balance, we found that Michelle’s skin was delivering the glow,” he notes. “If we’d overpowered the light, she would have looked ¢ lit.”

Above: A frame grab showing Léa’s visit to Biarritz, where she searches for a new suitor who can help her forget Chéri. Below: Khondji and Frears prepare to film another balcony scene at the seaside resort.

American Cinematographer 39

Impressionistic Cinema

This frame grab, showing Chéri’s return to his young wife, illustrates a rare departure from the subdued look that characterizes the rest of the picture. Able to time the shoot to take advantage of a sunny morning, Khondji added only the gold sconce in the background.

40 July 2009

Khondji favors Lee 129 Heavy Frost diffusion, which he believes is close to the 1000H tracing paper he used on Seven (AC Oct. ’95). “My favorite is real tracing paper — you get really soft light and the subject doesn’t feel lit — but gaffers don’t want to use it because it’s too flammable,” he says. “Sometimes I put a little soft tungsten light with the direction of the practical, a little rim that is very underexposed, because I can’t stand when it’s too backlit,” he continues. “It feels like it’s from the lamp, but the lamp doesn’t give it to you unless you shoot really wide open. With anamorphic, you have to create these kinds of subtleties.” Upon returning from his honeymoon, Chéri has breakfast at his mother’s, and the soft daylight from the windows is brighter and slightly cool. Khondji explains that his color scheme for the movie often involved hues slightly warmer and slightly cooler than the 3200°K rating for the film stocks. “Daylight was 4000-4500°K, rarely more, and the lamps were generally 2800-3000°K.” He likes to tint daylight slightly, and feels it helps the negative. “Film negative is a little weak on blue, so I always add some blue,” he says. He

completes the color range by “putting a touch of amber from a bulb in a practical.” Toward the end of the film, when Léa sits in a chair and consoles Chéri at her feet, the morning effect is much brighter. The scene was shot on a soundstage in Cologne, Germany. “Outside the windows, there was a big truss with a row of underslung tungsten lights that were extremely diffused,” recalls Khondji. Barely visible outside the window is a giant TransLite that required a lot of light. Pfeiffer is lit by a softbox that gives gentle direction to the foreground light. Orange practicals in the background add a touch of color contrast. Khondji notes that in this scene, as in others, he added a subtle color contrast to the image in the digital grade, which he carried out at Deluxe in London with colorist Adam Inglis. “I put a little bronze gold in the highlights and a bit of blue in the midtones and darks to create a more 3-D effect with color,” says the cinematographer. “Adam had what I was looking for: a sensitivity to nuance and the desire to make a work of cinema, not a pretty film with boosted contrast and video-like saturation. “Stephen and I decided to do a

DI because a lot of effects shots were required around Léa’s house in order to re-create the atmosphere of Paris at that time,” continues Khondji. “But the truth is that even with a 4K DI, the image quality never really matched the quality of the pure anamorphic image we saw in the dailies. My advice is to avoid doing a DI on an anamorphic picture unless you really have to, and we had to on Chéri.” One striking scene breaks with the subdued quality of the film’s overall look. In it, Chéri comes home and carries his young wife to bed through a bright, sunlit corridor. When scouting the location, Khondji noticed the timing of the morning shafts of sunlight, and he asked Frears if the shoot could be scheduled according to the weather. “We did it on a sunny morning, and we had to be very light on our feet,” says Khondji. The only lighting he added to the scene was a gold sconce in the background “for a color contrast.” The film is punctuated by a few bright exteriors, including Léa’s garden in Normandy, a dazzling helicopter shot of her car on a country road, and the seaside hotel in Biarritz. But even some exteriors feature limited contrast, as when Léa looks over the balcony at the beach in Biarritz and

Impressionistic Cinema

For the dining room in Biarritz, depicted in this frame grab, Khondji’s goal was directionless fill. “I like coming back to an era when the lighting was a bit flatter,” he says. “I didn’t want to make it low-key.”

42

the overcast image reflects her sadness. Barrault notes that Khondji almost always shaded the main characters in exteriors. To add fill, the crew often used Gaffair balloons, which could be moved on booms to follow the characters. Instead of the customary 85 filter, Khondji sometimes uses an LLD or 812 filter because they “barely correct daylight,” giving a day exterior a slight

blue tone. Arguably, the film’s most striking cinematographic accomplishment is its portraiture. In many ways, the faces define the movie, Pfeiffer’s more than any other. Khondji believed the film should have very few close-ups. “I feel that anamorphic close-ups sometimes magnify too much. You have to be careful with them. It’s a rule with all

formats in general, but with anamorphic, the close-up is especially powerful, and you have to hold the power back. You shouldn’t go into a strong, tight close-up unless you need to.” With a chuckle, Rae recalls, “Darius and I decided early on that when Stephen asked for a close-up, it would be a shot from the waist up, and we would only do two or three shots that were closer — we really saved them. Stephen would say, ‘Can’t I have a close-up?’ and we’d say, ‘This is a close-up.’ And he’d say, ‘Oh, is it?’ He generously allowed us to do that.” The rare close-ups were filmed with an Xtal Express 152mm without any diffusion filters. Khondji and Barrault devised a special “Michelle light” for some early scenes in the film. Inspired by the sequence at Maxim’s, Barrault constructed a lightbox comprising a rectangle of 20 150-watt household bulbs arranged in an arc that focused

soft light on Pfeiffer, giving her a unique glow that retained “the piquant of the bare bulb,” says the gaffer. This arrangement could not be used easily on the soundstage in Cologne, where scenes in Léa’s bedroom, bathroom and boudoir were shot. For those sequences, a similar arc of soft light was often created with Kino Flo units and Lee 129. “We had to be careful not to come too close and not to be too sharp on the skin,” notes Khondji. When the broken-hearted Léa returns from Biarritz, the lighting becomes less soft and the camera comes closer to her, revealing a few wrinkles here and there from sidelight. When Chéri comes back to see Léa, he kisses her on the floor. After so many wider shots, the softly lit dual close-up is powerful. “The highlight with a liner on Rupert is almost over the top,” says Khondji, adding that the difficulty lay in flagging Friend while

keeping a soft light from diffused Kino Flos on Pfeiffer. He remarks, “Green can be sexy on the skin. I use underexposed green all the time.” Toward the end of the film, Léa comes to see herself as an old woman, in a one-shot sequence in front of the mirror. Khondji explains that the remarkable transition was achieved very simply with a gradual shift from frontal light to toplight; a black cloth covered white gridcloth lit by a distant, frontal Wendy Light, while at the same time, flags were moved to unveil an eight-tube Kino Flo Wall-o-Lite above. The seamless transition makes Léa subtly age before our eyes. Chéri’s subject is age, and the film could not have worked without an older actress willing to show her age rather than hide it. “I take my hat off to Michelle,” Frears says of his star. He adds that the film “only really came to life” once all the elements

had been added: images, editing and Alexandre Desplat’s music. Khondji had a similar epiphany when he saw the film recently. “You don’t really do it all intentionally,” he muses. “It’s only when you see the finished film that you realize what you have created together as a group.” I

TECHNICAL SPECS 2.40:1 Anamorphic 35mm Arricam Studio, Lite Technovision/Cooke Classic, Cooke Xtal Express and Kowa lenses Fuji Eterna 250T 8553, 400T 8583, 500T 8573 Digital Intermediate Printed on Kodak Vision 2383

A world where entertainment technology and creative vision converge. Save the Date: September 17, 2009 The New Yorker, New York, NY November 4-5, 2009 Burbank Marriott, Burbank, CA

the future in hand | createasphere.com

43

Risk andValor

Barry Ackroyd, BSC uses Super 16mm and handheld cameras to lend intensity to The Hurt Locker, which follows a U.S. Army bomb squad at work in Iraq. by Patricia Thomson

44 July 2009

eterans frequently describe combat as the most vivid, fully lived experience of their lives. Some get hooked on it. As former New York Times war correspondent Chris Hedges writes in his book War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning, “The rush of battle is often a potent and lethal addiction, for war is a drug.”Those are the opening lines of The Hurt Locker, a drama about U.S. Army specialists who dismantle improvised explosive devices in Iraq. Directed by Kathryn Bigelow, the film follows members of the Bravo Company in 2004, an early and particularly bloody stage of the war. Often called in to defuse IEDs 10 or 20 times a day, soldiers in

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the Explosive Ordnance Disposal squads endure lives of unrelenting intensity. The Hurt Locker focuses on three characters: newly arrived Staff Sgt. William James (Jeremy Renner), whose impressive record of disarming 873 bombs is offset by a reckless bravado; Sgt. J.T. Sanborn (Anthony Mackie), a seasoned soldier who worked in Army Intelligence for seven years; and Spc. Owen Eldridge (Brian Geraghty), who is looking for a role model. The film moves through seven missions that are interspersed with moments of downtime back on the base. Visually, it combines the jagged edges of war reportage with inti-

