SEPTEMBER 2009

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1 9 2 0 S I N C E • T E C H N I Q U E S P R O D U C T I O N D I G I T A L & F I L M O F J O U R N A L I N T E R N A T I O N A L T H E
A M E R I C A N C I N E M ATO G R A P H E R • S E P T E M B E R 2 0 0 9 • T H E BA A D E R M E I N H O F C O M P L E X , I N G L O U R I O U S BA S T E R D S, M E S R I N E , C A M E R A - A S S E S S M E N T S E R I E S P T. 2 • VO L . 9 0 N O. 9
 M E M B E R P O R T R A I T

Levie Isaacks, ASC

have always loved movies

“I and responded to good

stories. When I got out
of the Army and returned to
college, I got a job answering
the phone at a TV station, and
soon I moved into the news
department. When I was
handed a Bell & Howell
camera, my love affair with
making movies began.
“One of the other
cameramen at the station
showed me American
Cinematographer, and my
eyes must have grown to the
size of silver dollars when I
saw it. I couldn’t believe there
was a magazine about how
cinematographers actually
worked, one that would give
me a chance to learn with every
new issue.
“I keep every issue of
AC, and I’ve always used it as
a reference for techniques I
want to experiment with. AC
is a great inspiration.”
©photo by Owen Roizman, ASC

—Levie Isaacks, ASC

TO SUBSCRIBE BY PHONE:
Call (800) 448-0145 (U.S. only)
(323) 969-4333 or visit the ASC Web site

W W W . T H E A S C . C O M
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S E P T E M B E R 2 0 0 9 V O L . 9 0 N O . 9

The International Journal of Film & Digital Production Techniques

On Our Cover: Gudrun Ensslin (Johanna Wokalek) and Andreas Baader (Moritz Bleibtrau) spearhead a
group of German terrorists in The Baader Meinhof Complex, shot by Rainer Klausmann, BVK. (Photo by
Jürgen Olczyk, courtesy of Vitagraph Films and Constantin Film.)

Features 32 Anarchy in the BRD

Rainer Klausmann, BVK recaptures a turbulent era
for The Baader Meinhof Complex

44 A Nazi’s Worst Nightmare

Robert Richardson, ASC reteams with Quentin 44
Tarantino on Inglourious Basterds

58 An Appetite for Crime

Robert Gantz tails a legendary French bank
robber for Mesrine

70 Testing Digital Cameras: Part 2

The ASC/PGA Camera-Assessment Series points the
way toward workflow solutions for digital cameras

Departments 8
10
Editor’s Note
President’s Desk 58

14 Short Takes: Love Hate

20 Production Slate: North Face
District 9
78 Post Focus: The Red Shoes
Mr. Hulot’s Holiday
86 New Products & Services
96 International Marketplace
98 Classified Ads
98 Ad Index
100 ASC Membership Roster
102 Clubhouse News
104 ASC Close-Up: Alexander Gruszynski 78

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
 S e p t e m b e r 2 0 0 9 V o l . 9 0 , N o . 9
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
————————————————————————————————————
ART DEPARTMENT
CREATIVE DIRECTOR Marion Gore
————————————————————————————————————
ADVERTISING
ADVERTISING SALES DIRECTOR Angie Gollmann
323-936-3769 FAX 323-936-9188
e-mail: gollmann@pacbell.net
ADVERTISING SALES DIRECTOR Sanja Pearce
323-908-3114 FAX 323-876-4973
e-mail: sanja@ascmag.com
ADVERTISING SALES DIRECTOR Scott Burnell
323-936-0672 FAX 323-936-9188
e-mail: sburnell@earthlink.net
CLASSIFIEDS/ADVERTISING COORDINATOR Diella Nepomuceno
323-908-3124 FAX 323-876-4973
e-mail: diella@ascmag.com
————————————————————————————————————
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 hrobinson@tsp.sheridan.com.
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.
————————————————————————————————————
4

  



    

 
    

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 American Society of Cinematographers
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 - 2009/2010
Michael Goi
President
Richard Crudo
Vice President
Owen Roizman
Vice President
Victor J. Kemper
Vice President
Matthew Leonetti
Treasurer
Rodney Taylor
Secretary
John C. Flinn III
Sergeant At Arms

MEMBERS OF THE BOARD

Curtis Clark
Richard Crudo
George Spiro Dibie
Richard Edlund
John C. Flinn III
John Hora
Victor J. Kemper
Matthew Leonetti
Stephen Lighthill
Isidore Mankofsky
Daryn Okada
Owen Roizman
Nancy Schreiber
Haskell Wexler
Vilmos Zsigmond

ALTERNATES
Fred Elmes
Steven Fierberg
Ron Garcia
Michael D. O’Shea
Michael Negrin

MUSEUM CURATOR
Steve Gainer
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 Editor’s Note inematic ambition is evident in every frame of The

C Baader Meinhof Complex, which earned a Best Foreign

Film nomination at the 2009 Academy Awards. Shot by
Rainer Klausmann, BVK, the tense political thriller retraces
the history of the Red Army Faction, which tore a violent
swath through West Germany for a decade, beginning in
the late 1960s. The filmmakers enjoyed extraordinary coop-
eration from German authorities, who allowed them to use
locations that included even Bismarckstrasse, a six-lane
highway that serves as one of Berlin’s main thoroughfares.
“We couldn’t believe that,” marvels director Uli Edel,
noting that the production needed the access to film key
scenes of student protests at the capital’s biggest opera house, the Deutsche Oper. “To
close one of the main veins of the city for three days and nights, just so we could restage
that scene, was amazing.” Klausmann amplified the historical realism by capturing the
drama with an intense, documentary-like camera style. “Finding a visual approach to the
film was easy because to my mind, you can’t play around with history — you have to go
for the facts,” he tells London correspondent Mark Hope-Jones (“Anarchy in the BRD,” page
32.) As our coverage confirms, however, executing this strategy was far from simple.
The makers of the four-hour crime epic Mesrine (“An Appetite for Crime,” page
58) faced equally daunting logistics while telling the story of a flamboyant bank robber who
thoroughly enjoyed his status as France’s “most wanted man” from 1973-’79. The French
government extended extraordinary privileges to the production, which managed to shut
down one of the busiest intersections in Paris, Porte de Clignancourt, to shoot the film’s
climax. “It’s unheard of,” cinematographer Robert Gantz tells Jean Oppenheimer. “That
plaza is a major entry and exit point for Paris.”
A pair of Americans working abroad, director Quentin Tarantino and cinematog-
rapher Robert Richardson, ASC, brought European flavor to their work on the World War II
revenge drama Inglourious Basterds. The filmmakers shot most of the picture at Babelsberg
Studios near Berlin but peppered the project with scenes staged at various locations in both
Germany and France. The resulting visuals reflect Tarantino’s fondness for both homage and
audacious framing: “Quentin and I will have these interesting little battles while I’m
composing a shot,” Richardson tells European correspondent Benjamin Bergery (“A Nazi’s
Worst Nightmare,” page 44). “I naturally move to one side or the other, especially when
shooting anamorphic, whereas Quentin enjoys dead-center framing. For singles in particu-
lar, we’re just cutting dead-center framing from one side to the other, with the actors look-
ing just past the barrel of the lens.”
If you haven’t already guessed, the theme of this issue is international produc-
tion, and it is also reflected in Production Slate articles about the features North Face (shot
at rugged locations in Austria and Switzerland) and District 9 (shot in South Africa), along
with a Short Takes piece on the British project Love Hate.
This issue also includes another installment of our coverage of the ASC/PGA
Camera-Assessment Series (“Testing Digital Cameras: Part 2,” page 70). This time around,
key participants outline the workflow solutions applied to tests involving seven digital
Photo by Douglas Kirkland.

motion-picture cameras.

Stephen Pizzello

Executive Editor
8
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 President’s Desk
ince being elected president of the

S ASC, I’ve been asked by a number of

people what my favorite movies are
and what I believe in. I don’t intend for this
column to be about me, but in the interest
of helping the filmmaking community get
to know me better, I offer these admittedly
random insights. My favorite films are an
eclectic bunch, a baker’s dozen that have
all imparted some pearl of inspiration in
just the right way.
The Graduate (1967) – My favorite
film. I’ve seen it more than 120 times in theaters since I was 8. The cine-
matography, by Robert Surtees, ASC, taught me the emotional value of shadow
and widescreen composition. And then there was Katharine Ross.
L’avventura (1960) – I fell asleep the first two times I tried to watch
Antonioni’s examination of the idle Italian rich because I kept waiting for him
to get back to the plot about the missing girl. It wasn’t until I realized what he
was saying about emotional disconnection through architectural composition
that I felt the characters’ plight acutely; Anna may be physically lost, but all of
us are emotionally lost as well.
Winged Migration (2001) – Yes, it’s 90 minutes of birds flying, but this
film made me feel like I knew what it was like to fly with them. It’s rare that a
movie can change my perspective on something I see every day. This one did.
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1968) – Eli Wallach’s search for the
grave with the gold is still one of the greatest moments in movie history. As he
frantically scans all the graves, the combination of photography, editing and
music is so overwhelming that you completely forget his character cannot read.
Spirited Away (2001) – Hayao Miyazaki’s animated masterpiece
created an amazing world of fantastic creatures and unusual events and made
it all seem real through the eyes of a child. I still want to take a ride on that
train skimming the surface of the lake.
C’était un rendez-vous (1976) – Claude Lelouch mounted a 35mm
camera on the front of a Mercedes and tore through the streets of Paris at 6
a.m. at 85 mph, blowing past red lights and driving up on sidewalks in one
unbroken nine-minute take. Pure cinema. Watch it on the big screen and sit in
the front row.
King Kong (1933) – A big movie in the best sense of the word. This gets
down to the core of what makes movies magical.
All That Jazz (1979) – You can accuse Bob Fosse of ripping off Fellini’s
8 1⁄ 2 all you want, but I happen to like open-heart surgery with my musical
comedy. A perfect partnership of dance, choreography, photography and edit-
ing, it was the natural successor to the unbroken-take, MGM style of dance on
film that Vincente Minnelli did so well in the 1940s and 1950s.
Cemetery of The Elephants (1975) – Armando Robles Godoy manages
to tell the story of a man’s life from boyhood optimism to old age and disillu-
sionment in the space of 15 minutes and makes it emotionally devastating and
unbearably poignant.
The Creeping Terror (1964) – Hideously awful and enormously enter-
taining movie about a space creature that looks like a big, walking carpet with

10
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 an orifice that swallows women whole. You will not be able to get the dance-
hall music out of your head no matter how hard you try.
Pandora’s Box (1929) – It was a tossup between this and Buster
Keaton’s Sherlock Jr. (1924) for my favorite silent film. Pabst’s examination
of the morality of an immoral girl was one of the pinnacle film achievements
in early cinema. You cannot watch the ending without wanting to step into
the story and take Louise Brooks away.
Day for Night (1973) – François Truffaut shows all the problems that
happen when you make a movie and still manages to make it seem like the
most fun you could ever have. Like real life.
L.A. Story (1991) – It took a lot for me to move to Los Angeles, and I
had a hard time even tolerating the place, but Steve Martin showed me I was
taking everything a bit too seriously. Thank you, Steve.
In terms of my beliefs:
I believe working in the motion-picture industry is the best job in the
world, and anyone working in the business who doesn’t feel that way should
get out of it and do something else.
I believe we will be using film until we no longer feel compelled to
compare every new digital medium to film, and when I hold a roll of film in
my hands and look at the individual frames through a light bulb, I’m looking
at the greatest wonder in the world.
I believe I was never complete until I met my wife, Gina, and even
though my son calls everything “Daddy” — the cat, his toy truck, his break-
fast — the first time he said it, he was saying it only to me.
I believe I will always remember Mary Carlisle’s cameo as Impy the
secretary in the 1932 Technicolor short film The Devil’s Cabaret, but I will
never remember what I had for dinner the night before.
I believe new technology is great and valuable and will be replaced by
newer technology as soon as I learn the previous version.
I believe daydreaming is not only worthwhile, but an important artistic
activity to be encouraged and nurtured — but not if you work on the electric
crew.
I believe William A. Fraker, ASC, BSC is no mere mortal, but a benevo-
lent angel sent to earth to remind us that we work in a magical, romantic
industry.
I believe I will never get over being accepted as a member of the ASC.
Never. Don’t even get me started on the whole president thing.
I believe that as phenomenal as the 1930s and the 1970s were in the
history of cinema, the best is yet to come. The craft of cinematography is a
living, breathing and constantly evolving art form. Visual storytellers are what
we are in any media. There are young filmmakers out there who have
absorbed the best of the past and have a vision for the future. You ain’t seen
nothing yet.

Michael Goi, ASC

President

12
Stefan Sonnenfeld
Colorist. Entrepreneur. Fanatic.

© Kodak, 2009. Kodak and Vision are trademarks.

. Film
back to film
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 Short Takes
Embracing Inner Anger
by Iain Stasukevich

The formerly
wimpy Tom (Ben
Whishaw)
exults in the
demonic
influence of his
inner Hate,
which takes the
form of an
attractive
female (Hayley
Atwell) in the
19-minute short
Love/Hate,
directed by
Blake and Dylan
Ritson. The
project was shot
by John Lynch,
who
used Arri’s
proprietary lake and Dylan Ritson’s short film assertive female (Hayley Atwell). She’s ShortFest and a nomination for Best
Mscope format
with the
company’s D-21
digital camera.
B Love Hate is a cautionary tale about
the perils of being too nice. At the
center of the tale is Tom (Ben
had enough of Tom’s antics as a
bumbling pushover and is determined to
turn him into a full-time hater.
British Short at the Edinburgh Interna-
tional Film Festival. The filmmakers
were interested in shooting Love Hate
Whishaw), an affable milquetoast who, Love Hate is the third film writ- in HD, which became an especially
despite his prejudices, does his best to ten and directed by the Ritson brothers, exciting prospect after producer Scott
put on a happy face for his job, his following the comedic shorts Out of Jacobson got in touch with Arri Media
acquaintances and, on occasion, his ex- Time (2004) and More More More U.K.’s Milan Krsljanin, who in turn
girlfriend. He maintains his positive (2007), which earned screenings at the offered to supply the production with

veneer until one fateful afternoon when
he is confronted by the physical mani-
festation of his inner ire, which arrives
in the form of an attractive and very
Berlin, London and Turner Classic
Movies film festivals, among others;
Love Hate has followed suit, winning
the Jury Award at the Palm Springs
Photos and frame grabs courtesy of Origin Pictures. Photos by Nigel Beach.
Arri’s D-21 film-style digital camera.
“They came across as extremely articu-
late and thoughtful people,” remarks
Krsljanin. “They were looking for a tech-

14 September 2009
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 Right: Mscope
exploits the
D-21’s
dual-stream HD
output by splitting
the camera’s 4:3
images into two
16:9 HD frames
that can later be
recombined in
post to create a
single 2:1
squeezed image.
Below: Blake and
Dylan Ritson
review a scene.
nology to help them express their ideas
in a more cinematic way, and while a
lot of filmmakers are using digital
formats to cut costs, sometimes the
power of the image is compromised. I
thought shooting anamorphic would be
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Enabling anamorphic capture
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wherein all of the even lines are
recorded to the first frame, called the E-
16 September 2009
frame, and all of the odd lines are
recorded to the second frame, called
the O-frame. Each separate 1920x1080
frame possesses the captured image’s
full horizontal resolution and half the
vertical resolution (1728x720 pixels),
with a border of 180 lines top and
bottom, and 96 pixels left and right, so
a single stream can be viewed as a
letterboxed 2.40 image on an HD moni-
tor. Both data streams are captured to
the same HDCam SR tape and recom-
bined on a postproduction workstation,
creating a single 2:1 squeezed image
containing 1728x1440 pixels of the
sensor’s 1920x1440 native scanning
resolution. Despite the complexities of
the hardware, it’s actually a simple
workflow solution.
The Ritsons knew that using
anamorphic lenses would lend their
project a bigger look, and they set out to
find a cinematographer who under-
stood the anamorphic format. They
eventually partnered with John Lynch,
whose credits include music videos for
Blur (“Song 2”), Robbie Williams
(“Millennium”) and Bjork (“All is Full of
Love”). Lynch immediately saw the
benefits of using the wide aspect ratio
to capture Tom’s plight: “When it’s
anamorphic, you can have Tom on one
side and Hate on the other, and you see
their relationship in one frame,” he
says.
“The story charts the descent of
somebody who’s generally a nice guy
into this dark place,” Lynch continues. “I
wanted to map that with the camera, so
we started off with a lot of space
around him, framing-wise, and then got
increasingly claustrophobic. The light-
ing becomes darker and more contrasty,
like a 4:1 ratio, and I used less diffusion
on the lamps to make it more punchy.”
While writing the script, the
Ritsons envisioned a realistic look for
Love Hate, with conditions ranging from
daytime exteriors in bright sunlight to
nighttime interiors in poorly lit under-
ground tunnels. Adding to the realism,
the filmmakers shot on location all
around London over the course of five
hectic days, with 25 to 30 setups per
day. With a limited lighting package
that essentially comprised LED panels,
Dedo lights, bits of poly silver and an

   

