Cinematography

Documenting the Unimaginable

Wed, 08/23/2017 - 14:58 -- Nick Dager

The Workshop’s True North is an inspiring documentary about Sean Swarner, who in 2002 became the first cancer survivor to reach the top of Mount Everest. He’s kept climbing ever since spreading his encouraging message of hope. In a span of five years, the two-time cancer survivor with only one functioning lung scaled the Seven Summits, the highest mountains in each of the seven continents.

Giving Reality a Cinematic Look

Wed, 08/23/2017 - 14:36 -- Nick Dager

MTV’s new reality series, Siesta Key, takes the tried and tested concept of earlier efforts like Laguna Beach: The Real Orange County and moves it to Florida, following a new group of young adults confronting issues of love, heartbreak, betrayal, class, and looming adulthood as they spend the summer together in their beautiful hometown. Siesta Key is set on a small barrier island off the coast of Sarasota. Cinematographer Gareth Paul Cox shot the series with VariCam 35 and LT cinema cameras.

Cinema Vérité Anne with an E

Tue, 06/27/2017 - 12:21 -- Nick Dager

Anne with an E, a Netflix series, is a filmed adaptation of the classic coming-of-age 1908 novel, Anne of Green Gables, by Canadian author Lucy Maud Montgomery. The series was shot by cinematographer Bobby Shore, CSC with Panasonic VariCam 35 cinema cameras. As a teenager growing up in Canada, Shore was a huge fan of director Darren Aronofsky (Black Swan, Requiem for a Dream) and his cinematographer, Matthew Libatique, ASC. While studying film at Concordia University in Montreal, he worked as an extra on the set of Abandon (2002), a feature film shot by Libatique. “When I would read about movies he [Libatique] was working on, it always seemed like his work came from an emotionally driven place,” reveals Shore. “It was easy for me to latch on to his ideas.”

Creating a Period Look

Tue, 06/20/2017 - 12:08 -- Nick Dager

A young reporter and his niece discover a beautiful and enchanting creature they believe to be a real mermaid, in the 1930s period tale The Little Mermaid, a live-action film inspired by the classic Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale and co-directed by Chris Bouchard and Blake Harris. Book-ended in the present day, The Little Mermaid gave cinematographer Neil Oseman the opportunity to use Cooke S4/i lenses to their fullest, capturing the look he loves from the fantasy/adventure films of the 1980s and1990s for The Little Mermaid’s 1930s look.

Avoiding Torn Frames in Ghost

Mon, 06/12/2017 - 12:38 -- Nick Dager

Typically, torn frames appear when a flash or strobe is not properly timed with a camera’s shutter and frame rate. They appear as a flash in the bottom half of one frame followed by a flash in the top half of the next frame. An innovative light source helped Ghost in the Shell cinematographer Jess Hall, BSC avoid the problem and bring a new level of visual sophistication to director Rupert Sanders’ epic feature.

Why Color Workflows Matter

Fri, 06/09/2017 - 11:05 -- Sarah Priestnall

Designing a precise color workflow during pre-production can save motion picture projects time and money. The larger and more complex the project, the more the potential for savings. Digital imaging technician Francesco Giardello (Pan, Game of Thrones, Ben-Hur, Thor: The Dark World) can accurately be described as a pioneer in the use of the Academy Color Encoding System on-set. He recently designed a set-to-post color workflow using ACES for the movie Life, directed by Daniel Espinosa and starring Jake Gyllenhaal, Rebecca Ferguson and Ryan Reynolds. This space thriller from Sony tells the story of the crew aboard the International Space Station and what happens when they encounter extra-terrestrial life in the form of an organism they name Calvin. On Life, Giardello worked closely with cinematographer Seamus McGarvey ASC BSC. The main cameras used were Arri Alexa 65s although, according to Giardello, several other cameras were also utilized. I spoke with Giardello about the color workflow used on Lif

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