Photos by Jonathan Olley. Frame grabs and photos courtesy of Summit Entertainment.

mate close-ups of the soldiers engaged in life-and-death assignments. In addition, long-lens surveillance and riflescope images create the sense of watching and being watched in a hostile land. The Hurt Locker is based on the accounts of embedded freelance journalist Mark Boal, who also wrote the screenplay. Bigelow says she “wanted … you to feel like you’re the fourth man in the Humvee — you’re right there. But we also wanted to keep it different from a documentary, moving past that into something that was raw, immediate and visceral.” To achieve those sensations, she turned to Barry Ackroyd, BSC, Ken Loach’s longtime cinematographer. Bigelow was particularly impressed with Ackroyd’s work on Paul Greengrass’ United 93 (AC June ’06) and Loach’s The Wind That Shakes the Barley (AC April ’07). “In The Wind That Shakes the Barley, Barry’s attention to character and story is as important as the look,” says Bigelow. “If I had to describe him simply, I’d say he’s a true poet.” For his part, Ackroyd considered The Hurt Locker a good fit. “My work has always got a political theme to it,” he notes. “I’ve worked with Ken Loach for 20 years, and there’s a reason why: our ideas coincide. All the good stories seem to revolve around political themes.” Although The Hurt Locker was independently produced on a fairly low budget, Bigelow wanted multiple cameras for multiple perspectives. “That’s how we experience reality, by looking at the microcosm and the macrocosm simultaneously,” she explains. “The eye sees differently than the lens, but with multiple focal lengths and a muscular editorial style, the lens can give you that microcosm/macrocosm perspective, and that contributes to the feeling of total immersion.” Ackroyd recommended shooting on Super 16mm. He recalls, “I said, ‘Let’s

Opposite: Sgt. Thompson (Guy Pearce) tries to outrun the blast of an IED in the opening sequence of The Hurt Locker. This page, top: With Spc. Eldridge (Brian Geraghty) looking over his shoulder, Thompson guides a robot toward the device in an attempt to determine what it is. Middle: Barry Ackroyd, BSC checks Pearce’s view. Bottom: After the robot breaks down, Thompson dons a protective suit to investigate further.

American Cinematographer 45

Risk andValor

Above: After disarming one IED, Staff Sgt. James (Jeremy Renner) uncovers a network of secondary bombs. Below: Sgt. Sanborn (Anthony Mackie) helps James out of the protective suit.

46 July 2009

make it physical.’ I figured the cameras would be handheld 90 percent of the time, and they were. “Kathryn wanted an accentuated version of what I do normally,” continues the cinematographer. “At times, we had up to four cameras running on a single scene, and everyone was instructed to get more coverage and as much information as possible about the characters. I think the film is full of energy because of that. We were trying to

convey the kind of paranoia that goes on in those circumstances.” This approach is evident in the very first scene, shot on the streets of Amman, Jordan. The opening image is a low-quality video of a war-torn street, tracking just inches above the ground. Next, a telephoto shot from a rooftop reveals that the video camera is attached to a small robot rolling toward a pile of rubble where an IED has been spotted. Tight, hand-

held close-ups follow, showing members of an EOD squad headed by Sgt. Matt Thompson (Guy Pearce), who is studying a monitor from behind a Humvee and remotely guiding the robot. Snap zooms zero in on faces and procedures; telephoto shots show locals watching from the rooftops; and another shot through a riflescope watches them back. When the robot malfunctions, Thompson dons a Kevlar protective suit and walks down to manually defuse the IED. Tensions mount when Sanborn spots an Iraqi using a cell phone, and the bomb detonates before Thompson, encumbered by his 80-pound suit, can reach safety. To cover this 10-minute sequence, the filmmakers used one high-speed Phantom HD camera and four Aaton XTR-Prods. “The Aaton is the camera I used during my documentary years,” says Ackroyd, who spent 10 years shooting for the BBC and other documentary outlets before transitioning to feature films. “It’s the basic tool of documentary-makers of the prevideo era, and I thought it was a good choice for this film. It feels very

comfortable and is very ergonomic.” For running shots and tighter quarters, like inside the Humvee, Aaton’s A-Minima came into play. “You can poke it around a bit, the same way people use [Sony] PD150s; it’s got that kind of attitude.” Though Bigelow storyboarded the film, the four Aaton operators worked like documentary shooters covering a war. The sets were big, usually more than 300 meters long. In the opening sequence, the video images were captured by the Army’s robotic device. Two XTR-Prods were stationed behind the Humvee to pick out dialogue and reveal characters. (In this sequence and others, special reveals were given to wellknown actors playing cameo roles, such as Pearce and Ralph Fiennes.) Canon 8-64mm and 11165mm zoom lenses were employed throughout the shoot. “It’s a good, huge range,” says Ackroyd. “We’d have three to four cameras, and we’d tell one of the guys to try to find a rooftop. There are lots of lovely 45degree angles down. Using an 11–165mm zoom, you could pick off a head-and-shoulders shot of someone across the street, or have a wide-angle shot. We used a lot of zooms within the shot to give it that little edge.” IED explosions were created by special-effects supervisor Robert Stutsman and his team. No digital effects were used to create or enhance any explosions because Bigelow was aiming for total accuracy. “Those fake gas fireballs have a lot of visual impact but are inaccurate, especially given the type of ordnance soldiers are dealing with in Iraq,” she says. “The effect we were after was predominantly a very dense, black, thick, almost completely opaque explosion filled with lots of particulate matter and shrapnel.” The blast in the opening scene was captured at high speed with a Phantom HD, which was obtained in Beirut, Lebanon. Ackroyd notes

Left: James examines the detonator he ferreted out while defusing a car bomb at the United Nations building in Baghdad. Below: James and Sanborn search an abandoned building where suspicious activity has been detected.

he is normally reluctant to use slowmotion for such scenes. “On a lot of films I’ve shot, we’d refuse to shoot high-speed or use multiple cameras on something like an explosion or a crash because that’s showing too much knowledge,” he explains. But in this case, “we shot high-speed to get the sense of flying dirt. When an explosion that big goes off, the whole earth moves. “The great thing about that [Phantom] camera is that it’s really quite simple to use, provided you have enough daylight,” he continues. “And you can play back and see your results straight away, which is really helpful.” He determined that shooting between 500-1,000 fps would facilitate the appropriate amount of screen time and optimal

resolution in the HD image. As he has on all his features, Ackroyd manned the A camera throughout the shoot. “It’s my documentary background,” he says. “When you’re feeling in tune with something, you can follow a whole scene or conversation — even one in another language — and know how to make that coverage tell the story. You can use one camera and one sound recorder and get cutaways and reaction shots, all in real time. I think that’s the greatest kind of training you can have.” The other camera operators on the picture were Scott McDonald, a Canadian who had worked with Ackroyd on Battle in Seattle (2007); Duraid Munajim, who was hired for second unit but

American Cinematographer 47

Risk andValor Right: While working out in the desert, James’ unit finds itself pinned down by an Iraqi sniper. Sanborn lines up his shot with James’ assistance. Below: Director Kathryn Bigelow talks over a setup with Ackroyd.

wound up operating for the main unit; and Neils Johansen, a Danish operator brought in for second unit. (Dory Aoun operated the Phantom HD.) Many other crew members were Jordanian, Moroccan or Palestinian. “I said to Kathryn right at the beginning, ‘No matter where we go, we can’t just take over the place and treat it like it’s just a backdrop,” recalls Ackroyd. “We very consciously tried to bring on as many people from the region as we could in all departments.” Because

48 July 2009

Jordan has a limited production infrastructure, Bigelow created a training program. “I modeled it after the Directors Guild program, like an internship,” she says. “There were trainees in the camera department, in the art department, in props and makeup — you name it.” Bigelow chose to shoot the Iraq scenes in Jordan because it has a sizable population of Iraqi refugees. “There are two million of them in Amman alone, and some of them are actors from Baghdad,” says the

director. “All of the extras and bit players were real Iraqis. That was really important to me. If we’d shot in Morocco, our extras would have been North African, and to an Arab eye, that’s probably the equivalent of me trying to look like a Native American.” Reinforcing her decision to shoot in Jordan were the country’s architectural similarities to Iraq, which it borders, as well as the availability of U.S. military gear. “One company there is already providing military machinery for war films, so we could get Humvees and the type of military hardware we needed to make this film look right,” says Bigelow. “We could even use some of the bases, which I think were built by America as a training school for Iraqi police.” Shooting in Jordan in midsummer, the filmmakers had to contend with average temperatures of 110°F. Though he was twice felled by heat exhaustion, Ackroyd saw a big benefit to the location: full sun was guaranteed every day of the shoot. He took advantage, using sunlight to illuminate certain interiors, such as a large, seemingly abandoned building that the EOD squad searches. “When we first saw that building, it