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 Right: The
milquetoast
eventually
realizes his
embrace of Hate
has turned his
life upside-down.
Bottom:
Cinematographer
John Lynch.
18K for some day interiors, Lynch took
advantage of the D-21’s variable ASA to
make the most of whatever illumination
was naturally available to him. “I
treated the camera as if I were using
film,” the cinematographer remarks. “I
floated around the 500 mark when we
were inside, and went down to
between 50 and 100 when we were
outside. I went to 800 ASA once, when
we were underground in a subway
walkway.”
Tom and Hate enter the subter-
ranean walkway on their way home
from a party. “It’s a dark scene, and the
whole idea is that Tom is drunk,”
explains Blake Ritson. “We put John
and the camera on a rickshaw, and the
movement adds a queasy quality to the
shot.” Lynch elaborates, “The walkway
had LED lights in the roof, which shifted
color every 10 seconds, from green to
blue to red. It’s an unusual effect, and it
added to the beauty of the scene.” For a
18 September 2009
small amount of fill, Lynch also posi-
tioned a handheld Sun Gun near the
camera.
As the film progresses, Tom
becomes increasingly infatuated with
Hate, and in one scene, the two share a
bath. Despite the scene’s sinister
undertones, Lynch and the Ritsons
chose to light it with soft candlelight.
“It’s got a very romantic feel,” says
Dylan. Lynch adds, “We had a small
China ball in the bathroom with us, but
I ended up putting my jacket over it, so
in the end there was nothing there
apart from the candles. The camera
was set to 500 ASA, and my meter was
coming up E, which means there’s noth-
ing there. But I was still very comfort-
able — I’m not afraid of the dark.”
Through most of the shoot,
Lynch kept his Hawk anamorphic lenses
at a T2.8, eschewing the notion of a
“sweet spot” in the middle T-stop
range. Shooting wide open allowed him
more flexibility in low-light situations,
although it also kept 1st AC Nathan
Mann on his toes. “Milan let us know
we could set the camera up in different
ways, like if we wanted to calibrate the
exposure to be biased towards high-
lights or shadows,” Lynch explains. “I
didn’t want to bias towards darkness,
because when we went outside we’d
have to recalibrate the camera. I set the
exposure calibration in the middle of
the exposure range and treated it like
film.”
Post work for Love Hate was
carried out at London’s Ascent 142.
Because it was the first project to use
Mscope, a proprietary Smoke plug-in
called Spark was developed specifically
for the image recombination. The grade
was performed on a da Vinci Resolve by
colorist Rob Pizzey, who also used the
system to unsqueeze the HD picture
into a flat 2.40:1 image. The final film
was mastered to HDCam SR, and an
anamorphic film print was also struck to
Kodak Vision 2383.
“This is our first time with the
format and we found it to be a really
exciting process,” Blake enthuses. “It
presented us with a lot of creative
possibilities.” Krsljanin adds, “All of
the elements came together nicely.
The filmmakers really used their tools
to capture the insecurities of the char-
acters in a visually compelling way.
They had a great cinematographer and
a great cast; it was a match made in
heaven. I know they’ll continue to
make big moves in the motion-picture
industry.”
TECHNICAL SPECS
2.40:1
High-Definition Video
Arri D-21
Hawk lenses
Digital Intermediate
Printed on Kodak Vision 2383
I
 Production Slate
Political Climbers and Extraterrestrial Immigrants
The German
film North Face
depicts an
attempt by
childhood
friends Andreas
Hinterstoisser
(Florian Lukas,
left) and Toni
Kurz (Benno
Fürmann) to
scale the
treacherous
north face of
Eiger Mountain
in 1936.

A Perilous Peak
by Jon Silberg
In the early 1930s, as Adolf Hitler’s
government set about working Germany
into the racist and nationalistic fervor that
would perpetuate World War II, moun-
taineers who were keen to conquer the
treacherous north face of Switzerland’s
Eiger Mountain provided the perfect
iconography for the propagandists. The
German film North Face (Nordwand)
depicts the attempt by German moun-
taineers Toni Kurz (Benno Fürmann) and
Andreas Hinterstoisser (Florian Lukas) to
scale the peak. Players in their story
include the cynical newspaper editor
(Ulrich Tukur) who wants to exploit their
pursuit, and the climbers’ young journalist
friend (Johanna Wokalek), who hopes the
story will be her big break but grows
increasingly worried about the pair’s
safety.
North Face was directed by
Philipp Stölzl and photographed by Kolja
Brandt, who won Germany’s Lola Award
for his work on the picture. The two had
collaborated on a number of music videos
and commercials, but Brandt speculates
that it was his documentary-style
approach to the 2006 feature Tough
Enough that sold Stölzl on his ability to
meet North Face’s challenges.
Stölzl was inspired by Kevin
Macdonald’s documentary/dramatic re-
enactment hybrid Touching the Void (AC
March ’04) and hoped to achieve a simi-
lar degree of realism in North Face. He
and his collaborators eventually decided
to first shoot stunt climbers on location,
then shoot the actors in a studio, and do
some elaborate compositing in post. In
North Face photos and frame grabs courtesy of Music Box Films. Additional photos courtesy of Kolja Brandt.
accordance with this plan, Stölzl, Brandt
and a skeleton crew comprising a
costumer, an assistant director and a
few assistants traveled to Switzerland
six months prior to principal photography
and set about shooting on the Eiger and
other nearby locations.
Brandt’s goal was to get the
camera in close to the climbers while
maintaining the ability to read the
surrounding environment. To achieve
this, he and B-camera operator Tommy
Ulrich were suspended by rope along-
side the professional climbers and
filmed with Arri 235s, pulling focus
themselves. “I love to have the camera
on my shoulder and be right where
everything happens,” says Brandt, who
spent three months training at a climb-
ing gym before the shoot. “And luckily,
I’m not afraid of heights!” The impetus

20 September 2009
 Left: Kurz and
Hinterstoisser
are joined in
their quest by
Austrian
climbers Edi
Rainer (Georg
Friedrich) and
Willy Angerer
(Simon Schwarz).
Below: Director
Philipp Stölzl
(foreground, left)
and the crew
prepare to film
Schwarz and
Friedrich in the
studio, which
was actually a
large, industrial
freezer.

to keep the cameras close to the
climbers was inspired in part by Robert
Capa’s still photography. “Capa always
had the camera really near to the thing
he was shooting — he said, ‘If your
pictures aren’t good enough, you aren’t
close enough,’” says Brandt. “Philipp and
I didn’t want to have a lot of shots from
far away with long lenses.”
He did use long lenses, however,
to delineate the perspective of the spec-
tators who gather at a cozy hotel at the
foot of the mountain to witness the
climb. “The spectators were watching
Bottom photo ©Kolja Brandt. Used with permission.
sun, and then only in the late afternoon,”
notes Brandt. He shot these scenes on
Fuji Super-F 64D 8522 and Eterna 250D
8563, using a mix of Cooke and Ange-
nieux lenses. “We took two Angenieux
Optimo short zooms [15-40mm] to the
mountain because the short Cooke zoom
lens wasn’t out at the time,” he says. “I
shot most of the rest of the picture with
Cooke S4 primes, my favorite lenses.
We used really long lenses for the spec-
tators’ perspective, including a Canon
1,000mm lens for one shot. I knew we
were going to finish with a digital inter-
mediate, so I wasn’t worried about the
slight differences between the lenses.”
The Eiger region “is actually very
good for shooting,” he continues. “You
can go up to Jungfraujoch by train, and
there is a tourist platform made of steel
that we could attach ropes to and drop
down from. The platform is at 3,500

the climb through a telescope, and for

that perspective, we used long lenses to
emphasize how much distance there is
between them and the things they’re
looking at on the mountain,” he says.
“They couldn’t know what was really
happening out there, even though they
could see it.”
Shooting on the mountain, the
team used the weather to determine
which scenes would be shot when and
where. Snow, mist and general overcast
conditions were the norm. “The wall is a
north face, so only part of it gets direct

American Cinematographer 21
 meters [11,483'], and we would hang
down about 20 or 30 meters [70'-100'].
From there, we were looking down
another 100 meters [328'] to the first
ledge. The stunt doubles, who are well-
known Alpinists, would be lowered, and I
would be lowered with a safety climber.
The camera was on its own rope, so
when the mag was empty, an assistant
could pull it up, change the mag and
lower it back down to me. Dietmar Raiff,
my great first assistant, and his crew had
all the equipment and film stock in a tent
on the platform — we couldn’t take the
lenses or stock inside because of the
temperature difference — and they
worked tirelessly, even in the worst
storms.”
For the studio portion of the shoot,
a section of the mountain’s face was re-
created in an industrial freezer that
measured roughly 100'x66' and had a 49'
ceiling. “The cooling machines were very
Above: Director loud, and we also had wind machines
of photography
Kolja Brandt going, so it was impossible to shoot any
shoulders an sync sound,” notes Brandt. “But we felt it
Arri 235 to film was important to shoot in an environment
Swiss Alpinist
Stefan Siegrist that was really cold. We wanted the audi-
(doubling for ence to really feel the coldness and see
Fürmann) on the actors’ breath.” He shot these scenes
Jungfraujoch.
Right: Brandt with an Arri 235, teaming with B-camera
pauses for a operator Franz Hinterbrandner, who
photo op. wielded an Arricam Lite. To create the
overcast-day look onstage, he bounced
Dinos and 10Ks off the enclosure’s gray,
concrete walls and through butterfly nets.
Just outside the frozen stage,
editor Sven Budelmann received a line

Photos by Thomas Ulrich, ©Kolja Brandt. Used with permission.

from the camera tap so he could create
rough comps of the finished scenes.
“Every two or three hours, Philipp could
go out and watch a whole scene,” says
Brandt. “It was very helpful to have that
reference right there.” He credits visual-
effects supervisor Stefan Kessner with
making the location and studio footage
blend seamlessly in post.
Most of the scenes that are not
set on the mountain take place in the
hotel where the spectators gather. After
attempting to secure the actual inn at the
Eiger, the production decided to shoot at
a similar location in Austria. In the hotel,
Brandt transitioned to an Arricam Lite and
mainly shot Fuji Eterna 500T 8573. (He

22 September 2009
 Film & Digital:
The Best of
Both Worlds

Michael Condon, SOC Andree Martin

VP Digital Division VP Technical Services

Some rental houses are film and others are digital. We
strive to be the best of both.
Our roots are in film. Over the past 30 years we have
steadily expanded our inventory to include a vast variety
of 35mm and 16mm film cameras. These are coupled
with the industry’s widest selection of specialty and
standard lenses to give cinematographers the ability to
maximize their creativity. You want it; we probably have it.
We started our digital division in 2001, where we
modified our Sony F900 cameras to be film-friendly;
capable of quick lens changes, consistent focus in
varying temperatures, etc. Then we worked closely with
manufacturers to ensure that ergonomics of their
products would be optimized for camera crews with a
film background. Today, our digital inventory has
expanded to include Arri D-21, Sony F23 and F35,
Iconix, Panasonic, and Red cameras. All supported with
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Our goal is to provide outstanding service 24/7. Feel free
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 Above: This used 8563 for some day scenes.) “We more fill, and in the adjacent room, we
frame grab had a very talented production designer, had 2Ks bouncing off big polys. All of
shows a climber
at work on the Udo Kramer, who put all kinds of practi- the dining-room lights were on a
Eiger. Below: B- cals in the lobby for us,” says the cine- dimmer and gelled with ¼ CTO. We
camera operator matographer. “To light the hotel dining worked at a very low light level — T2.5
Thomas Ulrich
(hanging from room, my gaffer, Christoph Nickel, used to T2.8 — with the 500-speed stock.
the Jungfraujoch a mix of 800-watt Redheads with That gave us a nice look and really
platform) Chimeras, a couple of Lowel Rifa-lites helped point out the contrast between
prepares to film
on location in and Zips for semisoft backlight, and a the guests’ comfortable environment
Switzerland. 6K Barger Baglite with a Chimera for and the climbers who were struggling
the tables in the background. Some 1Ks to survive.”
bounced off the ceiling provided a little The negative was processed by
Arri Film & TV Services, which also
provided DI services to the production.
The negative was scanned at 2K on an
Arriscan, colorist Traudl Nicholson
graded the picture on an Autodesk
Lustre Master, and the finalized files
were filmed out via an Arrilaser. Brandt
emphasizes that the time spent in the DI
suite was important because it enabled
him and Stölzl to work through some
important creative issues. “Philipp has a
very good eye, and he started grading it
before I was able to get there,” says the
cinematographer. “During the shoot, we
had talked about having soft blacks, not
crushed blacks, and going for a look that
wouldn’t take the audience away from
the mountain. But when I got to the DI
suite, the picture had really crushed
blacks and an aqua-color, 1950s kind of
look. I know Philipp, and I wanted him to
have an opportunity to experiment, so I
said, ‘It looks good.’
24 September 2009
“After a week of roughly grading
it, I wrote him an e-mail over the week-
end and said, ‘I think we’re wrong with
this look.’ We met again on Monday in
the DI room, and he asked what I’d
meant, and I reminded him how we’d
talked about it initially. After that, we got
the picture to the look you see now,
which I am very happy with. That’s what
I like about the DI: it’s a process. You can
try everything out.”
Brandt marvels at the fortitude
displayed by climbers like Kurz and
Hinterstoisser. “You have to respect
them. Today, we climb mountains with
lots of equipment and warm jackets,
and they didn’t have any of that. We
could call a helicopter if we needed it.
We could change our clothes when they
got wet. We could have hot tea. I’m a
physical guy, and I love that kind of
work, but when I look at what those Bottom photo ©Kolja Brandt. Used with permission.
climbers achieved back then, it really
touches me.”
TECHNICAL SPECS
2.40:1
Super 35mm (3-perf)
Arri 235; Arricam Lite
Cooke, Angenieux and
Canon lenses
Fuji Super F-64D 8522; Eterna 250D
8563, 500T 8573
Digital Intermediate
¢
Right: Wikus Ven
De Merwe
(Sharlto Copley)
marvels at the
mothership that
brought an alien
species to Earth
in District 9,
directed by Neill
Blomkamp and
photographed by
Trent Opaloch.
The film was
shot almost
entirely on
location in
Johannesburg,
South Africa.
Below: The
entrance to
District 9, where
the aliens are
sequestered and
forced into a
humiliating
existence.
Aliens in South Africa tently landed on Earth and are subse- create Johannesburg on a backlot or
by Jay Holben quently sequestered by the govern- stage,” says Opaloch. “The textures
ment. The project is the first feature there are really amazing. In the end,
In the winter cold and swirling for Blomkamp, a visual-effects artist, we shot about 95 percent of the movie
dust of Johannesburg, South Africa, and cinematographer Trent Opaloch, in Johannesburg, with a little bit of
military teams mobilize quickly to who has collaborated with Blomkamp splinter work in Wellington, New
round up a group of illegal immigrants on commercials and music videos in Zealand, and some motion-capture
and return them to District 9, their Vancouver, British Columbia. work in Vancouver.
slum in Soweto. There, like so many of Blomkamp, a native of Johan- “A number of large-scale
South Africa’s poor, these lost and nesburg, was keen to shoot all eight productions have been shot in the
confused souls survive in corrugated weeks of principal photography on area, and there is good support for
steel shanties. But the inhabitants of location in South Africa because he [filmmaking],” he continues. “Our keys
District 9 aren’t human. In fact, they knew the conditions and textures of were from New Zealand, the United
aren’t even from this planet. the real Soweto could not be effec- Kingdom, Canada and South Africa,
Directed by Neill Blomkamp, tively re-created anywhere else. “The but we hired the majority of our crew
District 9 (based on Blomkamp’s short studio [Sony Pictures] talked about locally in Cape Town and Johannes-
film Alive in Joburg) follows a race of shooting some of the movie in New burg. Those guys were really amazing.
extraterrestrials that have inadver- Zealand, but we just couldn’t re- They work on commercials and
features all the time, and I had a great

District 9 photos by David Bloomer, courtesy of Sony Pictures.

experience with them.”
One of the key reasons for
shooting on location was the quality
of Johannesburg’s winter air. “Winter
there is hardcore,” says Opaloch, “and
in the townships, people burn what-
ever they can to provide warmth.
We’d drive to the location in the morn-
ing and see people burning tires to
cook their breakfast on. It’s certainly
not a healthy environment, and the
layers of atmosphere this dust and
smoke puts on the horizon is unbeliev-
able — it looks and feels like a war
zone. We scheduled the photography
in the harsh winter months specifi-

26 September 2009
 cally to get that look.
“It’s amazing how different the
summer looks,” he continues. “We had
to do some pickups in December, South
Africa’s summer, and it was clean and
green and lush! We had to be very
selective about our framing to try and
match the winter photography.”
The winter shoot had a visible
effect on the gear, which included six
Red One cameras owned by Peter
Jackson, the film’s producer, and two
Sony PMW-EX1s. “My first assistant,
Houston Hadden, would take me into
the camera truck and show me the dirt
and grime he was pulling out of the
camera every night, and it looked like
Top: Backed up an ashtray had been poured out of the
by Multinational camera!” recalls Opaloch. Despite the
United agents, conditions, however, the cameras
Ven De Merwe
hopes for a remained in working order throughout
friendly the shoot.
exchange with The One’s 4K image serves as
one of the
aliens. Middle: the movie’s main perspective, whereas
An alien offers the 1920x1080 HD image from the EX1
its human represents footage shot by journalists
guards an
inscrutable embedded in the alien township. “We
expression. briefly considered shooting Super 16,
Bottom: With the and we talked a bit about shooting
help of 1st AC
Houston Hadden with the Sony F23, but the Red offered
(right) and 2nd us more of the look and functionality
AC P.J. we wanted,” says Opaloch. “If Sony’s
Makosholo
(wearing F35 had been out at the time, we
yellow), Opaloch certainly would have considered it, too.
(seated at “I like the Red system, and we
camera) frames
a shot for got a lot of support from the company,”
Blomkamp he continues. Working in Redcode 36,
(holding “we were shooting onto 8-gig CF cards,
monitor).
which started to feel a bit like a film
shoot because we were limited to the
shooting time, about 4½ minutes per
card. Also, the accessories for the Red
were all what we’re used to using
[with film cameras]. The great benefit
to shooting digitally was the ability to
run to the digital-imaging technician’s
truck and see the footage right away.”
On the truck, Red camera supervisor
Jonathan Smiles had two 30" HD moni-
tors. Smiles would receive the CF cards
from the set, open the footage in Red
Cine, and then he and Opaloch would
apply either a preset or custom curve to
the raw footage for viewing the
selected shots. ¢