INNOVA TION Qua had these wonderful shafts of light inside,” he recalls. “We could have brought a lot of big lights in to reproduce that look for different times of day, but I decided to do something else.” Shooting in late afternoon, when the sun was on the far side of the building, Ackroyd rounded up several grips to handle 4'x4' mirrors that would bounce sunlight through the empty windows into the interior. “There was a little embankment and a fence outside, so we could strap everything off to the fence and make the mirrors rigid. The sun was guaranteed, and there’s no movie light that gives you the intensity of sunlight. We managed to keep that with a little bit of luck, good planning, and trust. So instead of using electricity, we just used the sun.”The enduring sunlight also gave the filmmakers enough time to stage the scene the way they wanted. “We wanted those to be long, continuous takes that told lots of stories — every step could be a trip wire, every corner could be a booby-trap or ambush,” says Ackroyd. “I think that comes across.” Throughout the film, Ackroyd employed a small, portable lighting fixture he devised, a “Tubo.” Starting with a 2' or 4' section of black drainage pipe, he cuts away a section, paints the interior white, and then installs a few small clips to hold a battery-operated Kino Flo in place. He tops it off with diffusion. “It’s just a very simple way of getting more control of the light,” he says. He originally devised the Tubo for the 360degree or 180-degree lighting situations he often encounters on Loach’s films. “You can put them through batteries and dimmers to warm them up a bit; then, you can roll them underneath the bed, stand them behind a table or affix them anywhere. They’re useful things. The casing protects the bulb and also controls where that light goes. And you can always give it a little 10degree twist to make it less bright. It

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49

Risk andValor

Ackroyd and 1st AC Oliver Driscoll find a rare bit of shade on location in Jordan.

50 July 2009

tends to be my secret weapon to get the small stuff in a scene.” Tubos were among the fixtures used in a long night sequence that required a combination of sources. In the scene, the EOD squad is called in to investigate a deadly explosion in the Green Zone moments after it has occurred. The men arrive to find a huge crater surrounded by fires, mounds of rubble and survivors wailing over the dead. “Nights were tricky because we were trying to portray cities that were blacked out either because of curfew or because they’d lost power,” notes Ackroyd. “But we did have this great special effect, the fire, that we kept burning throughout the night. We just filled in and built around that.” Ackroyd’s 4' Tubos and flame bars backlit and silhouetted the soldiers and special-effects fires, while military-grade flashlights carried by some soldiers provided additional sources. Ackroyd wanted to add one more element: flares. “They light up a whole war zone so the soldiers can

see where they’re going,” he notes. “Those things are being fired off around Baghdad all the time, and we thought we could use that kind of light to give the scene an ethereal glow.” When military flares proved impossible to get, the production obtained some signal flares — not an exact match. To better emulate the roving, overhead light he had in mind, Ackroyd and his gaffer, Matt Moffatt, devised a low-cost solution, filming the signal flares only for effect. “I’m almost embarrassed to tell you,” Ackroyd says with a laugh, “but we got some silver shiny board, like a 4-by-4, and put it on the end of a long pole or lighting stand, then pointed a powerful Xenon [flashlight] up into the shiny board. It was just enough to create that very soft glow. What’s more, we could fade that light in and out just by waving the board over our heads, and move it around like it was a floating light up in the sky that drifted away into darkness. Sometimes you just improvise things!” When James decides the bomb could have been detonated by someone just outside the Green Zone, he takes his men to hunt for suspects, and they switch off their flashlights as they leave the bomb site. “When soldiers go into battle, they switch off their flashlights,” notes Ackroyd. Instead of using any of the standard tricks for suggesting total darkness, the filmmakers allow the image to go completely black for several beats. “Black is something that gets out of your control, really,” says Ackroyd, who notes that a key component of his night strategy was shooting on Fuji Eterna 500T 8673. “When I push Eterna 500 to its limits — i.e., at night, when you cannot or do not want to bring in too much light — the image will go somewhere that’s a little bit crazy, and that’s sometimes what we wanted on this film. If you feel you’re in control of the situation, you might lose the sense of danger you’re trying to

establish. I’ve been using Fuji for 10 years now, and I feel I can mess around with it.” Once they leave the site of the bomb blast, the soldiers search for suspects by scouring some urban alleyways. (This sequence was shot in a Palestinian refugee camp in Amman.) “In that location, we could use some justified light and play people against silhouettes,” says Ackroyd. They pre-rigged one alleyway, but at the last minute, Bigelow decided to have the soldiers split up and go down three separate alleys, and she wanted to film them simultaneously. Ackroyd determined he would need 360-degree lighting in the added locations, and his crew rummaged through the lighting truck and came back with a mixed bag of units. “They have very wacky lightbulbs there, really high-intensity bulbs,” he notes. “There’s sodium, mercury and all kinds of other things. The color temperature could be 6000°K with extra green in it! But that’s life, so we used those things. Of course, we also used some Kino Flos and standard fluorescent tubes. Though we had done tests on all the available lights, quality control was completely out of the window! We just knew that if we mixed it all together, we’d have a sense of reality, and that’s what we wanted.” I

TECHNICAL SPECS Super 16mm and High-Definition Video Super 16mm: Aaton XTR-Prod, A-Minima HD: Phantom HD Canon lenses Fuji Eterna 250D 8663, 500T 8673 Digital Intermediate Printed on Kodak Vision 2383

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Terror on the

Tracks

The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3, shot by Tobias Schliessler, ASC, places a hostage drama in the bowels of New York’s subway system. by Douglas Bankston Unit photography by Rico Torres and Stephen Vaughan, SMPSP

ore than 30 years have passed since the Pelham 1 2 3 subway train out of the Bronx was hijacked on the big screen. United Artists’ underrated 1974 adaptation of John Godney’s novel The Taking of Pelham One Two Three, directed by Joseph Sargent, had Walter Matthau matching wits with a steely Robert Shaw, who demanded money in

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52 July 2009

exchange for his hostages. A third character of sorts was just as important: New York City. Charged with capturing that gritty “New Yorkness” on film was Brooklyn native Owen Roizman, ASC, who had notched Oscar nominations for The French Connection (1971) and The Exorcist (1973). With The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3, which opened in theaters last

month, director Tony Scott has modernized Godney’s story, starting with the title — no more spelled-out numerals. John Travolta portrays Ryder, the leader of a four-man crew of ex-cons who commandeer the Pelham train, radio the Metropolitan Transit Authority and demand that $10 million be delivered in one hour. Taking Ryder’s call is disgraced police officer Garber

Join some of the world’s finest players at SIGGRAPH 2009 in New Orleans. Exchange insight and inspiration with the animators, artists, researchers, developers, and producers who are creating this year’s most amazing experiences. In the city that has been inspiring musical innovation, culinary excellence, visual splendor, and architectural wonder for 300 years. You’ll return from SIGGRAPH 2009 with re-energized imagination, renewed skills, and insider information to spark your creativity and surpass your goals for the coming year.

Terror on the Tracks Right: The crew sets up a dolly shot in a practical subway tunnel. The location’s challenges included noise, dirt, darkness, the 600-volt third rail and the bureaucracy of New York’s Metropolitan Transit Authority. Below: To boost the light levels in the practical tunnel, the crew installed 150watt sodiumvapor fixtures roughly every 50'. The subway train was then backlit with Nine-light Maxis and Par lamps gelled with Lee 242 to suggest the fluorescent lighting of a subway station somewhere in the distance.

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he definitely wanted to put his stamp on it visually,” says Schliessler. “I love the look Owen Roizman gave the original film, but we didn’t necessarily reference it. Tony wanted to show the energy of the city, and gritty or not, it feels on film like New York.” Schliessler opted to achieve the feeling of urban grit through lighting, camerawork and the intangibles that the city presents. “The logistics of how you do things in

New York are so different,” he notes. “There aren’t big streets, so you can’t park your 50-footer anywhere you want. You have to go much smaller, and in a way, that helped [the look] become grittier. I didn’t have big cranes to control the sun and big Bebees [Night Lights] to put the light back in.” Overall, he adds, “I tried to make it feel not lit and as real as possible — no beauty lights over the camera to get that ping in the eyes! I tried to shoot as much

available light as possible. Tony likes that gritty feel.” The kinetic camerawork Scott favors would seem to be an odd fit for Pelham, which takes place primarily in two static locations, the MTA control room and the subway tunnel. The filmmakers’ solution was to run four Panavision cameras, two Panaflex Platinums and two Millennium XLs, at all times. “That was the biggest thing: how do we get that energy through the camerawork?” says Schliessler. “We did one camera on a 360-degree circle track, constantly moving, searching and pushing in with the zooms. The more interesting the shot, the more compromise there had to be with the lighting. We decided the lighting didn’t have to always be perfect if the shot was interesting. “All four cameras were usually on dollies so they could move and adjust the frame during the shot,” continues the cinematographer. “We used only [Primo] zoom lenses, two 3:1 [135-420mm T2.8] and two 11:1 [24-275mm T2.8], and while we were shooting, Tony talked to the operators via a headset and had them adjust their framing. He

begins by telling each operator what he wants, and he can really play a scene out and cover the entire scene by reframing. That enables the actors to run through the whole scene. Then, on the next take, Tony’s on the headset telling the C camera to get a little closer on a hand or some other detail. He does coverage while he’s getting the wide shots. It takes a fair amount of time to set things up, but once that’s done, we go continuously.” For a new set or scene, two to three hours were required to set things up and start shooting the scene, both master and coverage, in one take. With this method, production shot two to three pages per day on a 72-day schedule. Pelham was shot in Super 35mm, and about 90 percent of it was shot on Kodak Vision3 500T 5219. Preferring a thicker negative and higher printing lights, Schliessler often rates his film stock slower and/or lights to a healthy stop; he rated the 5219 at 400 ASA. (He used Kodak Vision3 250D 5205, rated at 200 ASA, for day-exterior close-ups to match stunt work filmed by 2nd-unit director/cinematographer Alexander Witt.) “Because we used available light and practicals in the MTA control room, I lit it to about a T4 because Tony sometimes likes to use an extender or double extender on zooms, and that makes you lose a stop,” notes Schliessler. “We didn’t use extenders that much in the control room, but we did use them in the tunnel. Tony loves to be on the long end of the lens, and I lit so we were ready for that.” The control room was built onstage and designed to largely match the specs of the real MTA headquarters, including 9' ceilings. With four cameras, most of them moving all the time, lighting had to be practical and built into the set. “We had to come up with a lighting scheme that would facilitate four-

camera setups, and that’s the main reason we went with underlight or toplight directly overhead,” says Schliessler. “With that, we could maintain continuity in the look.” The control room features numerous desks and a wall of video screens that display the status of the various subway routes. (The images were rear-projected onto the screens.) Recessed fixtures in the ceiling held 3200°K fluorescent tubes. Dropdown fixtures at the rear of the room and background wallmounted sconces were 4100°K

Osram tubes with three or four points of green to provide color separation. “I wanted to keep the fluorescents in line with that greenish tinge government buildings have, so I used Daylight Green fluorescents,” says Schliessler. “We added Half CTB to the sconces to separate the walls a little more.” Garber’s dispatch desk received extra treatment in line with the top-lit and bottom-lit look. Kino Flos, 4x2 and 2x2 units with 3200°K tubes to match the overheads, were flown above the desk, just below the

Train interiors were filmed onstage at Kaufman Astoria Studios in Queens. The set was built to match the real train’s interior, with the exception that the entry doors were widened to accommodate dolly track.

American Cinematographer 55

Terror on the Tracks

Above: Schliessler (far left) and the crew prepare to shoot at Garber’s desk in the controlroom set. Below: Custom LED panels were built into the desk to light Washington from below.

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ceiling. (Schliessler avoided pulling out sections of the ceiling in an effort to move efficiently between wider and tighter coverage.) Lighting Washington from below were custom LED panels that production designer Chris Seagers’ crew had built into the desk; these could be dimmed up or down. “Denzel looks better in slightly warm light,” notes Schliessler. Pelham’s other main setting, the subway tunnel where Ryder has parked the hijacked train, is the visual opposite of the control room. The practical tunnel, where all train

exteriors were filmed, contained little practical lighting, so Seagers whipped up small, authentic-looking light boxes that were mounted on the tunnel walls every 50' or so. Each box held a 150-watt sodiumvapor bulb. “They’re a slight stretch, because those kinds of lights don’t exist down there,” notes Schliessler. O’Leary adds, “The real tunnels are almost pitch-black, with only the occasional incandescent lamp every 100 feet or so and various colored signal lamps and exit lamps. But this was the most logical idea we could think of; the lights were easy to wire

and move, and we felt they looked like they belonged in the environment. This gets back to working in New York: play the hand you have!” The sodium-vapor fixtures bathe the foreground in warm, orange light, and Schliessler took the opposite tack in backlighting the train. “Tony wanted to play around with color separation, so we used a cool, green backlight and spread it around to silhouette the train,” he says. O’Leary explains, “We used Nine-light Maxis and Par lamps; the Maxis were a ways back from the train, and we squeezed the Pars in below for the rails or above for the ceiling to light the areas the Maxis didn’t reach. They were gelled with Lee 242 [Fluorescent 4300°K] to match the color of the tubes on the station platforms — the logic was that this backlight was coming from a station farther down the tunnel. We didn’t change any of the MTA tubes; we just matched what existed. So 4100°K was the standard look.” Overall, the lighting in the tunnel was very low. “I knew where the limits were, and we definitely played it on the borderline,” says Schliessler. “When you get to a level that low, you battle, because to your eye it looks like more light.” Inside the train, a heavy, slightly teal hue was used on the lights; this was motivated by emergency backup lights that kick in when Ryder’s crew kills the power. “Normally, you don’t want your actors to have a blue-green cast on their faces, but it works for this story,” says Schliessler. “We had some of that sodium-vapor light coming through the windows, and the colors all came together. It seemed like the tunnel could have that atmosphere.” The MTA had strict regulations about mounting lights inside the train. O’Leary recalls, “The real trains had a couple of 20-amp outlets, so we used fluorescents matched to the existing tubes and mounted them to the bars [the passengers hold] or taped them to the ceiling.

Again, these were the MTA-standard 4100°K tube gelled with Lee 242. The gel added about 1000°K and some green, and although it was the same gel we used on the tungsten backlights in the tunnel, it appeared more extreme in the train because we put it on a 4100°K source instead of a 3200°K source. We tried to use common elements whenever possible because it was a logistical nightmare to get materials down there and move them around.” Shooting in the real tunnel presented significant challenges. “Between the noise, dirt, dust and darkness, the 600-volt live third rail, and the din when a train passed by on another track, there was no lack of distractions,” says O’Leary. Schliessler adds, “Even though the rail was sometimes off, we treated it like it was always live, because you never know when someone might make a mistake and turn it on. We protected everything with rubber mats and rubber feet. We could only shoot at night, and when we came out in the morning, it was like we’d been in a coal mine — our faces were black. The draft from trains going by would stir up so much dust that it affected the lighting, especially the backlight. To maintain continuity, we ended up adding smoke throughout the whole tunnel sequence.” All train interiors and shots from outside looking in were filmed on a soundstage at Kaufman Astoria Studios in Queens. The set was built to match the interior of the practical train, but the entry doors just behind the motorman’s cab were widened to accommodate 360degree dolly track. “We’d shoot [the antagonists] in the motorman’s cab from outside, and then we’d come around inside the train and shoot through the window of the motorman’s cab door, and then we’d go around again,” says Schliessler. “Tony wanted a feeling of constant ¢ motion.” 57

Terror on the Tracks

The crew captures a driving sequence on location in New York.

58 July 2009

While that camera circled, the other three cameras captured closeups, and to keep those cameras out of shot, they were positioned lower in the shadows, just below a TransLite of the tunnel. “They were also on dollies, so when the 360 camera came around shooting toward the close-up cameras, a close-up camera could pull back and then come in again,” explains Schliessler. “It was amazingly intricate, but it worked.” The lighting was virtually the same as the real train’s: fluorescents gelled with Lee 242 mounted near the ceiling. “Outside, we made the sodium tunnel lights a bit more orange to enhance the sodium feel,” notes O’Leary. Schliessler adds, “When we get into close-ups, we augmented the practical sodiumvapor fixtures with 2K Fresnels outside the windows and matched the color with Lee CID 237. We brought those vapor practicals to the stage and sometimes used them either bounced or direct, mainly to create continuity with our location work.” Scott also continued the passing-train effect onstage. “Tony doesn’t like greenscreen,” notes Schliessler, “so Chris [Seagers] came up with the idea of putting up a

screen with train windows. We shot stills of actual trains going by using different shutter speeds. When you’re in the tunnels, everything feels like it’s strobing. We put those images of train windows on an otherwise black TransLite; behind every ‘window’ was a Vari-Lite on a strobing flicker system; and in front of and above each ‘window’ was another Vari-Lite aimed into the train so it would feel like a continuation of the same lighting. If Tony felt like a train should go by in a scene, he would call it out, and we’d get the Vari-Lites strobing. We had the TransLite rolling a little bit so the strobing wouldn’t be exact.” Did the metal interior and exterior of the train coupled with four moving cameras cause problems? “Yes,” Schliessler laughs. “Depending on kick angles, you could have one camera angle going 5 stops over and another camera angle with nothing there. I tried to keep the kicks down as much as possible, but that’s where the digital intermediate came in handy. A few times, when a camera came around and we got that kick in the upper part of the lens, [colorist] Stefan Sonnenfeld [at Company 3] had to knock it down. With the DI, we

could cover up some of those things we couldn’t control.” Schliessler was not involved in the DI, which was carried out at 2K, but that’s not to say he was out of the loop. “I tried to do as much as I could in-camera, and we set the look with our tests in prep,” he notes. “We shot tests in the tunnel, on the street and on the MTA set, and then sat with Stefan for the color-correction and carried the tests through a filmout.” Company 3 also referenced the tests in creating the hi-def dailies — a format Schliessler found wanting on a picture with so much low-light work. “Pretty much every day, I went to Company 3 after work to look at the scanned negative, especially the low-light scenes,” he reports. But he wasn’t concerned when it came time for the final color-correction. “Stefan has graded 90 percent of my commercials, and I knew his work would match mine. “Lighting-wise, this was definitely the most challenging movie I’ve done because of all the tight spaces, the 360-degree shooting and the multiple cameras,” he concludes. “There wasn’t a shot that wasn’t challenging.” I