28 September 2009
 Opaloch looks When you embed visual effects into
through the Red that footage, it grounds the effects in
One’s electronic
viewfinder. “The a kind of reality that’s really unique.
great benefit to “The most helpful thing to me
shooting digitally was the built-in light meter in the
was the ability to
run to the Red,” continues Opaloch, who was
digital-imaging working with Build 15 of the camera.
technician’s “I had heard bad things about the
truck and see the
footage right built-in meter, but [the problems] were
away,” he says. all ironed out by the time I got to work
with the camera. With the combina-
tion of my light meter, the built-in
meter and the ability to run into the
truck and check the shots, I had
absolute confidence in how we were
shooting.”
“We were shooting in a lot of harsh sunlight. The production also Opaloch rated the One at 320
high-contrast lighting, and I was carried a 20'x30' silk that could be ISO. One of the oft-discussed concerns
mostly concerned with how highlights flown from a crane to diffuse the about the Red system is its infrared
were being represented in the Red sunlight from above or used on the sensitivity and the resultant color
footage,” says Opaloch. “I was careful ground to soften the HMIs. “For the anomalies that can arise while
to make sure the highlights didn’t journalists’ material, shot with EX1s, employing ND filters in high-contrast
blow out, and that meant using a lot we just let the highlights go,” he adds. situations with high IR light — in other
more fill than I would normally use.” “We also let the focus go on those words, the conditions encountered by
He used a combination of 18K and 4K cameras to make it feel more immedi- the District 9 crew. “I certainly noticed
HMIs to help shape and fill in the ate, real and rough around the edges. IR pop-off,” says Opaloch. “We ended

30
up shipping in some IR NDs and front-
surface mirrors from London, but it
was difficult to integrate them in
handheld situations, especially when
we were trying to backlight action as
much as possible. With the stack of
filters and backlight, there was always
the risk of getting reflections on the
filters and ghosts in the image. When-
ever possible, we strove to fix the
problem by being careful about what
we shot; we’d adjust wardrobe when
it was a problem and allow a little
IR spill into the shadows when we
couldn’t control it, knowing that we
could time it out later. Tiffen has since
introduced Red IR-ND filters that take
care of this issue.”
Actor Jason Cope portrayed
the aliens in the movie, donning a
trackball suit so the visual-effects
team, comprising artists from
Embassy Image Engine and Weta
Digital, could replace his human form
with various alien ones. “A big direc-
tive for us was to eliminate as much
rotoscoping as possible,” says
Opaloch. “Because we would be
replacing Jason completely with CG
characters, we knew that the cleaner
the background was, the easier the
replacement would be. If we had a
shot where Jason was going to enter
the frame against some dense foliage
that would require heavy rotoscoping,
we moved over two feet to avoid that
background. We also knew that any
given shot could become a visual-
effects shot — we might add the
mothership to a sky shot, for example
— so we always made an effort to
keep simple, trackable geometry in
the frame. If we could give the visual-
effects artists a little piece of back-
ground that would make tracking
easier, we tried to do it all the time.
“District 9 was a really amazing
experience,” he concludes. “I love
doing things that are exciting and
interesting, and it was great to
contribute to a film that’s so different.”
TECHNICAL SPECS
1.85:1
4K Digital Capture and
High-Definition Video
Red One; Sony PMW-EX1;
Vision Research Phantom HD
Cooke and Angenieux lenses
Digital Intermediate
Printed on Kodak Vision 2383
I
Errata
In our July coverage of Public
Enemies, the Zeiss 6-24mm DigiZoom
was omitted from the list of lenses
used on the production. Cinematogra-
pher Dante Spinotti, ASC, AIC made
equal use of the Zeiss and Fujinon zoom
lenses he discussed in the article.
In the same issue, the name of
actress Yolande Moreau was
misspelled in our coverage of
Séraphine.
31
 Anarchy
in the BRD

The Baader Meinhof Complex, shot by Rainer Klausmann, BVK,

details the rise and fall of a German terrorist group.
by Mark Hope-Jones
Unit photography by Jürgen Olczyk

32 September 2009
 n the summer of 1967, during

I
protests against the Shah of Iran’s
state visit to West Berlin, an
unarmed student named Benno
Ohnesorg was shot and killed by
a plainclothes policeman.
Ohnesorg’s killing sent shock waves
through German society, crystalliz-
ing the anger of a youth movement
that viewed America’s presence in
Vietnam as imperialism and its own
government as authoritarian. The
Baader Meinhof Complex charts the
10 tumultuous years that followed, as
student protests paved the way to
organized domestic terrorism. A
particularly single-minded group of
extremists, led by Ulrike Meinhof
and Andreas Baader, founded the
Red Army Faction to wage war on
the state. As the group’s attacks
Opposite:
intensified, the West German police Terrorist
were forced to modernize in order to mastermind
make arrests that provoked new Andreas Baader
(Moritz Bleibtrau)
kidnappings and killings. Despite the is cornered by
arrest of several key Red Brigade German police
members, the violence escalated, during a shootout
in broad daylight.
eventually culminating in the bloody This page, top:
“German Autumn” of 1977. Two members of
Although he has worked the Red Army
Faction, Willy
predominantly in Germany Peter Stoll
throughout his 28-year career, cine- (Hannes
matographer Rainer Klausmann, Wegener, left)
and Peter-Jürgen
BVK is Swiss and has always lived in Boock (Vinzenz
Zurich, so the real events depicted in Kiefer, on car)
the film had a limited impact on him ambush a high-
level target.
as a young man. “I got married in Middle:
1970, and I was more interested in Journalist Ulrike
my new wife than in political Meinhof (Martina
Photos courtesy of Vitagraph Films and Constantin Film.

Gedeck), who
affairs!” he says. “I knew the story a becomes
bit from newspapers and television, Baader’s
but it wasn’t really part of me; I was accomplice,
surveys the scene
never a student and I wasn’t in as protesters
Germany at the time.” attempt to
Instead of studying film at blockade the
Axel Springer
college, Klausmann learned his skills Group Publishing
on the job in the early 1980s. “I was Houses, an
an assistant in Switzerland with incident sparked
by the shooting of
[cinematographer] Hans Liechti and political dissident
then Thomas Mauch, a German Rudi Dutschke.
director of photography,” he Bottom:
Cinematographer
explains. “I was second camera on Rainer
Werner Herzog’s Fitzcarraldo [1982] Klausmann, BVK
with Mauch and then started out on lines up a shot.

American Cinematographer 33
Anarchy in the BRD
Right: For a
scene in which
Dutschke gives
a speech
protesting the
Vietnam War, the
production
filmed at the
actual location,
an auditorium at
the Technical
University in
Berlin. “The only
problem was
that it was much
bigger than we
expected!” says
director Uli Edel.
“We realized we
weren’t going to
be able to do it
with just 400
extras. On the
day, we got
1,200, which
filled half of the
room, and we
eventually
doubled them
with visual
effects.” Below:
In a meticulous my own. Eventually I was working When Eichinger took on The Baader anything together,” says Edel. “When
re-creation of a with directors like Oliver Meinhof Complex, he coaxed director this movie came along, I knew he
famous news
photograph
Hirschbiegel and Fatih Akin; the Uli Edel, an old friend from film would be perfect.”
taken by scripts got better and the work got school, back to Germany from a Though Klausmann had been
Bernard Larsson, better.” successful television career in the little affected by the events of the
a young woman
(Leonie Brandis)
In 2004, Klausmann shot States. Neither man had any doubt time, he was sensitive to the fact that
tends to dying Hirschbiegel’s Downfall, an that Klausmann was the man they Edel felt a great emotional connec-
student protester Academy Award-nominated study wanted behind the camera: “I’ve tion with the story, having lived
Benno Ohnesorg
(Martin Glade),
of Hitler’s final days in his bunker known Rainer for 20 years, and I’ve through it at close quarters as a
who was shot beneath war-torn Berlin, for always followed his work, although student in Germany. “Finding a
and killed by a German producer Bernd Eichinger. we never had an opportunity to do visual approach to the film was easy
police officer
during
because to my mind, you can’t play
demonstrations around with history — you have to
against the Shah go for the facts,” says Klausmann.
of Iran’s state
visit to Berlin.
“Uli didn’t want to present his own
The scene was vision of that era; he wanted to tell
shot at the exact the real stories.”
location of the
real incident,
Many of the events from
near the those difficult years, when West
Deutsche Oper Germany was still a relatively young
Berlin.
democracy, are so well known that
to stray too far from reality would
have alienated the film’s domestic
audience. “The shooting of Rudi
Dutschke [a student activist who
narrowly survived an attempt on his
life in 1968] was comparable [in
cultural impact] to the assassination
of John F. Kennedy,” says Edel. “I
know exactly where I was when I
heard the news. Everybody in

34 September 2009
 Top: Police bear
down on
students
protesting the
Shah’s visit.
Bottom left: An
explosion rocks
the U.S.
Parkplatz.
Bottom right:
Director Uli
Edel (standing
in truck, to the
right of boom
operator) and
the crew
prepare to
capture a street
scene.

Germany does, so you cannot
change these things too much.”
The most iconic moments of
the story were therefore re-created
on set with scrupulous attention to
detail; they serve as visual anchor
points, punctuating a chronological
narrative that links them all together.
“Those images were burned into the
consciousness of a generation,” says
Edel. “The image of a woman lean-
ing over the dying Ohnesorg went
around the world, so we wanted to
get as close as possible to the reality
of that. Most German people
remember Ohnesorg and Dutschke
without necessarily knowing how
they were connected; what I tried to
do was to give those 10 years a narra-
tive that lets you understand how it
all started and where it went.”
Klausmann’s cinematographic
approach was principally dictated by
the film’s fast-paced montage struc-
ture and the decision to cut original
television footage in with the action
throughout. “We watched a lot of real
footage and there were long discus-
sions about what [clips] to use,” he
says. “The color matching of the film
was influenced by what we used,
because our movie had to fit with the
real stuff; we avoided strong reds,
blues or greens and we desaturated
the image in the DI. Otherwise, it
would have looked like two different
movies, and that’s not good.”
For the same reason,
Klausmann’s camerawork was
informed by a newsgathering style
that would complement the sponta-
neous energy of the archival mater-
ial. “The idea was to make the whole
film in this documentary style so it
matched the original footage,” says

American Cinematographer 35
Anarchy in the BRD
Police crack
down hard
during the Shah
protests.
Edel. “I gave the actors a lot of free-
dom, especially in the bigger scenes
with all the extras. It was very impor-
tant that we could really follow the
action; we did not want to create the
action through cuts. That’s why
there were so many Steadicam and
handheld shots.”
This approach suited Klaus-
mann well: “Uli knows that I like to
handhold the camera,” he says. “The
actors like it, too, because they can
36 September 2009
do what they want and it’s my prob-
lem to follow them! I don’t like too
much technical stuff, [like] using a
lot of cranes and modern gear; I
prefer to do it the way I think it was,
to make it more real. If you’re nearer
to reality, you’re nearer to the story
and it’s more likely to work. I never
used filters on the film; it was just
about the available light and using
what was there.”
Klausmann opted to shoot
with Arricam Studios and Lites and
Arri Master Primes. “I first used the
Master Primes when they gave me
two or three to try on The Invasion
[2007],” he says. “I really liked them
then, and I think they’re still the best
lenses available. Their speed is good,
but mainly I like the way they match
with colors, and they’re not as hard
as the previous [Zeiss] Superspeeds.
To me, they’re perfect.”
In the spirit of authenticity,
Edel made an effort to shoot at loca-
tions where real events had taken
place. “We always tried to get the
original location first, and we got
very lucky with the most important
places,” he says. One such setting was
the Deutsche Oper Berlin, the opera
house that was the backdrop to the
protests that led to Ohnesorg’s death.
To Edel’s surprise, city authorities
granted the production permission
to shut down Bismarckstrasse, a six-
lane highway. “We couldn’t believe
Berlin gave us that,” the director
continues. “To close one of the main
veins of the city for three days and
nights, just so we could restage that
scene, was amazing.”
 Top: Baader
listens to radio
reports of Red
Army Faction
activities while
languishing in
his cell at
Stammheim
Prison. Below
left: Red Army
Faction member
Holger Meins
(Stipe Erceg)
struggles during
his arrest. Below
right: Astrid
(Katharina
Wackernagel)
resists a pair of
guards at Köln-
Ossendorf
Prison.

1st AC Astrid Miegel, who has
worked alongside Klausmann for the
last eight years, says four cameras
were used on Bismarckstrasse to
capture the chaos of a demonstra-
tion that descends into violence and
panic. “One Lite was handheld, two
were Steadicam and one Studio was
fixed on a static dolly with an
Angenieux 25-250mm,” she details.
“The Steadicams had several of the
most important shots, so it took
time for Rainer to get those exactly
as he wanted them; then, near the
end, he came over to our Studio and
we just searched for little details at
the long end of the zoom.”
“With four cameras running
you get the chaos, no problem,” says
Klausmann. “But within that [overall
approach] we wanted to get specific
images that had appeared on the
original news coverage of the event.
You have to start with the big shots,
with everybody there, and then you
move closer and closer until you’re
getting little moments like the young
girl being crushed against the barrier.
We had talked a lot about how it
should look, and then we story-
boarded all of it; capturing that
sequence was primarily a logistical
problem.”
Heavy rain at the location cost
the crew almost an entire day, but
shooting with multiple cameras
allowed them to make up the time.
However, this also created the risk of
cameramen wandering into each
others’ frames. “There is a moment
where you see one of our handheld
cameras fully in the shot,” admits
Edel. “But it was a great moment and
I didn’t want to lose it just because of
the camera, so we left it there — and

American Cinematographer 37
Anarchy in the BRD
Right: Gudrun
Ensslin (Johanna
Wokalek) and
Horst Mahler
(Simon Licht)
take aim while
receiving
military training
at a camp in
Jordan run by
the Palestinian
organization El
Fatah. Below:
Ulrich (Jakob
Diehl) takes a
tense phone call
during the
occupation of the
German embassy
in Stockholm.

nobody ever notices!”
Edel stayed close to his cine-
matographer throughout these
hectic setups, rather than trying to
control too much at once. “A lot of
directors have microphones and talk
to the cameramen from behind the
monitors, but I never do that,” he
says. “I was generally running along
next to Rainer and the main camera;
I like to be where he is so I can guide
him and communicate with him
constantly.”
The only other scene that
required four camera teams was set
in an auditorium at the Technical
University in Berlin, where Dutschke
gave a speech protesting the Vietnam
War just weeks before he was gunned
down. Edel location-scouted the
university during prep and found the
auditorium eerily unchanged by the
passing years. “It’s still exactly the
same,” the director attests. “I think we
just had to cover some modern loud-
speakers, but the rest was absolutely
original. The only problem was that
it was much bigger than we expected!
We realized we weren’t going to be
able to do it with just 400 extras. On
the day, we got 1,200, which filled
half of the room, and we eventually
doubled them with visual effects.”
Working with supervisors
from Arri Film & TV Services in
Munich, Klausmann and Edel shot
separate plates with the extras pack-
ing first the ground floor and then
the upper level of the auditorium.
“The Arri guys came on set and told
me what was possible, or not possi-
ble, or possible but very expensive!”
says Klausmann. “Occasionally you
have to do things you don’t like,
because otherwise the effects
become too costly; the camera
movement might be limited or you
might have to be very careful about
the background. It helped to go
through the shot list in advance with
the visual effects team and plan
exactly what we were going to do.”
Klausmann kept the lighting
in the auditorium as simple and
natural as he possibly could. “We
switched on the fluorescent lights
that had been there for more than 20
years, and that was it,” he says. “They
were the old kind of fluorescent
tubes, but they were fine; we didn’t
change any bulbs. The light was a
little bit green, but the place looks
like what it should look like: a

38 September 2009
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 Anarchy in the BRD
university hall. We just corrected for
the green a little bit in the DI.”
Gaffer Peter Fritscher recalls,
“The university had a system that
allowed us to change the color of the
fluorescent tube lights, but only in
the entrance — not the whole hall.
We just matched those to the lights
we couldn’t change in the rest of the
hall. There were no other film lights
at all; we just used reflector board for
the actors’ eyes on some of the close
shots.”
Shooting fluorescents with
Kodak Vision2 250D 5205 gave the
four camera teams just enough light.
“Rainer and I were about one stop
underexposed because we were on
the zoom, which was only a T3.5,”
says Miegel. “The Master Primes on
the other cameras were around
Top: Baader rises T2.8.” Klausmann’s preference for
to taunt the judge
as he and his
natural lighting and the use of either
co-defendants Vision2 50D 5201 or 250D 5205 for
stand trial in all interior scenes (only night scenes
Stammheim
Prison. Middle:
were shot on Vision2 500T 5260)
The multi- meant that lenses were almost wide
purpose hall at open throughout the shoot. “We
Stammheim,
another authentic
were usually somewhere between T2
location, also and T2.8,” continues Miegel. “It
remains virtually makes my job harder, but I’ve
unaltered.
General lighting
worked with Rainer for eight years
was provided and it’s always like that!”
by existing When Meinhof, Baader and
fluorescent tubes
in the ceiling, but
other prominent RAF members were
a few small arrested in June 1972, they were sent
fixtures, to Stammheim Prison in Stuttgart
including color-
corrected 4-bank
and eventually faced a trial that lasted
Kino Flos, added from 1975 until 1977. The lengthy
supplemental fill hearings were held inside the prison
for close-ups.
Bottom (from
in a multi-purpose hall that remains
left): 1st AC virtually unaltered to this day; once
Astrid Miegel, again the filmmakers were able to re-
operator Markus
Eckert and 2nd
create events in the exact location
AC Miriam where they originally took place. “My
Fassbender tend approach to lighting that room was
to their duties.
the same as at the university,” says
Klausmann. “I mostly used what was
there.” Suspended above the hall were
about 50 banks of fluorescent tubes
that had been there since the prison
was built. These provided general
lighting, but a few small fixtures, such
as 4-bank Kino Flos, were used to