TECHNICAL SPECS 2.40:1 Super 35mm Panaflex Platinum, Millennium XL Primo lenses Kodak Vision3 500T 5219, 250D 5205 Digital Intermediate Printed on Kodak Vision 2383

Senior colorist Mike Smollin works in Mega Playground’s Digital Vision Nucoda Film Master DI room, part of the facility’s DP Dailies service.

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DP Dailies System Targets Image Control by Iain Stasukevich When Richard Crudo, ASC published “A Call for Digital Printer Lights” in the September 2006 issue of American Cinematographer, Terry Brown was one of the industry professionals who sat up and took notice. With the arrival of new electronic image-capture technologies and the growing popularity of digital intermediates, the art of cinematography was changing, and cinematographers’ control over their imagemaking process was becoming difficult to maintain. Crudo suggested the dilemma could only be solved by a new universal standard of motion-picture capture, display, post and exhibition. It was a subject with which Brown was quite familiar. At the time, Brown was spearheading the redevelopment of Technicolor’s dailies workflow. “I looked at other digital-dailies systems and noticed that while you can create compelling

pictures, it doesn’t really have anything to do with the original exposure on the film and how it would look printed photochemically,” he says. The culmination of his efforts was the joint Technicolor/Grass Valley project Bones Dailies, a resolution-independent turnkey system for scanning, syncing, grading and delivering digital dailies. The integration of the ASC Color Decision List into Bones marked a further step toward standardizing the cinematographer’s vision when the image moves from dailies to the initial stages of the DI process. Even with the CDL, however, the potential exists for a disconnect between the two processes. When film dailies are transferred, it is generally accepted that the resultant media will be used for HD video masters and previews, after which the entire process is started over again for the final grade. It’s expected that once picture is locked, negative selects will be rescanned at a higher resolution for the DI, and that this may happen at a different facility than the one that did the original dailies timing. “Right now, you throw

your previews away,” says Eitan Hakami, founder of New York post facility Mega Playground. “You spend time and money on the stock, the conforming and color-correction; you screen it twice; and then you start your DI from scratch.” In 2007, Brown joined Mega Playground as the facility’s chief technology officer. Using Bones as a starting point, he began work on what eventually became the DP Dailies service, a closed post pipeline that includes the Spirit 2K, Bones Dailies, DVS storage solutions, FilmLight’s TrueLight colormanagement tools and the Digital Vision Nucoda Film Master. Negative is scanned as 1920x1080 DPX/Cineon files. “Our Spirit 2K has a data-only interface,” notes Brown. “I don’t like to call it HD because people tend to confuse that with Rec 709, and what you’re actually getting is a 10-bit log RGB file.” He maintains that if a project is shooting 3-perf or 4-perf Super 35mm (for either 1.85:1 or 2.40:1 exhibition), 1920x1080 is only 6-percent different than a full 2K scan. “The economics and efficiency of scanning once can yield significant cost savings in post,” he says. DP Dailies’ custom look-up tables are derived from the one used for Mega Playground’s DI process. The idea is that when a cinematographer is looking at dailies, whether in Rec 709 or P3 color space, he will be seeing the same image that will appear in the DI theater and on film. “I wanted to keep standard calibrations on the post display devices,” says Brown. “That way, we’re not doing oddball calibration on our monitors. As long as you’re in D65 Rec 709 color space, what you see is what you get.” Working in an emulated film space means cinematographers can give printer-light offsets to the dailies

Images courtesy of Mega Playground.

Post Focus

Right: The Bones Dailies system utilized in DP Dailies incorporates the ASC CDL to track color metadata through every step of the workflow. Below: A dailies room inside Mega Playground’s facility. The DP Dailies pipeline bridges dailies and the DI to protect the cinematographer’s intent from the shoot to the finished film.

same look to the new scans. “The density values would be the same,” says Brown. “It’s just a different file resolution.” One of the things Brown hopes to improve with DP Dailies is the relationship between the dailies timer and the cinematographer; the gap between film capture and digital dailies can sometimes create a disparity between the

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cinematographer’s intent and the interpretation of that intent by the person sitting at the controls in the timing suite. “The dailies colorist should be there to watch the cinematographer’s back, because he can see things in scene context and can grade and balance from scene to scene,” says Brown. “This can also benefit the editor, because he can get the footage in the

proper order and see how it’s going to look,” he adds. “Everybody wins, but the person who wins biggest is the cinematographer.” At press time, DP Dailies had been used on four feature films: In Northwood, Last Night, Paperman and Solitary Man. On a recent visit to Los Angeles, Brown ran the specs by Curtis Clark, ASC, chair of the Society’s Technology Committee, and Clark was optimistic about its potential. “Terry is addressing the challenges that exist [in film dailies], creating a closed-loop system and linking it to the DI finish,” he says. “If you’re using a system like that, it’s easier to make sure the information will transfer in a more accurate way.” Crudo notes: “The solution to this problem has to be simple, because simple is better. The person who creates a technology that fully puts image control back in the cinematographer’s hands will have found the Holy Grail.” I

New Products & Services AJA Intros Ki Pro Digital Disk Recorder AJA Video Systems has introduced the Ki Pro, a portable, tapeless video recorder that records files to the Apple ProRes 422 codec directly from camera, providing a powerful bridge between production and post with extensive analog and digital connectivity. Virtually any video and audio source can be fed into Ki Pro to record pristine, 10bit ProRes 422 media, which in turn is immediately ready for editing in Apple’s Final Cut Studio without having to rerender. Ki Pro records hours of media to a removable storage module with built-in FireWire 800, or to 34mm ExpressCard Flash. The small, portable unit can sit on a table, in a bay or mounted between a camera and tripod. Ki Pro is also ideal for on-set monitoring, providing instant access to multiple display devices simultaneously. Other features include the ability to connect digital cameras via SDI or HDMI, or analog cameras via multiple options; real-time converting from SD to HD, or 720 to/from 1080, in full 10-bit quality; simultaneous recording to camera and Ki Pro; and built-in Wi-Fi and Ethernet for complete control via Web browser or iPhone. During the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) conference held in Las Vegas this past April, AJA announced that the Ki Pro has been endorsed by Arri, Canon and Red. “Ki Pro fills the gap between camera acquisition and postproduction, giving filmmakers 64 July 2009

and video professionals instant access to their material,” says Nick Rashby, president of AJA Video. “It’s extremely gratifying to bring this product to market with the support and enthusiasm of companies such as Apple, Arri, Canon and Red.” Ki Pro is priced at $3,995, which includes the Recorder, the HDD Storage Module and an AC adapter. Additional product options include an exoskeleton for mounting between the camera and tripod, an SSD Storage Module, extra HDD Storage Modules, a Rod Accessory Kit and an AJA Lens Tap Cable Accessory. For more information, visit www.aja.com. Chemical Wedding Shines With Helios Chemical Wedding has introduced the Helios Sun Calculator, an application designed for use with Apple’s iPhone and iPod Touch. Utilizing algorithms created by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory and the National Geophysical Data Center, Helios offers professionals information regarding the path of the sun from dawn to dusk in any given place on any given day — past, present or future — accurate to a tiny fraction of a degree. The Helios application operates in four modes: HeliosMeter provides a graphical representation of the position of the sun on a compass dial for any time of day, indicating the sun’s elevation and the length of the shadow it would cast; Skyview offers an at-a-glance depiction of the sun’s path across the sky; Raw Data view provides strictly numerical information; and Inclinometer view allows for accurate measurement of the sun’s elevation, given in both degrees and times of day. Helios includes an internal database of more than 25,000 cities around the world, providing longitude, latitude, time zone and daylight-

savings information, and users can save favorite locations or add current locations from GPS data. Helios can be purchased in the iTunes App Store for $29.99. For more information, visit www.chemicalwed ding.tv. Silicon Imaging Goes 3-D, Teams With Band Pro Silicon Imaging, developer of the SI-2K camera, has unveiled the SI-3D, an integrated 3-D cinema camera and stereo-visualization system. The SI-3D shoots uncompressed raw imagery from two synchronized cameras and encodes directly to a single stereo CineFormRAW QuickTime file, along with 3-D LUT color and convergence metadata; the stereo file can be instantly played back and edited in full 3-D on an Apple Final Cut timeline without the need for proxy conversions. The SI-3D camera system uses two remote SI-2K Mini cameras with a P+S Technik interchangeable-lens mount connected to a single processing system via gigabit Ethernet; the cameras are synchronized and controlled through the familiar SiliconDVR touch-screen interface. On set, the cameras can be viewed individually or in stereo modes using modern 3-D LCD and DLP displays. With the addition of CineForm’s Neo3D, convergence and stereo or individual eyecolor adjustments can be dynamically controlled and modified while viewing live 3-D playback using side-by-side, overunder or interlaced output modes. The SI-3D system can record dual-

stream, 12-bit, uncompressed images directly to mobile 2.5" solid-state drives, with peak rates up to 200 MB/second; a 250 GB drive can store up to one hour of footage per camera. The resulting Silicon Imaging Video (.siv) footage can be seamlessly viewed and graded in Iridas FrameCycler and Speedgrade XR with look and stereo metadata applied. The files can also be exported as CinemaDNG sequences or converted to CineFormRAW 2-D or 3-D files. “The SI-3D camera system streamlines the entire stereo 3-D content-acquisition and postproduction process,” says Ari Presler, CEO of Silicon Imaging. “Combining two cameras into a single control, processing and recording platform enables shooting and instant playback like a traditional 2-D camera with the added tools needed on-set to analyze and adjust the lighting, color, flip orientation and stereo-depth effects. In post, a unified stereo file plus associated metadata can be immediately graded for dailies, edited and viewed in either 2-D or 3-D.” Additionally, Silicon Imaging has named Burbank-based Band Pro Film and Digital to be the company’s exclusive distributor in the United States and Latin America. “We’re very excited about our newest strategic partnership to expand our sales and service for the SI-2K Cinema Cameras,” says Presler. “Band Pro will bring their wealth of experience outfitting digital-cinema production equipment and will provide best-in-class technical support, education and service to our growing base of TV and filmproduction clients. Their Burbank and New York facilities are centrally located for access to studios and postproduction facilities leading the digital-acquisition and file-based-workflow transition.” Band Pro owner Amnon Band adds, “The new form of capture and workflow is the next big step in cine technology, and Band Pro will, as always, put our usual high standards of technological and educational resources behind every SI-2K camera package.” For more information, visit www.si-2k.com or www.bandpro.com.

Digital Recorders from Keisoku Giken Specializing in uncompressed imaging solutions for production, post and digital-cinema environments, Keisoku Giken Co. Ltd. has introduced the UDR-100 and UDR-20S recorders. The UDR-100 is a compact, lightweight, battery-powered, uncompressed recorder designed for digital-cinema shooting. The system can be camera mounted, hand carried, kept in a backpack or further adapted to suit any shooting style, and its rugged design makes it ideally suited for action shooting with cars, motorcycles, aircraft or boats. The recorder is capable of 2K recording, and it can also be used in a stereoscopic workflow, capturing HD 4:2:2 images via two-channel HD-SDI input. The UDR100 can record to HDD Disk Pack or SSD Flash Pack, and the recorder is compati-

ble with Panasonic variable frame rate and Arri data mode; it is also compatible with any camera with an HD-SDI output. Additionally, the UDR-D100 features an LCD viewer, which can be used to display menu settings or review thumbnails of the recorded images for additional peace of mind while working in the field. “We designed the UDR-D100 to be a comprehensive portable recorder that can be used in the field in multiple conditions,” says Kenji Hirano, president and CEO of Keisoku Giken. “Integrating seamlessly into the postproduction process, it is easy to use, highly versatile and provides unprecedented control to today’s digital cinematographer without

requiring any sacrifices in function, features or quality.” The portable UDR-20S player and recorder can record in a variety of formats and resolutions, from two-channel HD/2K digital film up to uncompressed 4K. The system features removable media Disk Packs, and an intuitive VTR-style front panel enables easy operation. With eight channels of HD-SDI video I/Os, the UDR-20S can interface with a number of digital camera systems, and multiple units can be operated in parallel and synchronized for even higher resolution recording, such as 8K. Optional J-UDR software allows the user to control the UDR-20S remotely from a PC and convert the image data into BMP, Cineon, DPX, TIFF, QuickTime and a number of other file formats; the J-UDR controls the UDR-20S via Ethernet or fibre channel. “We call the UDR-20S the ‘Master Recorder,’ because it represents the culmination of all our research and experience in the field,” says Hirano. “It is perfectly suited to support uncompressed processing. We are thrilled by its versatility across so many different aspects and applications in 4K RGB imaging.” For more information, visit www.keisoku.co.jp. Glidecam Launches HD-Series Glidecam Industries, Inc., has introduced the re-engineered Glidecam HD-Series handheld camera stabilizers, comprising the HD-1000, HD-2000 and HD-4000. The HD-Series allows operators to capture incredibly smooth and graceful shots even when running up and down stairs or traveling over rugged terrain. Each HD-Series stabilizer features an offset foam-cushioned handle grip attached to a free-floating three-axis gimbal, which isolates the American Cinematographer 65

operator’s unwanted hand movements. Additionally, the gimbal incorporates several adjustable axis-convergence controls, allowing all three axes to intersect for proper operational alignment. Users can quickly attach or remove their cameras to the stabilizers via a camera-mounting platform with a quick-release, no-tools, drop-on camera plate. Ergonomic control knobs allow quick, precise adjustment of the top stage’s movement and allow the operator to adjust the camera’s horizontal balance. Vertical balance can then be adjusted by varying the counterweights on the base platform or by changing the length of the no-tools, telescoping central post. Finally, a proprietary Dynamic Base Platform can expand or contract, allowing users to easily adjust the overall system’s dynamic balance and increase or decrease the system’s rotational pan inertia. For more information, visit www.glidecam.com. New Bearing with Miller Compass Miller Camera Support has unveiled the 75mm Compass range of fluid heads, a premium camera-support option with professional performance at competitive pricing. The stylish, lowprofile, lightweight, operator-friendly design boasts a wide payload range, selectable pan-and-tilt drag settings and an illuminated bubble level. The Compass range retains the same drag components used in Miller’s Arrow range of 100mm fluid heads, resulting in the widest drag range available in a 75mm fluid head, with ultrasmooth takeoffs, super-stable pan/tilt moves and perfect stops. The newly 66 July 2009

designed four-position counterbalance system in the Compass 15 and 20 fluid heads provides for a wide payload range; where other counterbalance systems can reduce the tilt range and cause “spring-back” in higher settings, the Compass counterbalance settings are fully functional in all positions. The Compass 15 provides professional performance for the latest generation of lightweight HDV/DVCam/XDCam and P2 HD cameras with payloads between 4 and 20 pounds. With a payload range of 4-26 pounds, the Compass 20 is compatible

with an even larger range of cameras. For more information, visit www.millertripods.com. Miller Wheels Out Arrow Shell Case Miller Camera Support has introduced the Arrow Shell Case with wheels for two-stage Arrow tripod systems. The semi-rigid case is constructed with quality, weatherproof, 1000D Cordura; lightweight, padded, honeycomb-plastic wall paneling; corner protection; and heavyduty straps. Both the pull handle and carry straps are double attached, integrated with metal D-links for extra strength and positioned for ergonomic comfort. The case’s inline roller wheels are recessed to protect the axle from damage during shipping and to provide ease of maneuverability in transit. Additionally, molded-plastic foot and base supports enable the case to stand upright, clear of wet or dirty floors. Inside the Arrow Shell Case are pockets for accessories and a dedicated

tripod adaptor-plate pocket. A molded head cradle offers added protection for the Arrow range of fluid heads, and easy snap-lock straps fasten the tripod in place. For more information, visit www.millertripods.com. Cine-tal Unveils B Series Cine-tal Systems, a developer of image-monitoring and color-management solutions, has expanded its awardwinning Cinemage product line with the Cinemage B Series, comprising 42", 23" and 19" monitors. Providing true 10-bit display with wide color gamuts to support both HD and DCI standards, the B Series integrates the company’s CineSpace colormanagement and calibration software. “By integrating our CineSpace technology into Cinemage, we provide precision control of the wide gamut color primaries, creating a perfect reference for DCI, HD and SD monitoring,” says Rob Carroll, president and CEO of Cinetal. “Cinemage is the only monitoring system utilizing an optimized combination of 3-D LUTs, 1-D LUTs and 21-bit color matrices to provide the highest precision of monitor calibration, displaysystem emulation and color previsualization.” The B Series also supports an enhanced user interface and modular control panel. Cine-tal has also released version 4.0 for the Cinemage 2000 product line, adding support for 2K XYZ color space, XYZ Waveform Monitor, Enhanced Standard Definition Modes and Independent Color Space I/O. Additionally, the company has introduced CineSpace version 2.7.1, which offers support for a wider range of measurement tools, including Photo Research, Minolta and XRite. For more information, visit www.cine-tal.com.