40 September 2009
 Anarchy in the BRD
Edel (left) and
producer-
screenwriter
Bernd Eichinger
take five on the
Köln-Ossendorf
prison set.
add supplemental fill for close-ups;
these units were color-corrected to
match the fluorescents on the ceiling.
Despite the size of the hall, only two
cameras were used for the court-
room scenes, and handheld camera-
work was abandoned in favor of
Steadicam and tripod shots. “It’s
kind of a static scene,” says Edel. “If
people are sitting and talking
through a whole scene there is no
reason to pick up the camera and
shake it around, so I said, ‘Let’s just
put it on a tripod.’ I hate handheld
camerawork when there’s no reason
for it, and I’m very happy with those
scenes. Trial scenes can seem very
boring, but of course they’re really
not; if you don’t move the camera
too much they can be quite intense.”
Efforts to shoot at original
locations were so successful that
stage work on the film was limited to
nine days at Bavaria Studios in
Munich, where historical accuracy
and realism remained overriding
goals. Production designer Bernd
Lepel rebuilt the cells and communal
hallway that had housed the RAF
inmates at Stammheim during the
trial, even sourcing original fixtures
and fittings from the prison’s base-
ment. “Bernd’s priority was to make
that set as close as possible to how
Stammheim had really been, so I
decided to use the same light and
told him not to change anything for
me,” says Klausmann. “Often in a
studio, it’s tempting to light from
above because it’s easy, but I don’t
like that approach. We installed the
original light fittings in the ceiling
and supplemented those with light

42
coming in the windows — just as we
had at the prison.”
Fritscher adds, “We used
color-corrected Osram Lumilux
tubes for the practical fixtures on the
ceiling to match what had been there
in the original location. From outside
the windows we had Dinos behind 8-
by-8 and 12-by-12 frames of silk,
Light Gridcloth, half diffusion and
full diffusion. In the hall there was a
big wall of glass bricks; coming
though that we had one Quarter
Wendy and three Dinos behind a 20-
by-20 of Light Grid.” The naturalistic
lighting design gave the actors and
camera total freedom of movement,
allowing Edel to shoot as though he
was at another authentic location.
“For smaller scenes like that,
we always used just one camera,” says
Klausmann. “I prefer to work that
way because the actors know what’s
going on and I’m able to control the
whole thing. With more than one
camera you always have to keep a
distance from the actors so the
cameras don’t see each other.”
Arri Film & TV Services
handled almost every aspect of post,
including front-end lab work, visual
effects and the 2K digital intermedi-
ate. Alex Klippe, a DI producer at the
facility, oversaw the ingestion of all
the old newsreel footage. “There was
film negative, print film, HD video,
DigiBeta and MPEG-4 material
from various archives and private
collections,” he says. “We scanned all
the neg and print at 2K on an
Arriscan, just like the rest of the film.
We captured all the video with
Clipster and blew it up to 2K in
Lustre, using a LUT for the linear-to-
log conversion. The MPEG-4 mater-
ial was rendered out to a single file
sequence in Shake.”
Both Klausmann and Edel
attended the final grade and worked
together to blend all of the disparate
elements together into a seamless
whole. “For me, it was a successful
collaboration,” says the cinematogra-
pher. “Uli is a good director to work
with; he’s really quiet and he knows
what he wants to do, but you can
discuss anything and offer other
opinions. We’re about to start a new
film together in Berlin, so something
must have worked!” I
TECHNICAL SPECS
Super 1.85:1
(3-perf Super 35mm original)
Arricam Studio, Lite
Arri and Angenieux lenses
Kodak Vision2 50D 5201, 250D
5205, 500T 5260
Digital Intermediate
Printed on Kodak Vision 2383
43
 A Nazi’s
Worst
Nightmare
World War II is
the backdrop for
Quentin Tarantino’s
stylized revenge
fantasy, shot by
Robert Richardson, ASC.
by Benjamin B
Unit photography by
François Duhamel, SMPSP

uring a press conference at innovations was to allow the charac- ’05) — and notched three other

D
this year’s Cannes Film
Festival, Quentin Tarantino
maintained, “I am not an
American filmmaker. I make
movies for the planet Earth.” The
director and his crew were at the fes-
tival for the world premiere of his
latest creation, Inglourious Basterds,
whose intentionally misspelled title
is the first of many twists from a
production that combines a
European milieu with its earthling
auteur’s stylized sensibilities.
The World War II saga was
shot mostly at the Babelsberg
Studios near Berlin, with an interna-
tional cast that includes Brad Pitt,
Mélanie Laurent, Diane Kruger and
Christoph Waltz. One of Tarantino’s
ters to speak in their native tongues;
the subtitled film skips easily from
French to English to German, and
mastery of foreign tongues, the sub-
tlety of accents, and even body lan-
guage are all important plot points.
Inglourious marks the third
collaboration between Tarantino
and Robert Richardson, ASC, fol-
lowing Kill Bill: Vol. I (AC Oct. ’03)
and Vol. II. Prior to teaming with
Tarantino, Richardson shot 11 films
for Oliver Stone before establishing
an ongoing rapport with Martin
Scorsese (for whom he recently shot
the forthcoming thriller Shutter
Island). Richardson has won two
Academy Awards — for JFK (AC
Feb. ’92) and The Aviator (AC Jan.
Oscar nominations, and he has been
nominated for eight ASC Awards.
Inglourious Basterds unfolds
as a series of chapters that weave
three subplots united by one very
bad guy, Gestapo Col. Hans Landa
(Waltz). In an opening that evokes
Spaghetti Westerns, Landa and his
posse of Nazis drop in on a French
farmer and his family. While soldiers
and the family wait outside, Landa
methodically asks the farmer
increasingly pointed questions
about the whereabouts of missing
Jewish neighbors during a cat-and-
mouse sequence that builds inex-
orably to violence.
After Landa kills her family,
Shosanna (Laurent) escapes to Paris,

44 September 2009
 Opposite: Col.
Hans Landa
(Christoph Waltz)
questions a
French farmer in
an early, pivotal
scene in
Inglourious
Basterds. This
page, top: Sgt.
Donny Donowitz
(Eli Roth, left)
and Lt. Aldo
Raine (Brad Pitt)
are two of the
“Basterds,” a
unit of Jewish-
American
soldiers who
terrorize Nazis
behind enemy
lines. Bottom:
Cinematographer
Robert
Richardson, ASC
shapes the light.

where she runs a movie theater and
meets top Nazi brass. When
Shosanna learns that her theater has
been chosen for the VIP premiere of
a Nazi propaganda film, she sees an
opportunity for revenge.
Elsewhere in France, a unit of
Jewish-American soldiers, led by
hillbilly Aldo Raine (Pitt), lurks
behind enemy lines terrorizing
Nazis with the threat of mutilation,
scalpings and executions by baseball
bat. Tales of these “Basterds” eventu-
ally reach Hitler, who throws a fit.
Meanwhile, in London, the
British high command hatches a
plot to blow up the movie premiere.
German-speaking agents are sent to
a cellar tavern called La Louisiane,
where they meet with a glamorous
German actress (Kruger) who is
actually a British secret agent. In a
lengthy scene, the agents exchange
Images courtesy of The Weinstein Co.
film” directed by Eli Roth; the pro-
duction even arranged for lead
actress Laurent to learn how to run
a film projector. The final sequence
gathers its main characters at the big
movie premiere, leading to a spec-
tacular, surprising conclusion fol-
lowed by an ironic epilogue.
In discussing Tarantino’s
approach to moviemaking, Rich-
ardson agrees that the director
qualifies as a film “purist.”
Richardson’s longtime camera
assistant, Gregor Tavenner, concurs,
noting that Tarantino eschews the
“video village” found on most con-
temporary sets. “The only video
monitor on the set is the small one
on the camera,” says Tavenner.
During takes, Tarantino stays next
to the camera, near the actors. If
there is a dolly move, he climbs
along for the ride, looking at the
actors and glancing at the small
Transvideo monitor on the camera
to check the framing.
Tarantino favors shooting
with a single camera, going against
the trend for two cameras, which
often necessitates lighting and stag-

pleasantries with a party of drunken

German soldiers, and then with a
suspicious Gestapo officer, before
engaging in a climactic shootout.
As always with Tarantino’s
films, Basterds is rife with cinematic
references. Indeed, much of the
action takes place inside the movie
theater during the projection of a
black-and-white “film-within-a-

American Cinematographer 45
A Nazi’s Worst Nightmare
Escaping to
Paris after her
family dies at
the hands of
Nazis, Shosanna
Dreyfus
(Mélanie
Laurent) takes
charge of a
movie theater.
ing compromises. “You get such a
handcrafted movie,” Tavenner
enthuses. “The actors know they’re
going to do a lot of setups because
it’s only one camera, but they get to
perfect their craft. The camera rolls
for as many takes as necessary to
perfect each shot, and it’s a real joy
and a pleasure.”
Tavenner explains that the
director enforces a quiet set:
“Quentin creates a beautiful envi-
ronment for the actors to perform
in. The crew is trained to be so
46 September 2009
respectful.” Tarantino bans cell-
phones from his set; a security
person at the door collects all
such phones. Tavenner recalls a
tense moment when producer
Harvey Weinstein came to visit the
set and the guard asked for his
phone. There was a moment’s pause,
but Weinstein finally handed over
his cellphone and nodded to his
assistant, who then handed over
four more. “Everybody cheered,”
Tavenner recalls with a chuckle.
Richardson’s longtime gaffer,
Ian Kincaid, describes another
Tarantino tradition on the set: every
hundred cans of exposed film are
celebrated on the spot with a glass of
champagne for each crew member.
“Quentin is very gracious. He’ll say,
‘Hey, everybody gather ’round. Let’s
celebrate another 100 rolls!’ — even
if it’s 11 in the morning.” During
production, Tarantino also arranged
for evening crew screenings of fea-
tures he personally selected.
Part of the period style of
Inglourious Basterds is created via
dolly and crane movements. “In a
way,” says Tavenner, “it’s a classic
style. There’s maybe one Steadicam
shot in the whole film.” A
Technocrane was used sparingly
(once to sweep across the audience
in the movie theater), but the bulk of
the crane shots were done with
Richardson riding a one-person
crane made by Grip Factory
Munich, allowing for more organic,
less automated movements than a
remote head would produce. “I
often use a crane as a dolly when the
space allows, because it allows for
greater movement,” the cinematog-
rapher notes. “I can also do a track-
 When her
theater is
chosen for the
premiere of a
Nazi propaganda
film, Shosanna
recognizes an
opportunity to
avenge her
family’s death.
The climactic
sequence brings
the theater —
and the Nazis
inside — to a
fiery end.

ing shot without seeing the dolly Inglourious Basterds stems from its
track in frame.” disregard for pure naturalism and
Inglourious was shot with lighting motivation, which also con-
Panavision anamorphic Primo and tributes to its impressionistic period
G-Series lenses, as well as the com- feel. For example, the look of the
pany’s new anamorphic zooms and opening scene in the farmhouse is
a “Panavised” Cooke. “The Primos defined by hot, hard daylight that
held up the best in terms of overall shines down onto a table, bouncing
resolution,” Tavenner asserts. “You to illuminate the two characters.
have a sweet spot between T2.8 and Although one can imagine a skylight
T4. If you can close those lenses above the table, there is no clear
down a stop, you gain quality that is motivation for the farmhouse light-
well worth it.” ing. “I don’t believe there always
Richardson explains that needs to be a motivation for a light,”
Tarantino’s propensity for wide- says Richardson. “Sometimes you
angle lenses and centered framing have to light for what you feel the
give the film a contemporary, origi- sequence is.” ¢
nal feel. “I could have shot the movie
with just the 35, 40 and 50mm,” he
says. “That’s not what you would do
on an old-fashioned movie, though;
this lensing is more modern.
“Quentin and I will have these
interesting little battles while I’m
composing a shot,” Richardson con-
tinues. “I naturally move to one side
or the other, especially when shoot-
ing anamorphic, whereas Quentin
enjoys dead-center framing. For sin-
gles in particular, we’re just cutting
dead-center framing from one side
to the other, with the actors looking
just past the barrel of the lens.”
Part of the distinctive look of

American Cinematographer 47
 A Nazi’s Worst Nightmare
Right: Shosanna
greets a German
admirer who
barges into her
projection booth.
The 20K
backlighting
Laurent also
provides some
bounced fill from
her red dress.
Below:
Richardson
frequently
employed a one-
person crane
manufactured by
Grip Factory
Munich. “I often
use a crane as a
dolly when the
space allows,”
says the
cinematographer.

He explains that he avoided a
source-y approach to the scene (i.e.,
having the main source come
through the windows) in part
because this “would have put a lot
more light on the background. Here
you feel the daylight on their faces
but the background is relatively
dark. The room was tiny and the
source was isolating them in that
small space.” He points out that the
table bounce is also adapted to the
action of the scene: Landa fills out
his paperwork, while the farmer has
a tendency to look down. “I felt it
was important to have light in their
eyes and to always have that bright
spot available to the iris if so
desired,” he says. The toplight source
also gave the actors the opportunity
to play with the light by moving in
and out of the shadows, and it
enabled Tarantino’s camera staging,
which involved several wide-angle
dolly moves around the table.
“When the camera started on one
side and ended on the other, there
were very few places to get a light in,”
Richardson observes.
The cinematographer would
often add a soft fill light during the
scene, and he felt free to adjust the
direction of the top keylight from
shot to shot. “When I had the oppor-
tunity, I would add a level of bounce,
and I would move the toplight to
one side or the other to help the dark
side move toward camera. I prefer to
have the face lit from the opposite
side — not backlit, but ¾ — and I
want the dark side toward my lens as
often as possible; there’s something I
like aesthetically about that choice.
I’m willing to flip a key in a sequence
to accommodate that.”
Tarantino told Richardson he
wanted to see the landscape through
the windows of the farmhouse,
which required the quick changing
of ND gels on the windows to adjust
for the changing weather outside.
Kincaid notes, “We’d sometimes

48 September 2009
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A Nazi’s Worst Nightmare
with an initial plan to capture most-
ly exterior shots before moving to a
soundstage for the interiors. But
Tarantino quickly decided to start
shooting the dialogue inside the
house before continuing to shoot
the same scene on the Babelsberg
stages near Berlin, creating a chal-
lenge in terms of lighting continuity
because the location and stage
footage had to cut together seam-
lessly throughout the 25-minute
sequence. To maintain continuity,
the location lighting was duplicated
in Babelsberg, and Richardson
decided to use HMIs on the sound-
stage, “which we never do,” says
Kincaid. For the windows,
Richardson used greenscreened
plates when necessary, or painted
backdrops masked with black net
when the windows were less “pre-
Above: have to bring the light way up 12K Par through the door, and a 6K sent” in the frame.
Shosanna
discovers her inside” to balance with the exterior Par through a window to create a The roomy soundstage
German admirer view. All of the scene’s sources were small spot of sunlight on the wall. allowed for bigger bounce fills than
is a Nazi war daylight-balanced HMIs, and inside, Kincaid confirms that there the location, but the principle was
hero and the
star of a the main overhead source com- was no lighting whatsoever, not even the same: “muzz and muzz.” Kincaid
propaganda film prised Par 1.2Ks rigged in an attic a passive bounce, during the 100' explains that Richardson eschews
based on his above the table. Most of the lights tracking shot of Shosana running “plastic” diffusion or bouncing
own exploits.
Right: were gelled with ¼ CTO to lend the away in profile at the end of the material like beadboards or
Richardson “daylight” a slight warmth. sequence. Achieving this shot was Griffolyn in favor of cotton muslin
takes a moment Large sources outside provid- simply a matter of choosing the or real silk. A “muzz and muzz” soft
to soak in the
backlight. ed some soft light and an occasional right moment to film against the source involves hard lights bounced
touch of hard light inside. These naturally soft backlight of the north- off muslin and then diffused
external sources included 18K ern sky. through muslin again. The sides of
Arrimax HMIs on turtle stands Filming began on location at the setup are covered with black
bounced up on big muslin frames, a a farmhouse in northern Germany, material to prevent spill, creating a
pie-shaped, soft light box.
Richardson explains his affinity for
muslin by noting it “has a more nat-
ural feel on the skin. I don’t feel as
many highlights coming back,”
whereas plastic materials give a
“shine off of makeup or skin.”
Richardson claims that the
muslin-bounced diffusion lends a
unique quality to the soft source.
“It’s the quality of the wrap of the
light. I don’t feel the shadow of the
source. I enjoy the way the light
moves across the face.” Because the
soft light has to be cut and flagged,
the cinematographer usually tries to
obtain the largest possible diffusion

50 September 2009
A Nazi’s Worst Nightmare
Landa (near
right) draws his
weapon of
choice, and
Raine responds
in kind (far
right).
surface for the location. For exam-
ple, when Pitt’s character interro-
gates a Nazi in the ravine scene, the
bounce is a 12-by, but for tight inte-
riors, the cinematographer will
sometimes just staple a 4' piece of
muslin bounce to the wall.
For a few scenes in
Inglourious, Richardson uses a pas-
sive bounce as a key. A 12K provides
most of the lighting for a brief but
memorable scene in which
Shosanna wields a hatchet and
threatens a film developer posi-
tioned on a table. The hard source
backlights Shosanna and her accom-
plice, and then bounces off the table
to provide a soft key on her face. The
lighting is completed by a practical
above and a 12K positioned on a
Condor outside a window.
A similarly elegant use of hard
light and bounce can be seen toward
the end of the film, when a smitten
German soldier barges into the pro-
jection booth and confronts
Shosanna at the doorway. Shosanna
is backlit by a 20K positioned farther
back on the set, and the soldier acts
as her moving bounce: a strip of
muslin was pinned to him off-cam-
era. “Depending on how close she
moves to him,” Richardson com-
ments, “there is a movement [in the
light] and a lighter and darker quali-
ty on her face.” A hint of red bounce
also comes from Shosanna’s red
52 September 2009
dress. On the reverse shot, a similar
setup lights the German, with a 12K
bouncing off of the red dress. Other
backlights were added to extend this
effect once the actors move further
inside the booth.
Richardson used a mixture of
hard and soft sources for a beautiful
scene on the top floor of the theater.
As Shosanna prepares for the fateful
premiere by applying her makeup, a
20K shines in through a circular
window to provide a searing back-
light. In front of the mirror, her face
is keyed by a warm, soft source com-
prising a cluster of small, tungsten
“golf ball” bulbs dimmed way down
and diffused through muslin.
Kincaid explains, “The muslin lends
a creamy feel to her skin. When
we’re shooting a beautiful woman,
we’ll go muzz-muzz. Generally, the
front is bleached muslin and the
back is unbleached. Unbleached
muslin has a tighter weave; it’s a
nice, rough surface, so it has no
sheen. It’s a bit erratic, but it softens
the light, and then the bleached
muslin in front unifies it.”
Kincaid reveals that
Richardson often uses rows of
dimmed tungsten bulbs with diffu-
sion to create soft sources that can fit
in tight places. “On this film, we used
soft frosted bulbs on wires, bunched
in balls, attached to squares of wood
and even draped around the cam-
era,” says the gaffer. A variation of this
technique was applied for a scene in
which Shosanna is whisked off to meet
Goebbels in a swanky French restau-
rant. Their encounter was shot in a
private dining room at Berlin’s
Einstein Café. Rows of tungsten bulbs
were suspended from the low ceiling
and diffused with muslin to create a
soft top source, which was supple-
mented by several Chinese lanterns
and a Par can throwing a pool of hard
light down onto the tablecloth.
Kincaid notes that Richardson fre-
quently uses lightweight Par cans. “You
can cluster them, and we use them for
accent lights, for narrow backlight, and
often for bouncing,” he says.
The long scene in the La
Louisiane tavern posed one of the
show’s biggest lighting challenges. Ten
characters meet around two small
tables in the cramped basement bar.
The three British agents try to talk
their way out of the tavern, leaving
one table of drunken Germans and
then accepting a round of drinks with
a suspicious Gestapo officer. The ten-
sion rises until the scene explodes in a
shootout.
The tavern set had very low
ceilings and little room in which to
maneuver. Richardson deadpans, “For
all intents and purposes, it was a prac-
tical location built on a stage.” Kincaid
adds, “We said to ourselves, ‘Okay, this
is like the trailer scene in Kill Bill.
 Think BIG.

Find out how BIG.

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 A Nazi’s Worst Nightmare
Quentin wants to create the feeling
that nobody’s getting out of here eas-
ily.’” Complicating matters further,
the actors frequently move from
seated to standing positions.
After trying and rejecting in-
frame practicals as too cluttered, the
crew attached rows of tungsten bulbs
to the ceiling, adding two layers of
muslin beneath them to create a soft
base light. The headroom was so tight
that the bottom layer of muslin had
to be removed when actors stood.
Richardson then decided to add Par-
can toplights and bounced backlights
as the shots progressed, reflecting the
scene’s mounting tension. “Slowly, as
the scene evolved, I moved from the
soft top and started adding hard
lights off the table to increase the con-
trast. I also began bringing in soft
backlights to separate actors from the
background. I just felt this need to do
it as I went along, but I tried not to do
it in an obvious manner so the audi-
54
ence wouldn’t be aware of it.”
Although the transition is subtle,
Richardson confesses that he won-
dered at the time whether altering
the light was “a gigantic error.”
Kincaid concedes, “We were very
busy in there; every setup was a new
challenge. We have a saying, though:
Pressure makes diamonds.”
When the shootout starts, the
lighting changes dramatically, with
beams of hard light shining through
the smoke and gunfire. Tarantino
punctuates the scene with a few of
his signature snap-zooms into
Germans firing their weapons. The
timing of the shootout feels realisti-
cally rapid, without the extensive
high-speed work that has become a
convention in contemporary action
films. The lighting for the dramatic
climax in the movie theater involved
a series of 6K and 9K Maxi-Brutes
hung from the ceiling with black
skirts and silk frames. A fire effect
was created mostly with real fire
generated by an extensive network
of gas pipes, supplemented by red
gels on the Maxis.
Richardson did the digital
intermediate for Basterds at EFilm
with colorist Yvan Lucas, and the
colorist says he did the color-correc-
tion “the old-fashioned way,” start-
ing from the qualities Tarantino and
Richardson liked in the workprint
made by Arri Munich during shoot-
ing. While he was timing the tavern
scene, Lucas recalls, “Bob said, ‘Yvan,
I know you come from film, so
you’re going to match the faces,
right? You’re not going to do it like
the video timers, who match the
backgrounds?’ His point was that
faces are what jump out at you, and
that was the big idea of the film: to
work the old-fashioned way, by
matching faces, and then seeing
what we could do with the back-
grounds if there were any problems.”
 Asked how Richardson’s pen-
chant for strong hard light impacts
the digital grade, Lucas notes that he
sometimes uses Richardson’s high-
lights to find the timing of a shot.
“I’ll often start with the faces, but I
can also find my density value in
relation to the strong highlight. It’s
like a visual reference that shows me
where I have to place the shot. If the
white is too bright, it’s not very pret-
ty. By adding density, the white
remains very overexposed and very
strong, but it gets more body. In fact,
there is very little choice in timing.
There is one value that’s really right.
Often when Bob sees what I’ve pre-
pared for him, he doesn’t ask for
density changes because I’m already
where he wants to be.
“Bob has a very particular
way of lighting a face — it’s very
chiseled,” Lucas continues. “That
allows me to go to a density value I
would never dare use on another
film. There is a gradation in the
grays of the shadows that I can work
with. His lighting allows me to go to
a darker and very interesting density
value without smothering the
blacks.” For example, the colorist
adds, referring to the scene in which
Shosanna stands at the window
before applying her makeup,
“because the backlight is very
strong, there is detail in the blacks.
Although she is in the shadows, her
face is delineated. When you add
density, you see the cheekbones ...
but with this gradation. It’s very
beautiful, and it’s due to the very
hard light.”
Reflecting on his work,
Richardson muses, “When I’m
shooting, I don’t sense the passage of
time. I start and finish the sequence,
and I don’t recall the majority of
what takes place in between unless I
have a tremendous problem or I’m
trying to rectify something in the
middle of the sequence. Nothing
exists except for that moment. The
closest thing to it is when I jumped
out of an airplane and parachuted to
the ground. I don’t recall anything
after jumping ... until my chute
opened.” I
TECHNICAL SPECS
2.40:1
Anamorphic 35mm
Panaflex Millennium; Arri 435
Panavision Primo,
G-Series lenses
Kodak Vision2 200T 5217,
Vision3 500T 5219
Digital Intermediate
Printed on Fuji Eterna-CP 3513DI

55
 An Appetite for
Crime Mesrine, an epic
thriller shot by
Robert Gantz, tracks
the flamboyant
exploits of a
legendary French
bank robber.
by Jean Oppenheimer

Unit photography by
Roger Arpajou

58 September 2009
 acques Mesrine would have fit

J
perfectly into today’s celebrity-
obsessed media culture. A career
criminal who specialized in
bank robberies, kidnappings
and brazen prison escapes, he was
unusually witty and charismatic,
qualities that made him a popular fig-
ure with the press and public alike. He
grew up in France but first gained
notoriety in Canada, where his crimes
fueled his legend and earned him the
title of “Public Enemy Number One”
— after returning to Paris, he quickly
vaulted to the top of France’s most-
wanted list, remaining there from
1973 until his death in 1979.
A man of supreme self-confi-
dence and explosive rage, Mesrine
could be charming one moment and
vicious the next. By his own — albeit Opposite: Early in
dubious — count he killed 39 people his criminal
during his lifetime, and he died as vio- career, Mesrine
(Vincent Cassel)
lently as he had lived, in a hail of bul- beds a prostitute,
lets after police ambushed him as he Sarah (Florence
and his girlfriend sat in their car at a Thomassin). This
page, top: As
Paris intersection. Mesrine’s
“Jacques Mesrine is a part of notoriety grows,
French history and culture, like John he and his
accomplice,
Dillinger or Bonnie and Clyde are for Jeanne
us,” says cinematographer Robert Schneider
Gantz, the sole American on an other- (Cécile De
France), become
wise French crew. Mesrine marked his stars in the
second collaboration with director media, where
Jean-François Richet, following 2005’s they are
portrayed as the
Assault on Precinct 13. (The cine- Bonnie and Clyde
matographer’s other credits include of France.
the features Lake City and Middle:
Cinematographer
Mindhunters, the series CSI: Crime Robert Gantz (at
Scene Investigation, and dozens of eyepiece) lines
Photos courtesy of La Petite Reine and Roger Arpajou.

music videos and commercials.) up a shot with

camera assistant
Based on the autobiography Laurent Hincelin.
Mesrine wrote during one of his Bottom: In 1969,
many stints in prison, the project was Schneider and
Mesrine are
conceived as two separate features cornered by
split into act one and act two of the Arizona police in
protagonist’s life. Telling the story in the desert.
this fashion required a marathon pro-
duction, with two months of prep, a
nine-month shooting schedule and
more than 100 locations — whenever
possible, Richet planned to shoot
where events had actually taken place.
L’Instinct de Mort, the first of

American Cinematographer 59
An Appetite for Crime

Above left: The the two films, takes place in the 1960s camera expressing whatever emo- Schneider (Cécile De France), a
impulsive
Mesrine when Mesrine (Vincent Cassel), just tions are on the screen,” he asserts. woman as fearless and violent as he is.
smashes a bar out of the army, is trying to find a Mesrine’s vicious streak is They move to Canada, where they are
glass in the face direction for his life. He discovers he often underlined by handheld cam- arrested after a kidnap victim escapes,
of a belligerent
customer. To has an aptitude for burglary and finds erawork, as in a scene that begins and when both end up behind bars,
capture the full a mentor in underworld gangster with him relaxing at a bar. When the images become almost mono-
intensity of the Guido (Gérard Depardieu). “Jacques another customer becomes belliger- chromatic, with a hint of sickly green.
moment, Gantz
switches to is living the life he wants,” says Gantz, ent, Mesrine suddenly smashes a “The bright lighting we had early in
handheld who sat down with AC during a glass in the patron’s face, completely the film reflected Mesrine’s feelings of
camerawork recent trip to Los Angeles. “He’s rea- without warning. “That scene starts freedom,” says Gantz. “Now he’s
immediately
after the glass sonably happy and carefree as he off with classic static camera angles,” trapped and can’t get out. And the
breaks. Above ascends the criminal ranks. To reflect remarks Gantz. “The image is so longer he is incarcerated, the blander
right: Mesrine this, I used a lot of red, blue, green calm, the audience is totally caught the images look.” Gantz kept the cam-
and his criminal
colleague, Paul and orange light — the colors of the off guard when Mesrine suddenly era on the Steadicam and dolly
(Gilles 1960s.” To suggest how in control erupts. As soon as the glass shatters, throughout Mesrine’s incarceration
Lellouche) finish Mesrine feels at this point in his life, we switch to handheld.” and escape with a fellow inmate; only
the job. Bottom:
Mesrine’s Gantz favored the fluid moves of the In the first film, Mesrine falls when the two men return to the
adventures take Steadicam and dolly. “It’s all about the passionately in love with Jeanne prison and try to free their friends
him through the does Gantz take the camera handheld.
Pigalle
neighborhood in The second film, L’Ennemi
Paris, home to Public No. 1, was shot almost entirely
the famous handheld, and the color palette is
Moulin Rouge
cabaret (visible much darker, with Gantz now light-
in background). ing in subdued earth tones. The tone
To light this of this film becomes more frantic as
sequence, Gantz
deployed a Mesrine’s magnetism gives way to
Condor-mounted unbridled egoism. He begins wearing
18K backlight disguises; dubbed “the man of a thou-
gelled with ½
CTB, shooting sand faces,” he seems to be daring the
on tungsten- police to catch him. “Our basis for this
balanced film was The French Connection,” vol-
Vision2 500T
stock with unteers Gantz. “We consciously want-
no 85 filter. ed to give it that 1970s style of film-
making, not only with the handheld
camera, but also with a lot of zooms.
Jean-François fell in love with the
zoom, and we did a lot of slow and

60 September 2009
snap zooms during the action
sequences using a 28-76mm
Angenieux Optimo that 1st AC Olivier
Fortin got for us.”
The bulk of the camera equip-
ment came from Panavision Alga
Techno and included Primo primes;
3:1 (135-420mm), 11:1 (24-275mm)
and 4:1 (17.5-75mm) Primo zooms;
two Millennium XLs; and a number of
Arri 435s, 235s and Eyemos. (The lat-
ter were used for car-crash scenes.)
The Angenieux, reserved for handheld
shots, was used extensively in the sec-
ond film. The production’s gear
included 50' and 30' Super
Technocranes with Z-Head three-axis
remote heads, and key grip Jean-Pierre
Deschamps also brought some of his
own equipment. “Jean-Pierre had the
Top: Resourceful
best car-rigging stuff I have ever seen,” inmate François
marvels Gantz. Besse (Mathieu
Gantz used Kodak Vision2 Amalric) is
searched in
500T 5218 and 200T 5217 on both prison, where he
pictures, but he took a different meets his future
approach to a brief sequence set in criminal partner,
Mesrine. For this
Algeria, where Mesrine served in the shot, Gantz used
French army; this scene was shot in a Kino Flo to
Super 16mm and underwent a bleach- create a back
sidelight.
bypass at LTC in Paris. (All of the pro- Middle: This
duction’s footage was processed at shot of the
LTC. The digital intermediate was car- prison interior
was made with
ried out at Duboi, where Gantz collab- natural daylight,
orated with colorist Fabien Pascal.) In using tungsten-
the scene, Mesrine takes part in the balanced Vision2
stock and no 85
brutal interrogation of an Algerian filter. Bottom:
prisoner. “We used two Arri 16SR-3s Guards use the
and the old Zeiss 11-110mm T2.2 wand on
Mesrine, who
Super 16 zooms because we didn’t is sidelit by a
want the scene to look too good,” notes Kino Flo.
Gantz. “We wanted the lens flares and
the crazy highlights you get with the
bleach bypass. I lit the scene with old-
school Photofloods, the kind they
actually used in interrogation rooms
back then, and we screwed in standard
250-watt bulbs. I didn’t use any other
lights inside, but I brought a 12K
through the window and used a bit of
smoke. I love the way that scene looks.”
In the first of two audacious
casino robberies, Mesrine and Jeanne
burst into the room holding shotguns.
Working onstage, Gantz recalls, “Jean-

American Cinematographer 61
An Appetite for Crime
François wanted to move the camera
in circles, [but we were limited] by the
size of the room, which was small and
had low ceilings. We had to light from
the side and [couldn’t completely circle
the actors]. Strangely enough, there
was a problem at the lab and we had to
reshoot the scene. When Jean-François
and I talked about it, we realized that
neither of us was happy with what we
had shot previously — this is Jacques
and Jeanne’s first robbery and it need-
ed to have more excitement.”
A larger location was found for
the reshoot, with higher ceilings that
permitted Gantz to craft pools of light
from above. Once Mesrine and Jeanne
storm into the room, the camera never
stops moving and neither do the
thieves, who continually swing their
guns around to cover the room, turn-
Top: Mesrine’s ing in tight circles while the Steadicam
right-hand man, swirls around them in the opposite
Jean-Paul
Mercier (Roy direction. “We had a great Steadicam
Dupuis), awaits operator named Eric Catelan,” declares
a rendezvous in Gantz. “He was also the A-camera
a forest outside
Paris. An 18K operator.”
was deployed to Mesrine is incarcerated four
light the times during the course of the two
background,
while a Kino Flo films. The second prison is in Canada
unit provided — the exterior was a facade erected
sidelight for the outside Paris, and the interiors were
foreground.
Middle: Mesrine built in a warehouse — and when
employs the Mesrine arrives, he is stripped, thrown
element of into solitary confinement and beaten
surprise after
hiding in the by guards. As he cowers, traumatized,
trunk of a car. in a corner of the cell, the camera starts
Bottom: Gantz on his face and pulls all the way back to
(far left)
discusses a the very high ceiling, spinning as it
setup with widens out. At the very end of the shot,
director Jean- Mesrine’s body makes a slight, almost
François Richet
(center) and 1st involuntary jerking motion. “That’s
AC Olivier Fortin one of my favorite shots in the film,”
in a forest acknowledges Gantz. “We did it with a
outside
Montreal. crane arm and a Z-Head three-axis
head. I operated because in France
they rarely use a geared head. If you
notice the slight movement Vincent
makes at the end of the shot, it looks
bizarre. That’s because the camera
actually started at ceiling level and
spun into him; we reversed it in post. It
looks far more intense that way.”
One of the film’s more harrow-