P+S Technik Offers SteadyFrame Scanner P+S Technik has introduced the SteadyFrame Universal Format Scanner, a state-of-the-art digital film scanner for 16mm and 35mm. The SteadyFrame can scan great quantities of film at a high quality in a short period of time while taking great care of the film elements. Capable of confronting the variety of problems often encountered with archived film stock, the SteadyFrame is perfectly suited to high-end restoration and preservation projects. The filmtransport system allows for an easy exchange between 35mm and 16mm, and the graphical user interface makes it easy to quickly understand how to operate the scanner. The heart of the SteadyFrame is the software-based Perforation Recognition System (PRS). The replacement of mechanical image-stabilization modules with software-based pattern-recognition algorithms enables careful handling of the archive film throughout the scanning process thanks to sprocket-free transport. Other advantages include the ability to handle different perforation patterns, types and pitches, as well as different types of film, such as positive, negative and intermediate. With PRS, even currently unknown film formats, perforation patterns and aspect ratios can be scanned with a simple software update. A number of SteadyFrame Scanners have already been delivered, including to New York-based preservation and restoration facility Cineric. “We are very impressed with the SteadyFrame’s very gentle sprocket and pinfree transport system,” says Adam Wangerin, Cineric’s optical line manager. “Being able to switch from 35mm to

16mm in just minutes makes it easy and fast to work in multiple formats.” The SteadyFrame Universal Format Scanner is available through the ZGC distribution network in North and South America, as well as P+S Technik’s international resellers. For more information, visit www.pstechnik.de or www.zgc.com. I

CLARIFICATION In our June article about previsualization, the abbreviation “previz” was used throughout the text, reflecting AC ’s house style at the time. However, the Previs Subcommittee of the ASC Technology Committee — a joint committee comprising members of the ASC, the Art Directors Guild and the Visual-Effects Society — has decided to use “previs” as its official abbreviation of the term. AC has amended its house style to reflect that consensus.

67

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Backstage Equipment, Inc. 6 Band Pro 5 Burrell Enterprises 68 CamMate Systems 68 Cavision Enterprises 23 Chapman/Leonard Studio Equipment Inc. 9 Cinema Vision 69 Cinematographer Style 63 Cinematography Electronics 57 Cinekinetic 68 Cinerover 68 Clairmont Film & Digital 17 Cooke Optics 6 Creative Handbook 59

Filmtools 57 Fletcher Chicago 31 Fuji Motion Picture 41 Glidecam Industries C3 Golden Animations 69 High Def Expo, Inc. 43 Hollywood Post Alliance 67 IBC 75 K 5600, Inc. 32 Kino Flo 33 Laffoux Solutions, Inc. 68 Lentequip, Inc. 69 Lights! Action! Company 68 Litepanels 2 Maine Media Workshops 49 Matthews 69 Movie Tech AG 69 MP&E Mayo Productions 69 New York Film Academy 11 Oppenheimer Camera Prod. 68 Panasonic Broadcast 7 PED Denz 49, 69 Photon Beard 69 Pille Film Gmbh 68 Pro8mm 68

70

Siggraph 71 Stanton Video Services 6 Super16 Inc. 69 Vancouver Film School 19 VF Gadgets, Inc. 68 Walter Klassen FX 42 Willy’s Widgets 68 www.theasc.com 57, 61, 70, 73 Zacuto Films 69 ZGC, Inc. 6

Join some of the world’s finest players at SIGGRAPH 2009 in New Orleans. Exchange insight and inspiration with the animators, artists, researchers, developers, and producers who are creating this year’s most amazing experiences. In the city that has been inspiring musical innovation, culinary excellence, visual splendor, and architectural wonder for 300 years. You’ll return from SIGGRAPH 2009 with re-energized imagination, renewed skills, and insider information to spark your creativity and surpass your goals for the coming year.

In Memoriam Jack Cardiff, BSC, 1914-2009

Was it the process or the practitioner? Movie buffs have long lamented the passing of three-strip Technicolor, a process praised for its ability to vividly capture nature’s colors and bring them to the screen in a painterly way. These same movie buffs will cite the films A Matter of Life and Death (a.k.a. Stair-

72 July 2009

way to Heaven, 1946), Black Narcissus (1947), The Red Shoes (1948), The Black Rose (1950), Pandora and the Flying Dutchman (1951) and The African Queen (1951) as proof that the magic was in the process, and yet all of those pictures were photographed by the same person: Jack Cardiff, BSC. Cardiff, a onetime ASC member and, more recently, an Officer in the Order of the British Empire (even the Queen recognized that he had a bit to do with the brilliance of “Glorious Technicolor”), died on April 22 at home in Cambridgeshire, England. He was in his 94th year, and not long out of harness. His last project as a cinematographer was the 2007 documentary The Other Side of the Screen. In a way, his career had come full circle; his earliest credits as a lighting cameraman were travelogues and industrial documentaries in the 1930s. It would not be fair to say Cardiff was a reluctant cinematographer — he pursued his career with a passion — but his motives for joining the camera department did not spring from artistic pretensions. “I started as a child actor in 1918, when I was 4 years old,” he told AC in 2006. “By the time I was 14, I was working as a tea boy on The Informer [1929], one of the last British silent films — a part-talkie, actually. I heard the boys in the camera department went abroad a lot, and I thought that sounded great, so I got into the camera department as a number boy. Of course, for the next two years, I only managed to get to the Isle of Wight, just across the water, for one afternoon.” Cardiff moved up the ranks and eventually operated the camera on Britain’s first three-strip Technicolor production, Wings of the Morning (1937). “I was working as a kind of operator and junior cameraman, and I would occasionally do odd inserts for features,” he told

AC. “A German, Count von Keller, came to Technicolor with his wife … they’d been traveling around with a 16mm camera shooting amateur movies, and their friends suggested they get a proper color camera and a cameraman. I was assigned by Technicolor to go touring with them. We had a van and a whole Technicolor crew, and I was the cameraman. We were shooting travelogues, working with a company called World Windows. Those travelogues were exciting work and gave me an opportunity to light what I liked, and I gained great confidence in my abilities.” Cardiff’s first break as a feature cinematographer came when he worked on The Great Mr. Handel (1942) with cameraman Claude Friese-Greene. “I had worked with Claude as a focus puller and operator, and the director, Norman Walker, wanted him to shoot the film, but [Claude] was a black-and-white man, so he suggested I collaborate with him on the film.” After that, Cardiff went back to shooting inserts and second-unit material, and one day, director Michael Powell happened to wander onto a stage where Cardiff was lighting an insert shot. “The shot was of a wall with animal heads mounted on it,” recalled Cardiff. “The animals had horns, and every time you put another light on it, you got duplicate shadows — there were horns all over the bloody wall! But I had all day to do it, and I suppose I did a very good job on it eventually, because I heard a voice say, ‘Very interesting.’ I turned around, and there was Michael Powell. He said, ‘Would you like to photograph my next film?’” That film was A Matter of Life and Death, and it began a fruitful working relationship that eventually brought Cardiff an Academy Award for Color Cinematography, which he won for Powell’s Black Narcissus. Cardiff earned two more Oscar nominations for cine-

ASC file photos. Photo on this page by Douglas Kirkland.

matography, for War and Peace (1956) and Fanny (1961), but he was a man of many talents, and for about 10 years, he traded in his rangefinder for a director’s chair. He earned an Oscar nomination for Best Director for Sons and Lovers (1960), which was shot by Freddie Francis, BSC. In 2001, the Academy presented Cardiff with an honorary Oscar for his landmark achievements in color cinematography. Cardiff maintained that his strongest influences were Hollywood cinematographers and the French Impressionists — the “quota quickies” he worked on in the 1930s offered little in the way of artistic training. “We were making very economical, little films, and Hollywood was sending over these big classics with wonderful sets and lighting,” he recalled. “I got to realize the photography of certain people, including [ASC members] George Barnes, Harry Stradling and Gregg Toland. Eventually, I worked for Stradling as an operator on a number of pictures in England. At the same time, I formed a terrific love of painting, particularly the Impressionists; they were daring, and they had ideas. I said to myself, ‘Audacity is the ticket.’” Cardiff published his autobiography, Magic Hour: A Life in Movies, in 1997. He is survived by his wife, Nikki, and four sons, Mason, John, Rodney and Peter. — Robert S. Birchard I

he trilogy book set and DVD, Storaro: Writing With Light, is the project of a lifetime: an encyclopedia by a single man — a visionary, a researcher and a scholar — about the mystery of vision.