62 September 2009
An Appetite for Crime
Gantz takes a
meter reading
while
preparing to
shoot a river-
escape
sequence.
ing scenes takes place inside a cave in
the Forest of Halatte, where Mesrine
lures a journalist whom he plans to
murder. Mesrine, an accomplice, and
reporter Jacques Dallier (Alain
Fromager) walk deep into the cave
until they arrive at a kind of cul-de-
sac where Mesrine has arranged a
dozen or so candles on a rock ledge.
Mesrine orders the journalist to strip,
and then brutally beats him. “Boy,
that was difficult,” says Gantz, shaking
his head at the memory. “The electri-
cians put up spreaders because there
was nothing to hang the lights from,
and I had Kino Flos as backlights and
no frontlight. I used a light diffusion,
like an Opal, and probably a ½ CTO.
I was wide open: T2.6.
“Even though we had a good
ventilation system in there, it got ter-
ribly smoky from the candles,” the
cinematographer continues. “At one
point we had to stop shooting for half
an hour to try and suck the smoke
out with fans. Another difficulty was
that Fromager had to be naked
throughout the scene, and it was
impossible to hide pads on his body
to cushion any blows. He had to fall
on the ground and roll around as he
was being kicked — you can’t just fall
on the ground like that without
injuring yourself. The actor did the
entire scene himself. He did an amaz-
ing job.”
Gantz stayed at a T2.8 or a T4
for most of the film. “I would have
64 September 2009
preferred to shoot more of it at a 4,
just to get a bit more depth of field,
but in the end I always find when I’m
lighting that it looks better at 2.8. We
had two really good focus pullers on
the production, Pierre Mazard on
L’Instinct de Mort and Olivier on
L’Ennemi Public No. 1.”
Gantz describes his general
approach to lighting as “less is more.”
He notes that he likes to key from the
side; with a smile and a slight growl,
he adds, “To me, frontlight is a dirty
word. For day interiors, I like to let
the natural light come through more
than anything else. If I have to ampli-
fy it, I will, but I don’t want to over-
power the natural light.
“I always try to motivate the
light, but there are certain conven-
tions I always use,” he continues. “If
it’s night, the action’s going to be
backlit. There’s a scene where Jacques
and Guido beat up a pimp. It’s night-
time and they pull into a courtyard,
get out of the car and start whipping
him, but they are right up against a
wall. I tried to figure out a way to get
a backlight on them and ended up
putting a light in a room high up in
the building. While I don’t think you
should be able to see a lot at night —
because, in reality, you can’t — you
have to at least have an edge on the
characters so you can see their
shapes.”
Mirrors are used to great visu-
al and thematic effect throughout the
film, and on more than one occasion
Mesrine sits at a poker table, reflected
in multiple panels at once — a visual
metaphor for his fractured personali-
ty. Early in the first film, when
Mesrine enters a prostitute’s room, he
first appears to be standing in the
doorway on the right side of the
frame, but he when he enters from
stage left, we realize that the shot of
him in the doorway was, in fact, his
reflection in the mirror. The camera
then slowly dollies right and pans left
as Mesrine walks to the bed and sits
down beside Sarah (Florence
Thomassin), who has her head
bowed. As the camera moves, it picks
up multiple images of both Mesrine
and Sarah, overlapping reflections
within reflections. Finally, as Mesrine
sits, the back of his head appears in
frame and we realize he and Sarah are
sitting in front of the mirror, and that
all the action so far has merely been a
reflection. With the camera still catch-
ing the mirror image, Sarah lifts her
head and reveals a badly beaten face.
“That was a really hard shot,” admits
Gantz. “In fact, it was probably the
most complicated shot we did. I had
to adjust each section of the mirror.
The camera was on a dolly and Eric
had to pan at exactly the right
moment; otherwise, we’d either miss
the image we wanted or we’d see Eric
and the camera in the mirror. We
didn’t erase anything in post. The only
technical problem we had was that on
the best take, Sarah’s focus was slight-
ly soft. So they ended up doing a head
replacement on her from another
take.”
Leading up to their first jail sen-
tence in Canada, Jeanne and Mesrine
kidnap a wealthy man confined to a
wheelchair. The kidnappers enter the
man’s bedroom in the middle of the
night and sit on his bed; the
Steadicam, meanwhile, shoots from
behind multiple pieces of beveled
glass, resulting in multiple distorted
images of each participant. “Years ago,
I did some Oil of Olay commercials,
and we shot through beveled glass,”
 An Appetite for Crime
Dogged police the busiest intersections in Paris, a
commissioner place called Porte de Clignancourt,
Robert
Broussard and I wanted to film at the exact spot.”
(Olivier That required shutting down the
Gourmet, center, plaza, and such is Mesrine’s allure in
with gray hair
and white shirt) France that the production received
examines the special permission to do so. Gantz is
scene after his still amazed: “It’s unheard of. That
men gun down
Mesrine and his plaza is a major entry and exit point
girlfriend, for Paris.”
Sylvie (Ludivine The lead-in to the killing and
Sagnier), in a
busy Paris the actual shooting constitute one
intersection at extended sequence during which
Porte de Mesrine and girlfriend Sylvie
Clignancourt.
(Ludivine Sagnier) leave their apart-
Gantz relates. “I spoke with produc- he’ll listen to other people’s ideas, but ment, get in their car and head out of
tion designer Emile Ghigo, who was he knows what he likes. He is espe- Paris, driving through Porte de
able to find a folding screen with cially involved with framing and Clignancourt. A canvas-backed truck
beveled glass. Even when they sit on movement. He pretty much let me pulls in front of them at a red light,
the bed, there are three images of handle the lighting, but he is very and suddenly the canvas is pulled
everything. Jean-François was really sure of what he wants to do with the away to reveal men with guns who
specific about what he wanted; it camera.” start firing into Mesrine’s car. This
took 21 takes to get it right. Richet maintains, “The tough- sequence repeats several times, serving
“One of the things I like about est scene to get was when Mesrine is as the opening scene of both films and
working with Jean-François is that shot and killed. It happened at one of ending the second film, and the lead-

66
in was shot from two different per-
spectives. The first time it unfolds as
Mesrine and Sylvie would have expe-
rienced it; they leave their apartment
and walk to the car, but fail to notice
the policemen staking them out. “It’s
not literally from their point of view,”
Gantz notes, “but it is how they
would have seen it.” The second time
the scene unfolds almost the same
way, except “this time we see every-
thing from the policemen’s point of
view. Now viewers understand what
is really going on.”
Before the sequence was shot,
the crew spent one day practicing in a
parking lot dressed to match the
geography of the intersection. Six
cameras were used to follow
Mesrine’s car as it wends its way
through traffic and stops at the
Clignancourt intersection. “Jean-
François wanted the sequence cov-
ered from all angles, including over-
head,” says Gantz. “The car was never
up on a process trailer; instead, we put
rigs on the car and let Vincent drive.
“We were able to film the really
close stuff another day at another
location,” he continues. “Using long
lenses, we were shooting mostly into
the car and truck. You couldn’t see
any background, so those shots could
be staged anywhere. If you notice,
everything from Vincent’s point of
view is shot traditionally, but whenev-
er we see the police, the camera is
handheld. Then, once the gunfire
starts and all hell breaks loose, it’s all
handheld.”
Three handheld cameras pick
up the aftermath: cops swarm the
vehicle, Sylvie is pulled from the car,
and a media frenzy erupts as hun-
dreds of reporters arrive at the scene.
“We wanted it to look like 16mm
news footage, so I added saturation
and contrast in the DI to make it feel
more like reversal film. We were also
shooting at T5.6 or a T5.6/8 split —
by giving the assistants more stop,
focus pulling was easier.”
Looking back on the 11-month
production, Gantz shakes his head. “It
was such a massive monster to organ-
ize, and on a show like that, so much
is out of anyone’s control.” But the
worst part of the shoot, he adds, was
“sitting in Paris traffic.” I
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 Testing Digital
Cameras: Part 2
The post process for the ASC/PGA Camera-Assessment Series
illuminates how 7 digital motion-picture cameras fit into the
industry’s standard workflow.
by Stephanie Argy

his is the second part of our ual cameras or how they performed. designed to test them within a com-

T
report on the Camera-
Assessment Series that was
recently conducted by the
American Society of
Cinematographers and the Producers
Guild of America. The series, detailed
in the June ’09 issue of AC, assessed
seven digital motion-picture cameras,
comparing each of them to 35mm
film, the benchmark standard for the-
atrical motion-picture quality.
This article contains no judg-
ments or conclusions about individ-
Instead, we focus on the partici-
pants’ general thoughts about the
tests, what they learned, and what
still needs to be explored. Although
this article discusses the overall post
workflow, the details of that work —
for example, how much time was
spent color-correcting specific
scenes shot by specific cameras —
will be reported at a later date.
There are many ways for dig-
ital cameras to be integrated into a
production, but the CAS was
monly used film/digital post work-
flow designed for theatrical releasing
on print film and digital cinema
(DCP). “As far as we know, this is the
first time anyone has done a photo-
graphic performance assessment of
the seven selected digital cameras
using a common, film-centric, digi-
tal-intermediate workflow finish,”
says Curtis Clark, ASC, chair of the
Society’s Technology Committee.
“We wanted to know how these seven
cameras would fit in that workflow

70 September 2009
 without putting the footage through Pictured on these
two pages are
a series of proprietary, ‘secret sauce,’ ASC members
post-facility contortions.” who were
“We also wanted this assess- among the
cinematographers
ment to be applicable to production who participated
and post now,” adds producer Lori in the Camera-
McCreary, chair of the PGA Motion Assessment
Series. Opposite
Picture Technology Council and page, from left:
president of Revelations Entertain- Michael Goi,
ment, which funded the CAS. Shelly Johnson,
Nancy Schreiber,
“Because most feature films are fin- test supervisors
ished at 2K resolution, we chose a
Photos by Richard Crudo, ASC. Illustrations courtesy of the ASC Technology Committee.

David Stump and

2K post workflow.”
Many people were eager to
suggest alternate approaches based
on their experiences with custom
workflows. “As a result of their indi-
vidual experiences, filmmakers
develop highly personal and fre-
quently conflicting perspectives on
digital-camera image quality, corre-
sponding with their varied results,”
says Clark. “To get an effective and
manageable handle on the digital
cameras’ image performance, we
realized it was necessary to eliminate
the ‘wild card’ variability of multiple
workflows by selecting a commonly
deployed workflow for all the cam-
eras. We’re talking about a theatri-
cal-motion-picture post workflow
— not DVD, and not HD broadcast.
Television production will require a
different assessment series based on
an HDTV Rec. 709 finish, a different
deal. The digital-camera workflow
finishing you can do on a MacBook
Pro in Apple ProRes HQ is not con-
sistent with the DI workflow that is
used for most studio productions.
“The manufacturers of most
of the current digital motion-pic-
ture cameras who participated in the
CAS have adapted their HD image-
capture technologies to be more
compatible with the prevailing, film-
centric DI workflow by adopting a
Log-mode encoding of their image
capture as opposed to gamma-
encoded, ‘linear’ HD video,” he con-
tinues. “These Log modes attempt to
emulate the characteristics of film
negative, reproducing a wider
dynamic range of scene tones [from
Curtis Clark, and
Peter Anderson.
This page, from
left: Robert
Primes, Karl
Walter
highlight to shadow] within a wider Lindenlaub,
color gamut that is closer to film Steven Fierberg,
than the conventional HD Rec. 709 Kees Van
Oostrum,
color-space gamut.” Matthew Leonetti,
To briefly recap our June ’09 Kramer
report, the CAS shoot took place Morgenthau (at
camera), Richard
over two days in January 2009 at Edlund and
Universal Studios. The digital cam- Rodney Charters.
eras were the Arri D-21, the Grass
Valley Viper, Panasonic’s AJ-
HPX3700, Panavision’s Genesis, the
Red One and Sony’s F23 and F35.
The same tests were also filmed with
an Arri 435 using two tungsten
stocks (Kodak Vision2 200T 5217
and Kodak Vision3 500T 5219) and
two daylight stocks (Kodak Vision2
250D 5205 and Vision3 250D 5207).
One cinematographer was assigned
Testing Digital Cameras: Part 2
What is the ASC CDL?
The ASC Color Decision List is a framework
developed by the Society’s Technology Committee
that allows the interchange of basic RGB color-cor-
rection information between equipment and soft-
ware made by different manufacturers. Although the
basic controls of most color-correction systems are
similar, they differ in specific implementation. The
terms Lift (for dark tones), Gain (highlights), and
Gamma (mid-tones) are commonly used by most
color-correction systems, but those definitions may
vary in detail from system to system and manufac-
turer to manufacturer.
To avoid confusion, the ASC proposed a set of
three defined transfer functions with unique names:
Offset (lift), Slope (gain) and Power (gamma). Each
function uses one number for the red channel, a sec-
ond for the green and a third for the blue. Thus, the
three transfer functions for the three color compo-
nents can collectively be described by nine parame-
ters. A tenth number, Saturation, was specified in
Version 1.2 of the ASC CDL, and is applied to all
three channels together.
to each camera and stayed with it
throughout the tests; each camera
manufacturer helped choose which
cinematographer would be paired
with its camera. The cameras all
passed through six different test sce-
narios, each with its own on-set cin-
ematographer.
After the shoot, each camera
manufacturer was responsible for
converting its own images to 10-bit
log DPX files and delivering those
files to LaserPacific, which joined
Deluxe Laboratories in donating
post services to the project. (All of
the 35mm processing was done at
Deluxe.) The 35mm footage was
scanned at 4K on a Spirit 4K scanner
and then downconverted to 2K 10-
bit DPX files. All of the files were
then ingested into an Autodesk
Lustre for color-correction. The
entire post workflow, which had to
accommodate the schedules of peo-
ple who were volunteering their
time, lasted five months. The results
were a film print and DCP for pub-
lic presentation. “We cut out most of
72 September 2009
the editorial phase in order to get
the material ready to screen as
quickly as possible,” says Dave
Stump, ASC, chair of the
Technology Committee’s Camera
Subcommittee. “It was really an
exercise in seeing how ingest and
color-correction worked rather than
how an entire editorial workflow
worked.”
Because the goal was to make
the images suitable for printing to
film, a film-print-emulation display
look-up table was applied to all of
the footage, simulating the look of
the images when recorded to film.
However, “it was discovered soon
after we started our work that a lot
of the digital cameras delivered
images that didn’t give me enough
range to work with in a traditional
Cineon workflow,” says LaserPacific
colorist Mike Sowa, who graded the
tests. “When I put up some of the
images and looked at them with the
print-density LUT applied, the
information in the lowlights
appeared to be clipped.”
To expand that image area
and gain access to the digital cam-
eras’ full dynamic range, Sowa had
to apply an Input Device Transform
(IDT), which adjusted the gamma
slope of the cameras’ Log-mode
images to more closely match film
negative. “Although they’re designed
to emulate film-tone scale, the Log-
encoded gamma slopes of the vari-
ous digital cameras are not congru-
ent with the Log gamma slope of
film negative,” explains Clark.
“Applying the IDT ensured that the
final color-grading accurately pre-
dicted the filmout results.”
Doug Jaqua, who works in
color science at LaserPacific, notes
that each of the cameras has its own
method of encoding the digital sig-
nal to record the largest dynamic
range the camera can capture. “The
problem is that they all do it differ-
ently,” he says. “None of these things
play well together out of the box in a
common workflow.” Stump adds
that the digital cameras are linear
recording devices, whereas film is an
analog medium characterized in log
terms, and because the DI/DCP
pipeline was designed for film, it is
built around film’s log signal. “When
you plug a digital camera into a film
workflow, inevitably the signal from
that camera has to be transformed
into the Cineon log signal space that
accommodates film,” says Stump.
“That doesn’t just happen; it requires
a significant amount of effort.”
At the moment, each post
facility creates its own input process-
es to convert the raw material from
an electronic camera into a form that
will work within that facility’s infra-
structure. “Every post house has to
create its own input matrices,” says
Stump. “That input-matrix data is
the special sauce of every lab for
every camera.”
The CAS guidelines prevented
LaserPacific from applying its own
special sauce because the workflow
had to be platform- and facility-
independent, able to be reproduced
anywhere. Fortunately, the ASC
Color Decision List includes a Power
function — approximating the tra-
ditional Gamma function of color
correctors — that could be used as
an IDT, offering Sowa the full
dynamic range of the digital cam-
eras’ Log-encoded images for color-
correcting.
Because the 35mm footage
would serve as the benchmark for
the tests, Sowa began by color-cor-
recting that footage. He sat with the
cinematographer from each test sce-
nario and did two passes on the film
footage. First, they did a “best-light”
color-correction with no secondar-
ies, windows, dynamics or keyfram-
ing; because the cameras often
moved through changing lighting
conditions during the scenes, Sowa
optimized the timing for one
moment. Then, they did a final grade
using the full DI toolset except for
noise-reduction and sharpening
tools. (The CAS guidelines forbade
Testing Digital Cameras: Part 2
noise reduction and sharpening
throughout the entire workflow,
both on set and in post.)
With the look set for the film-
originated footage, Sowa set to work
on the images from the digital cam-
eras. Again, there were two passes:
the best light (optimizing for the
same moment chosen for the film
camera) and then the final grade,
which focused on making the
footage match the look of the film
footage as closely as possible, regard-
less of how many adjustments were
needed. At no time were any of the
digital cameras matched to one
74 September 2009
another or even shown side-by-side.
“It was the goal of the PGA and the
ASC that no electronic camera
would be directly compared to any
other electronic camera,” says Bill
Bennett, ASC, who was the on-set
cinematographer for the Arri D-21
and sat in on many of the grading
sessions.
The camera manufacturers
were allowed into the DI suite, but
only while the footage from their
particular camera was onscreen.
“We decided to do the color-correc-
tion on a scene-by-scene basis,” says
Bennett. “Most of the time, the
manufacturers were able to send a
representative for each timing ses-
sion. They had to come back day
after day and wait in the lobby until
their camera came up.” He adds that
he found it valuable to see the whole
post process. “Cinematographers
usually show up for the color-timing
session, but we don’t often see the
data-transformation aspect of it, or
all those other peripheral things. To
learn about how that happens was
very helpful.”
The final film print and DCP
were first presented at a pair of
events in June, the PGA’s Produced
By Conference and a private ASC
event. One of Clark’s initial impres-
sions was that “we now have digital
motion-picture cameras that are
refined and capable of producing
some extraordinary results in today’s
DI workflow environment,” he says.
“You can use a top-performing digi-
tal camera without necessarily being
handicapped by choosing that cam-
era over film. A few of these cameras
are demonstrating that they are able
to adapt to existing, film-centric DI
workflows and do so very effectively.”
However, says Stump, no one
should assume that enough time and
effort can make images captured by
any digital camera look like film.
“That’s not the right conclusion to
draw from this,” he says. “We’re
almost there, but we have to keep
making more demands of the manu-
facturers to refill our toolbox with
electronic tools. There are still many
things you can do with film that you
can’t do with electronic tools. The
manufacturers have been listening
— that’s why all these cameras look
so good — but let’s not let anyone off
the hook. This test points out where
we can improve the entire imaging
chain, from acquisition to display. It
isn’t good enough yet.”
At the Produced By
Conference, McCreary mentioned a
few of the improvements manufac-
turers still need to make. “We would
love optical viewfinders in the digital
Testing Digital Cameras: Part 2
cameras — in our assessment, only
the Arri D-21 and the Arri 435 film
camera had optical viewfinders,” she
said. “We also asked for true 2K and
4K cameras in terms of both sensors
and storage — no compression.
Another request was that the manu-
facturers help us define and imple-
ment metadata standardization.”
Bennett agrees that manufac-
turers need to provide an easier way
to input the metadata on set and tie
it to the file itself, ensuring that it is
always present and retrievable in
post. He notes that the CAS incor-
porated a primitive sort of metadata
in the form of color Post-It notes
that were always visible in frame; a
different-color Post-It was used for
each camera. “That way, we knew
we’d always be able to tell which
camera it was,” he says.
Stump, who also chairs the
ASC Technology Committee’s
Metadata Subcommittee, believes
metadata is one of the last great
places to save money in filmmaking.
“Producers and the studios expend
an enormous amount of effort to
squeeze every nickel out of the pro-
duction budget and get it on the
screen,” he says. “If they only knew
how much is being squandered by
inefficient workflows that could be
automated by metadata! People just
don’t recognize it for what it is. It’s
76 September 2009
going to take the whole community
to implement a rich, automated,
uninterrupted stream of metadata,
but if the entire industry pursues it,
the production community will
realize big savings they never knew
were there.”
Stump also notes that
although 4K finishes are uncom-
mon, there is good reason to push
camera manufacturers in that direc-
tion. “It was announced in June that
Texas Instruments and all the pro-
jector companies are going to be
supplying 4K projectors, which
means 4K exhibition will eventually
be ubiquitous. That will give us 4K
projection, 4K DCI standards, and a
fairly nice movement toward 4K fin-
ishing, workflows and color correc-
tors. The only thing we don’t have is
a true 4K digital-acquisition device
that supplies co-sited RGB pixels at
4K each. Everyone has to realize that
‘good enough’ isn’t good enough.”
Based on the CAS, though,
there is a great deal of optimism
about the manufacturers’ level of
engagement and commitment to
the industry. “It’s quite a tribute to
the manufacturers that they all
stepped up and participated fully in
the CAS,” says Bennett. “In the post
phase, we got the distinct impres-
sion that they were learning as much
or more than we were about blend-
ing their cameras into established
workflows. They all made some
tremendous realizations.”
Already, some of the camera
manufacturers are beginning to offer
their own LUTs to bridge the gap
between the images their cameras
capture and the film-centric DI
workflow used for the CAS. “The
more camera manufacturers have to
stew in that juice, the better they can
appreciate why digital is not ubiqui-
tous as an acquisition medium yet,”
says Stump. “In that respect, the CAS
was a huge success.”
Bennett emphasizes that the
CAS is only a starting point, and
before commencing any project,
filmmakers should “test as much as
possible, and carry those tests all the
way through to the way in which it
will be distributed — film print, tele-
vision, Blu-ray DVD. You must test all
the way through the process to dis-
cover the limits of each imaging sys-
tem and then work within those lim-
its. All imaging systems have limits.
Even with paint on canvas, artists had
to learn what they could and couldn’t
do. Then, applying their skills, they
could make beautiful images.
“As digital acquisition evolves,
we’re learning what these cameras’
strengths are, and the cameras are
being used for those strengths,” con-
tinues Bennett. “That’s the biggest
benefit the CAS can offer filmmakers:
we can use the cameras in the situa-
tions to which they’re best suited.”
“The CAS is a current snap-
shot,” says Clark. “In two years, these
cameras will have moved toward
even higher resolution and an
expanded color gamut with a wider
dynamic range of scene-tone repro-
duction, along with an advanced 4K
post workflow. But we need to under-
stand how they perform right now in
the workflow that is most commonly
used.” Stump adds, “You don’t know
which way is forward is until you
know where you are.” I
 Thank You for Your Participation in
the Camera Assessment Series Project
Digital Motion Picture Camera Manufacturers:
Arri–D-21 • Panasonic–HPX3700 • Panavision–Genesis
Red–Red One • Sony–F35 and F23 • Thomson–Viper
Kodak
Key participants who enabled the CAS project:
ASC Technology Committee Deluxe Laboratories
Curtis Clark, ASC, Chair
David Stump, ASC, Camera Subcommittee Chair
Cinematographers who participated:
Al Barton, Workflow Subcommittee Chair Assigned to individual scenes
Lou Levinson, DI Subcommittee Chair Rodney Charters, ASC
Glenn Kennel, DI Workflow Specifications Coordinator Richard Edlund, ASC
Steven Fierberg, ASC
Revelations Entertainment Michael Goi, ASC
Lori McCreary, President Jacek Laskus, ASC
Producers Guild of America (PGA) Matthew Leonetti, ASC
Set Producers Stephen Lighthill, ASC
Hawk Koch Robert Primes, ASC
Michael Manheim John Toll, ASC
O.D. Welch Assigned to individual cameras
Producers Peter Anderson, ASC
Nick Abdo Bill Bennett, ASC
Charles Howard Mark Doering-Powell
Shelly Johnson, ASC
Camera Producers Karl Walter Lindenlaub, ASC
Paul Geffre Kramer Morgenthau, ASC
Pamela Keller Marty Ollstein
Lisa Sotolongo Nancy Schreiber, ASC
Bruce Devan
Yvonne Russo Directors of Photography Project Supervisors
Kim Van Hoven Curtis Clark, ASC
David Stump, ASC
Behind-the-Scenes Producers Kees Van Oostrum, ASC
Jon Lawrence
Michael Shores Special thanks to
Cory McCrum, Postproduction Producer Tom Walsh, President, Art Directors Guild
Lori McCreary, Chair, PGA Technology Council George Perkins, Exec. Producer, Desperate Housewives

LaserPacific Very special gratitude

Brian Burr
Doug Jaqua, Mike Sowa, Ron Burdett to the production crews!
Rob Smith, Sean Lohan, Chad Gunderson
and the LaserPacific team
 Post Focus
Pictured here Brand-New Shoes
and on the next by Robert S. Birchard
two pages are
frame grabs from
the recent digital Michael Powell and Emeric Press-
restoration of burger’s The Red Shoes, an “art film”
The Red Shoes,
directed by
about the world of ballet, was eagerly
Michael Powell embraced by audiences upon its release
and Emeric in 1948 and has remained a cult favorite
Pressburger and
photographed
ever since. Noted for its vivid color cine-
by Jack Cardiff, matography by Jack Cardiff, ASC, BSC,
ASC, BSC. and its somewhat over-the-top passion
for dance, the film is a favorite of Martin
Scorsese, whose Film Foundation
recently helped the UCLA Film & Televi-
sion Archive digitally restore the movie in
concert with the British Film Institute.
The restoration team’s original
goal was to do a new photochemical
restoration using wet-gate contact print-
ing from the original three-strip Techni-
color camera negatives, a procedure the
UCLA Archive had used to restore The
Barefoot Contessa (1954) and Becky
Sharp (1935). “We gathered a lot of
material from England, including 48 reels
of cut picture negatives, an original 1948
Technicolor nitrate print, and a 1955
78 September 2009
safety reissue print,” recalls Robert Gitt,
preservation officer for the UCLA
Archive. “We took everything to Dave
Cetra at Cinetech, and he made a new
print using the three Technicolor nega-
tives, color-timing the entire thing. That’s
when we discovered some pretty shock-
ing problems.
“The picture negative was
covered with mold — there were chalky
deposits all over it,” continues Gitt.
“[Archivist] Barbara Whitehead cleaned
all 48 reels by hand and then ultrasoni-
cally; that took the worst mold off but left
behind stains and little cracks and
crevices in the emulsion. We were
relieved when we saw Cinetech’s first
test reel — all of the fungus damage had
been eliminated simply with the use of
diffused light and wet-gate printing.
Then, when we saw the whole movie,
we discovered that a lot of the material
was badly out of register, much more so
than in any other Technicolor film I’ve
worked on. There had been differential
shrinkage in the elements over the years,
but what was even more worrisome was
that there were extreme vertical-regis-
tration problems in quite a number of
shots. We discovered that the problem
actually went way back; we found
records from Technicolor in London that
showed they’d had to make corrections
in 1948 to compensate for vertical-
registration problems.”
Gitt soon realized that the only
way to do a photochemical restoration
would be to go back to the cumbersome
method of optical printing, which would
add film generations and build up
contrast. A digital restoration seemed to
be the way to go. He recalls, “Cinetech
was interested in using a combination
of photochemical and digital tech-
niques, and they did some tests using
wet-printed master positives that came
out very well, but we know that theo-
retically, it’s best to use the original
picture negative if you can, so we also
did some tests at Warner Bros. Motion
Picture Imaging using the original nega-
tives. Both facilities did very good work,
but when we blew up the image very
large, it was evident that scanning the
original negs produced a result that was
less grainy and sharper. So the decision
was made to work with the original
YCM negatives at MPI and use digital
techniques exclusively to fix all the
The Red Shoes images courtesy of UCLA Film & TV Archive.
film’s problems, including mold
damage.”
At MPI, the 48 reels of original
negatives — yellow, cyan and magenta
records for each of the 16 finished
picture reels — were scanned at 4K on
a Northlight, and the scans were
cleaned up using both automated and
manual techniques before being recom-
bined. “Normally, we don’t tweak the
color levels when we do the recombine
because we don’t want to affect what
the color timer will eventually work
with,” notes Bill Baggelaar, MPI’s senior
vice president of technology. “On occa-
sion, we’ve had to do major preliminary

corrections, but for The Red Shoes, the
YCM color values were introduced at
standard settings.”
The recombined images were
turned over to MPI colorist Ray
Grabowski, who graded them under
Gitt’s supervision, with input from
Schoonmaker and Scorsese. “The
shadow detail and color information in
Cardiff’s original negatives is amazing
— genius, really,” marvels Grabowski.
“We used [FilmLight] Baselight 8 hard-
ware and software for the color-correc-
tion, and we also used Baselight’s
degraining tool here and there. The goal
was to keep the look of the original film
as much as possible. We did no grain
reduction except for some of the optical
effects, where the grain structure would
change and be very obvious.”
Indeed, the optical effects were
a problem on The Red Shoes, and they
offer a clue to the beauty and limitations
of the three-strip Technicolor dye-trans-
fer printing system that was used from
the early 1930s to the early 1950s. Gitt
explains, “When Technicolor did
dissolves and fades, the entire preced-
ing shot and the entire following shot
were copied optically, and in some
cases the shots went on and on. There’s
one reel [in The Red Shoes] where a
shot involved in an optical effect goes
on for two minutes. Technicolor was
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79