73

Clubhouse News Mindel, Grobet Join Society Born in Johannesburg, South Africa, Dan Mindel, ASC (below) entered the film industry as a camera assistant for such cinematographers as Philippe Rousselot, ASC, AFC and Jeffrey Kimball, ASC. After pulling focus on Thelma & Louise (1991), Mindel earned 2nd-unit-cinematographer credits on Ridley Scott’s White Squall (1996) and G.I. Jane (1997), and Tony Scott’s Crimson Tide (1995) and The Fan (1996). Continuing his collaboration with Tony Scott, Mindel moved up to first unit and photographed Enemy of the State of the camera department, starting as a loader. Grobet got his break as a featurefilm cinematographer with La Mujer de Benjamín (1991), and he moved to Los Angeles following the success of Sexo, pudor y lágrimas (1999). In 2000, he earned acclaim for his work on Julian Schnabel’s Before Night Falls (co-shot with Guillermo Rosas; AC Jan. ’01). His feature credits include The Woodsman (AC May ‘04), Nacho Libre (AC June ’06), City of Ember (AC Oct. ’08) and I Love You Phillip Morris.

(1998), Spy Game (2001) and Domino (AC Nov. ’05). His other feature credits include Shanghai Noon (2000), The Skeleton Key (2005), Mission: Impossible III (AC May ’06) and Star Trek (AC June ’09). A native of Mexico City, Xavier Pérez Grobet, ASC, AMC (center column) developed an early appreciation for crafting images thanks to his mother and father, who worked as a photographer and architect, respectively. He began honing his craft as a child by shooting films on Super 8. After earning a degree in cinematography from Mexico’s Centro de Capacitación Cinematográphica, Grobet climbed the ranks 74 July 2009

Bender Named Associate Member Mark Bender, Bogen Imaging’s director of sales for the Western Region, recently became an associate ASC member. Born in San Francisco and raised in Los Angeles, he earned an undergraduate degree from the University of the Pacific and specialized in marketing and international business during graduate studies at San Diego State University. Bender recently helped Henner Hofmann, ASC, AMC organize a master class in Mexico City. J.L. Fisher Hosts Mixer Members of the ASC, the Society of Camera Operators and the Interna-

tional Cinematographers Guild recently enjoyed their fourth annual mixer, hosted by J.L. Fisher in Burbank. The event included a panel discussion that focused on the collaboration necessary to create effective camera movements. The discussion was introduced by David Mahlmann, SOC and moderated by George Spiro Dibie, ASC. The panel comprised ASC members Bill Bennett, Richard Crudo, Michael Goi, Donald M. Morgan, Michael Negrin, Daniel Pearl and Kees Van Oostrum; Local 80 members Don Hubbell, Lloyd Moriarty and Russell Nordstedt; SOC members David Frederick, Buddy Fries, Robert Gorelick and Michael Scott; and Local 600 member and 1st AC Bob Hall. Zsigmond Named Cinematographer in Residence Vilmos Zsigmond, ASC was named Kodak Cinematographer in Residence for the spring quarter at the University of California-Los Angeles School of Theater, Film and Television. “The generous spirit of cinematographers, their passion for their art form and their willingness to share their knowledge and insights has made this program an extraordinarily valuable experience for our students,” says William McDonald, the UCLA professor who inaugurated the annual mentorship program in 2000. Elmes, AC at TriBeCa Film Festival Frederick Elmes, ASC was among the participants in a panel discussion at this year’s TriBeCa Film Festival. Titled “A Matter of Choice,” the panel was moderated by AC contributing writer Patricia Thomson and included directors Damien Chazelle, Julio DePietro and Bette Gordon; cinematographer Stuart Dryburgh; and producer Christine Vachon. I

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–

ASC CLOSE-UP Mark Irwin, ASC, CSC

Which cinematographers, past or present, do you most admire? Ozzie Morris, BSC; Arthur Ornitz; Billy Williams, BSC; Gordon Willis, ASC; Owen Roizman, ASC; Michel Brault; Jean Claude Labreque; Conrad Hall, ASC; Richard Leiterman, CSC; Thierry Arbogast, AFC; Roger Deakins, ASC, BSC; Vittorio Storaro, ASC, AIC — the list goes on and on! What sparked your interest in photography? I started taking pictures at around age 10, but I began my ‘career’ in film as a projectionist, first at age 5 with a filmstrip projector in my Sunday School class, and then progressing to full-fledged AV geek status, which lasted way past high school. Where did you train and/or study? I studied political science at the University of Waterloo, where I projected all the films in my ‘The Medium is the Message’ class, and then studied film at York University in Toronto, graduating in 1973. Who were your early teachers or mentors? Terrence McCartney-Filgate was an early pioneer of direct cinema and taught the Maysles brothers and D.A. Pennebaker the vérité style a generation before he taught me. My biggest mentor was David Cronenberg, who began his career as a director/cameraman on Stereo and Crimes of the Future. What are some of your key artistic influences? I started playing guitar at the same time I became interested in photography, in 1956, and I find there are parallels between music and performance, especially jazz, and working with a crew to light and compose a cinematic story for an audience. The mechanical aspects of both visual and musical expression satisfy me very much, particularly the ‘invisible’ control of the cinematographer. How did you get your first break in the business? My first paying gig was in the porno-film world, loading mags with short ends for an ancient BNC and a very impatient director. I managed to talk my way into operating the B camera, but my big break came a year later, when the same director fired his cinematographer and called me to take over — at 10 o’clock on a Sunday night. I was on set by 10:30 and finished that film, prophetically titled Point of No Return, and then shot two more for the same director — after hiring the fired cinematographer as my gaffer! What has been your most satisfying moment on a project? I was lucky enough to shoot a Jackie Chan film, The Protector, in Hong Kong in 1984. By then I had 11 years in the business. Golden Harvest and 76 July 2009

Raymond Chow produced it, and Jim Glickenhaus directed. We had five cameras every day for 66 days, and only two crewmembers spoke English, my A-camera focus puller and the gaffer. Of course, we had very elaborate fight scenes as well as car chases and explosions, and I wasn’t sure how the language and/or experience gap would affect things. But everything went perfectly from Day One. It taught me I was part of the global family of cinematic storytellers. Have you made any memorable blunders? I’d taken 12 years to trade up from an Eclair NPR to a CP reflex to an Arri SR-1 package (with a Zeiss T2 10-100mm and my favorite Angenieux 9.557mm) when the business slowed down so much that I had to sell all my gear, a real disadvantage in the freelance world. The business picked up later, and I ended up shooting a 10-week miniseries with my own cameras — rented from the camera-supply house I’d sold them to! What is the best professional advice you’ve ever received? When director Gil Cates chose me to shoot a love story starring Bea Arthur and Richard Kiley, he said he liked what I’d done on The Fly. I reminded him that Jeff Goldblum and Geena Davis were in a horror film, not a love story. He said, ‘No, they were in love, and that’s what the audience saw. Sometimes you have to ignore the words and let the pictures tell the story.’ What recent books, films or artworks have inspired you? My visual inspiration has always come from the works of David Blackwood, Christopher Pratt and Alex Colville, my favorites of the Magic Realism school. For music: Larry Carlton, Stan Getz, Toots Thielemans, Jaco Pastorius, Diana Krall and Oscar Peterson. Do you have any favorite genres, or genres you would like to try? I began shooting horror films, and that led inexplicably to comedies, but I have always wanted to do more period films, particularly Westerns, Depression-era pictures or Elizabethan dramas. If you weren’t a cinematographer, what might you be doing instead? Playing guitar and taking pictures, and traveling around the world while doing it. Which ASC cinematographers recommended you for membership? Jack Priestley and Gerald Perry Finnerman. How has ASC membership impacted your life and career? Being an ASC member is an invaluable link to everyone in the film community, from labs to camera manufacturers and beyond. There is usually only one director of photography on a set, so being able to connect with people in a similarly lonely position gives us an opportunity to share, compare and learn. My biggest thrills are attending meetings and serving on committees with my true, living heroes and being able to give back what I received as a film student in 1970. I

Photo by Gene Page.

When you were a child, what film made the strongest impression on you? Lord Jim (1965), shot by Freddie Young, BSC; The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), shot by Jack Hildyard, BSC; and The Cranes Are Flying (1957), shot by Sergei Urusevsky. But the films of the National Film Board of Canada, especially those by Donald Brittain and Arthur Lipsett, were the ones that drew me in the most.

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