rather cavalier about controlling the
contrast of its opticals; they didn’t
attempt to make them match the
surrounding footage. That’s because
they had a trick up their sleeve. The
Technicolor process allowed them to
make corrections at the last minute as
the matrices were being made for dye-
transfer printing. In making the three
80 September 2009
matrices, which were gelatin relief
images that they would soak with dye
to print, they used an optical printer, so
each negative was exposed a frame at
a time, and they could not only change
the exposure to alter the color balance
and brightness of the scene, they could
also change the contrast shot-to-shot or
even within a shot. That’s the stage
where they corrected color-registration
problems as well. Today, Eastmancolor
developing is standardized; if you want
to break the rules, you can develop it to
a lower contrast, but the colors start
wandering off in different directions,
and the results aren’t easily repeatable.
With digital technology we can easily
modify the contrast, even shot-to-shot
as Technicolor did in 1948. That’s a big
plus.”
MPI digital conformist Katie
Largay assisted Grabowski throughout
the project, maintaining a spreadsheet
for every reel and every shot that
included what the source data was and
any relevant notes. “Katie wrangled the
data, and it was a load of stuff,” notes
Grabowski. “We were working at 4K
resolution, and there were a lot of things
going back and forth with fixes and
many inserts of newly repaired material.
Keeping track of it all was very time-
consuming, and Katie’s attention to
detail allowed me to concentrate on the
color-timing with Bob Gitt.”
John Polito at Audio Mechanics
restored the sound using mainly two
1948 track masters. “One of the masters
had extensive fungus damage, and only
small parts of it were usable,” says Gitt.
“The other was in generally good shape,
with some fungus damage at the ends of
the reels. John also worked with the
1955 Technicolor projection print; it had
splices here and there, but the sound
was good on it, and the reel ends were
in better shape.”
Once the digital work was
finished and approved, the processing
and final printing were carried out at
Cinetech. The restored film had its
premiere at this year’s Cannes Film
Festival. “When you run the final print
side-by-side with the digital version at
the same size and with the same screen
brightness, it matches very closely,”
observes Billy Patten, the project
manager at MPI. “Because we’ve
recorded to Eastman Color negative and
printed on Kodak Vision [2383], the print
is slightly grainier than the digital
version, but in terms of color and
contrast, they’re very close.”
¢
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 Celebrating Mr. Hulot’s
Holiday Anew
by Stephanie Argy
The 2009 Cannes Film Festival
also saw the debut of a newly restored
Mr. Hulot’s Holiday (Les Vacances de
Monsieur Hulot), which stars
writer/director Jacques Tati as the
nearly silent title character.
Tati himself revisited the movie
several times over the course of three
decades. The black-and-white picture
was originally shot in 1951/1952 in
Saint-Marc-sur-Mer, a small French
resort on the Atlantic coast. In 1962, Tati
re-edited parts of the movie and
reworked the score and the sound mix.
In a nod to the popular postman charac-
ter from his first feature, Jour de Fête, he
also superimposed a color stamp and a
postmark over the final shot of the
movie.
Then, in 1977, as Mr. Hulot’s Holi-
day began to attract a new following,
Tati saw Jaws and was inspired to shoot
additional footage. His original cut had a
scene in which Hulot goes out on the
ocean in a folding canoe, then gets
caught inside it when it collapses on
him. As he struggles to get free, the
canoe keeps snapping open and shut,
looking like the biting jaws of a shark.
The new shots featured panicked people
on the beach, running away from the
shark. (A close examination of their hair-
styles reveals that they were
photographed in the late 1970s, not the
early 1950s.)
The restoration of Mr. Hulot’s
Holiday represented an unusual collabo-
ration between two film foundations,
the Thomson Foundation for Film and TV
Heritage and the Fondation Groupama
Gan pour le Cinéma, as well as the rights
holder, Jérôme Deschamps (Tati’s
nephew), and the Cinémathèque
Française.
This sequence of images illustrates a
repair on a single frame from Mr. Hulot’s
Holiday. Steps in this repair included the
removal of both actors from the frame, the
reconstruction of the background,
rotoscoping, and a partial actor
replacement.
82 September 2009
When it came time to do the
restoration, the first matter to settle
was which version should be treated as
the definitive one. “Restoration is not
only technical, it’s also creative and
ethical,” says Séverine Wemaere, head
of the Thomson Foundation. “Today,
many works are called ‘restoration’ but
are really just materials that have been
cleaned. Some respect the author, but
some take too many liberties. You really
want to go deeply inside the movie and
not betray the filmmaker by doing a
restoration that is not what he would
have wanted.”
In this case, because the director
had made all the changes to the movie
himself, it was decided that the third
and final version should be the basis of
the restoration, which was carried out
at Technicolor in Los Angeles. Noting
that she was pleased with Technicolor’s
recent restoration of Lola Montès (AC
Sept. ’08), Wemaere says, “A team that
wins, you take it again.” Overseeing the
project was Lola Montès veteran Tom
Burton, vice president of digital services
at Technicolor Digital Intermediates.
Mr. Hulot’s Holiday was shot on
nitrate shortly before the highly flamma-
ble stock was phased out of use. The
Technicolor team considered scanning
the original nitrate negative, but after
doing test scans of both the original
negative and an interpositive, Burton
decided to work from a fine-grain IP
made on Kodak 2366. There were many
splices and grading notches in the nega-
tive, so when Technicolor struck the IP,
they had to do custom adjustments in
the gate of the contact printer to stabi-
lize the negative as much as possible as Mr. Hulot’s Holiday images courtesy of Technicolor.
it went through.
The negative was in bad shape,
partly because of all the work Tati had
done on the movie over the years.
Damage included tears, vertical
scratches, warping at splices and perf
damage. The black-and-white was
completely gray. “You couldn’t see Mr.
Hulot’s Holiday in good condition any
more, and that was what pushed me to
do this,” says Wemaere. “The object
was film heritage. Many, many film-
makers were inspired by Tati.” ¢
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This image The restoration was both digital
shows and photochemical. Wemaere explains
the finished
product. that there were two goals: to get the
best new elements so the film could be
shown again, and to create a new film
negative so the movie could be
preserved properly. “Who knows what
84
digital format will still be in effect in 10
years?” she muses.
One of the biggest challenges
was the schedule. Wemaere says the
project should have taken one year, but
by the time all the necessary elements
were located, it was December 2008,
and the goal was to have the restora-
tion finished in time for Cannes in May.
“It became a race,” she says.
Different phases of the process
that ordinarily would have been
sequential all went on at the same time.
The IP was scanned (using Arri and
Spirit scanners) to create a 2K master;
the color correction was done by Tim
Peeler on a da Vinci 2K Plus; and the
image repair was done using an array of
tools, including da Vinci Revival, MTI
Correct, Digital Vision Phoenix and
Adobe After Effects. A team of about 20
people worked in two or three shifts.
“Organization was the key,” says Danny
Albano, a visual-effects artist and
compositor on the project.
From a technical standpoint, the
biggest issues were stabilizing the
image to compensate for the jitteriness
caused by perf damage; cleaning up the
damage, especially from splices that
had been taken apart and put back
together (often leaving missing frames);
and combining materials from different
sources. Many of the existing opticals
and effects were questionable, to say
the least, presenting the team with the
recurring question of which to restore
and which to leave untouched. In one
instance, an image of a horse kicking a
car rumble-seat and trapping a man
inside was created using a split-screen
composite, but in the existing footage,
the two sides of the composite shift
noticeably against one another. “Decid-
ing whether to fix something like that is
tricky,” says Burton. “In this case, we
decided to do it.”
A major alteration was in the
overall look of the film, which was
taken from muted, low-contrast grays
back to higher-contrast blacks and
white — turning what had become a
cloudy day back into a sunny one.
Burton admits that adding the color
stamp at the end of the movie, one of
the changes made in Tati’s 1962 revi-
sion, was complicated because it meant
combining color and black-and-white
stocks. The team wanted to replicate
the original scenario as closely as possi-
ble, which led them to print the stamp
on color stock (Kodak Vision 2383) and
the rest of the picture on black-and-
white (Kodak 2302). As a result, they
had to splice in that extra color shot by
hand and accept the subtle focus issues
caused by the different thicknesses of
the print stocks; black-and-white stock
has one layer of emulsion, whereas
color has three.
While the picture-restoration
work went on in California, Léon
Rousseau at L. E. Diapason in France
was cleaning up the sound. According
to Burton, Rousseau had a complete
reference sound track to work with —
no splices, no missing pieces. Because
small bits were cut out of the picture,
there was a lot of communication back-
and-forth to ensure that picture and
sound would sync perfectly when they
were combined immediately before
Cannes.
Wemaere says she and Gilles
Duval of the Fondation Groupama Gan
share a philosophy about film restora-
tion: films shouldn’t just be restored,
they should also be shared with the
public. Four film prints and a digital-
cinema version of Mr. Hulot’s Holiday
have been created, and following its
debut at Cannes, the movie was
screened at other film festivals.
Wemaere notes that the restora-
tion was launched at the height of the
financial crisis. “Nobody wanted to
enter into any projects, and our two
foundations working together set such a
good example,” she says. “When
money is short everywhere, collabora-
tion becomes even more important. We
didn’t just share the costs, we also
shared the experience, and it was a joy.”
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85
New Products & Services
Panavision, Loumasystems
Unveil Louma 2
Panavision Remote Systems and
Loumasystems have introduced the
Louma 2, a new-generation camera-
movement system built on an open-
architecture platform. The system
expands Louma’s telescopic-crane tech-
nology exponentially with the introduc-
tion of ShotAssist, an open-architecture,
programmable software platform that
enables cinematographers to plan intri-
cate multi-axis shots and execute them
with less rehearsal and fewer takes.
Master/slave coordination between any
axis of the crane and remote head is
possible.
“Today’s technologically and visu-
ally sophisticated audiences are pushing
directors and cinematographers to be
ever more creative in developing eye-
arresting shots,” says Jean-Marie
Lavalou, Academy Award-winning co-
founder of Loumasystems. “We designed
the Louma 2 to meet those demands by
creating an open-architecture system so
flexible that virtually any shot imaginable
is possible, and any technology innova-
tion can be incorporated.”
86 September 2009
Specifically designed for the film
industry, the Louma 2 boasts smooth,
stable and quiet operation in all of its
movements.The Louma 2’s ShotAssist
software extends the original Louma
crane’s back-pan compensation to every
axis, including pan, tilt and telescope of
the arm; pan, tilt and roll of the remote
head; and even focus, zoom and camera
speed. Pan, tilt and roll limits are all
available at the touch of a button with
adjustable ramps to aid framing. One of
the applications of this software is the
ability to create straight-line “dolly”
shots, with the telescope compensating
for the arcing of the boom while the
head self-corrects with the back-pan
compensation. The Louma 2 frees oper-
ators of the “mechanical” work of
compensating for the crane, enabling
them to focus purely on the art of fram-
ing.
The Louma 2 boasts a newly
developed arm, allowing over 24' of
telescopic travel. A two- or three-axis
remote head and leveling gear can be
switched easily from overslung to
underslung and back. Additionally, the
remote head is fully equipped with
Preston F.I.Z. and remote-start connec-
tions, as well as 12-volt and 24-volt
camera and accessory power hookups.
The new ultra-rigid arm and remote-
head construction permit a high degree
of image stability, and all cabling is
internal, so there are no cables running
along the exterior of the arm. The unit
also comes with custom trolleys and an
operator’s cart, and it can be ready to
shoot in less than 60 minutes.
Key specifications of the Louma
2 include a maximum lens height when
overslung of 37', and when underslung
of 32' 10"; a telescopic range of 24' 2"; a
maximum telescopic speed of 2.6
meters per second; a maximum camera
load with two-axis head of 100 pounds,
and with three-axis head of 66 pounds;
a clearance of 4' 11" wide by 7' high; a
maximum length of 32'; a track width of
3' 3"; and a maximum overall weight of
4,130 pounds.
For more information, call (818)
316-1080, or visit www.panavision.com,
www.loumasystems.biz or www.lou
ma2.com.
 Cineped Provides
360-Degree Support
Cineped has announced the
availability of its panoramic 360-degree
camera-support system, which enables
camera operators to capture excep-
tional images with ease. More than a
dolly or tripod, the system features a
42", 360-degree rotational sliding
camera plate; extendable, automatic-
positioning telescopic column; digital
remote control; and a diamond-style
mobile base with heavy-duty rubber
wheels. Designed to allow for a
wealth of camera angles — including
horizontal and vertical movement,
panoramic/360-degree movement and
compound camera moves — Cineped
maneuvers with fine-tuned, virtually
noise-free operation.
With a weight capacity of 120
pounds, the sliding rotational camera
plate can carry multiple cameras simul-
taneously. The telescopic column, with
a base height of 58" (with camera),
extends to a height of 74.5". When the
telescoping column is removed, the slid-
ing rotational camera plate can attach
directly to the mobile base for capturing
low-angle shots. The mobile base is a
mere 27" wide, enabling setup in tight
shooting spaces. Cineped is also ideal
for smooth transitions, extreme close-
ups, and tabletop and POV shots.
For studio or location shoots,
Cineped’s completely modular design
allows easy transport and fast camera

87
 repositioning. Including the sliding
camera plate (45 pounds), telescopic
column (39 pounds) and mobile base (70
pounds), the total weight is 154 pounds,
and assembly is quick and trouble-free.
Manufactured in the U.S.A., the
Cineped system includes a digital
remote control box, a battery/charger,
an AC/DC converter and a low-mode
adaptor. For more information, visit
www.cineped.com.
Arri CSC Relocates, Expands
Arri CSC will relocate its New
York camera-rental department to a
custom-designed facility adjoining the
company’s lighting and grip division in
Secaucus, N.J. The adjoining buildings
have a combined footprint of 91,000
square feet; the new camera-rental
facility is 36,000 square feet, represent-
ing an expansion of over 50 percent.
The new camera department will
feature multiple prep bays and four
dedicated testing rooms surrounded by
optical, mechanical, digital and techni-
cal support departments, all on one
level. The Secaucus location also
accommodates parking for more than 70
vehicles, with no impact on vehicle load-
ing and unloading via dedicated bays.
Arri CSC, 25 Enterprise Ave.
North, Secaucus, N.J., 07094. For more
information, call (212) 757-0906 or visit
www.arricsc.com.
Porta-Jib Goes Exploring
Porta-Jib has announced the
Explorer, an all-in-one lightweight
jib/tripod/trolley/dolly system for
cameras weighing up to 20 pounds. The
Explorer’s various configurations
are made possible by a
custom four-sided extrusion
and corresponding dovetail
clamps with spring-loaded
safety pins.
The jib can be miniatur-
ized to 18", or it can be extended to
put the camera 9' in the air. With the
addition of two monopods, the jib
becomes a 6'-long elevated trolley
system; the jib arms simply fold over
to become the trolley’s 6' rails, and
the conversion takes only 3 minutes.
88 September 2009
A gas lifter in the tripod provides 35
pounds of vertical lift, making leveling
the rails and setting their height a quick
one-person operation.
By removing two more quick-
release screws, the entire rail system
can be lifted off the tripod and placed on
the ground for low-angle work; the
tripod’s spreader then detaches, and the
spreader’s legs and feet become the
leveling supports for the rails on the
ground or on a tabletop. The rails come
in 3' lengths, so longer configurations
can be obtained with the purchase of
more rails and clamps.
The versatile spreader boasts
two other functions as well. First, since
the legs are made of the 4-sided extru-
sion, the feet of the tripod clamp posi-
tively anywhere along the length of the
leg, allowing the tripod to be rigidly
mounted with its legs completely verti-
cal like a center column. This column-
like position allows the arm a greater
range of motion than if restricted by
outward-angled legs. Secondly, the
spreader can transform into a 3-wheel
dolly by simply removing the leveling
feet and clamping on a set of wheels.
The Explorer’s wheels are also
unique in that they can function
as track wheels on tradi-
tional steel track, PVC
pipe or Porta-Jib Flex-
Trak, and they
additionally
function as
floor wheels, which is especially useful
when repositioning the jib or trolley
system.
The jib’s rigid and lightweight (22
pound) design is ideal for shoots in
remote locations. The Explorer also
features a weight bucket, eliminating
the need for steel counterweights; the
bucket can be filled with dirt, sand or
rocks once on location.
The Explorer jib and trolley
system can mount to any 100mm tripod,
but using the Explorer tripod provides
the added ability to clamp the legs verti-
cally. Even with the jib’s small footprint,
its 36" arm boasts a 64" lift, allowing
operators to put the camera approxi-
mately 9' off the ground.
The Explorer can be purchased
as a complete system — comprising the
jib, tripod, trolley and dolly — or as
separate components. For more infor-
mation, visit www.porta-jib.com.
Polecam Extends to
7th Heaven
Polecam has announced its long-
reaching, truly portable camera rig,
Polecam 7th Heaven. Incorporat-
ing seven rigid carbon-fiber
elements, which interlock to
achieve an 8-meter reach
(approximately 26'), 7th
Heaven delivers unprece-
dented versatility in terms
of horizontal and vertical
camera location while giving oper-
ators total control of boom angle,
pan and tilt.
“Like the standard 6-meter Pole-
cam, 7th Heaven can be carried
anywhere and set up or dismantled
in less than 10 minutes, without
need for spanners, screwdrivers or
any other assembly tools,” says
Steffan Hewitt, Polecam’s founder
and managing director. “The 6-
meter span is ideal for most practi-
cal purposes, but 7th Heaven’s 8-
meter reach allows much closer
wildlife shooting where you want to
get near your subject without risk of
being eaten. It also has obvious
advantages for live events such as
concerts or sports, and at crowded
news briefings where you can go clean
over the heads of other reporters.”
7th Heaven is made possible by
a new formulation of high-rigidity
carbon-fiber elements, also now
supplied as standard with the five-
element Polecam rig. Using a combina-
tion of laminated and spun carbon-fiber
with 24-percent more fiber, the new
formulation delivers a 15-percent

“The intensely practical experience at

LFS gave me the technical grounding I
needed to experiment and develop
creatively as a cinematographer.”
Tobia Sempi from Milan. graduated MA Filmmaking in 2003. Since then he’s shot
over 50 commercials, 40 music videos and
many shorts including Chloe de Carvalho’s
increase in boom stiffness. award-winning Motor Industry Seeks
7th Heaven is fully compatible Test Driver. He is preparing his first
with all standard Polecam accessories, feature as DOP in late 2009.
including heads, underwater housings,
HD and SD cameras, CCUs and THE LFS TWO-YEAR
recorders. It also retains the internal
ducts and total freedom from stabilizer
MA FILMMAKING
stanchions that allow wiring to be PROGRAMME
routed inside the rig rather than left STARTS IN JANUARY,
exposed to snagging or other physical MAY AND SEPTEMBER.
abuse; this also saves on rigging and
de-rigging time by eliminating the need To find out more about training in all
for external cable straps and allowing departments, on a minimum of six film
exercises, including two 35mm projects,
surplus cable to be stowed within the
in a working studio with students from
boom. 30 countries visit
For more information, visit
www.polecam.com. lfs.org.uk
¢ THE LONDON FILM SCHOOL
A T R A D I T I O N O F I N N O V A T I O N
24 SHELTON STREET, LONDON, WC2H 9UB U.K. TELEPHONE: +44 (0)20 7836 9642 EMAIL INFO@LFS.ORG.UK 89

ACS France Supplies Europe
with PFC Ultimate Arm
ACS France recently signed an
exclusive partnership with Performance
Filmworks Canada, becoming the Euro-
pean supplier of the PFC Ultimate Arm,
a robotic crane fixed on a 4x4 AMG
Mercedes ML55. This system has
provided amazing results for the film
industry, performing even in off-road
and inclement-weather conditions.
The PFC Ultimate Arm is a light-
weight robotic arm that can be used on
most any automobile as well as boats or
trains. ACS France is offering the Ulti-
mate Arm integrated onto the
Mercedes ML55. The arm is mounted
on top of the vehicle, and the camera
installed on the Lev Head or Stab-C
Compact. The crew works in the safety
and comfort of the ML, operating the
head via joysticks or wheels.
The PFC Ultimate Arm was
honored with a Technical Achievement
Award from the Academy of Motion
Picture Arts and Sciences. The arm can
rotate 360 degrees in six seconds, and
the vehicle can travel at speeds up to
100 miles per hour while maintaining a
steady image. The camera’s highest
position is 5.4 meters (17.7') above
ground, and it can dip to below ground
level. The PFC Ultimate Arm has also
been used in extreme temperatures
ranging from 129°F in Death Valley to
-40°F in Alaska.
ACS France specializes in equip-
ment that consistently produces unique
and inspiring images, be it aerial film-
90 September 2009
ing, flying cameras (Cablecam) or
running cameras (Speedtrack). For more
information, visit www.aerial-france.fr
or www.performancefilmworks.com.
Tuffpak Heads Abroad
Manufactured by Nalpak, Tuff-
pak tripod cases are now available in
Europe. Florian Granderath, founder of
Camera Support Granderath, stocks all
sizes of the Tuffpak case line and main-
tains a distribution network throughout
Europe.
Features of Tuffpak cases
include an octagonal shape, preventing
the cases from rolling; wheels for most
models, making transportation easy;
protected and recessed handles,
increasing storage space and decreas-
ing shipping dimensions; and rotation-
ally molded construction, eliminating
seams and welds, and increasing wall
thickness at all bends.
For more information, visit
www.casu.tv or www.nalpak.com.
Plasticase Unleashes Nanuk
Nanuk is a new line of profes-
sional-quality protective Plasticase,
designed for professionals who need to
rely on robust, lightweight and high-
performance cases for protection in the
harshest environments.
Plasticase developed Nanuk’s
new, high-impact NK-7 resin to with-
stand environmental extremes. With
their rounded corners and reinforced
wall construction, Nanuk cases are built
to absorb shocks, providing optimal
impact resistance and protection to
sensitive equipment. All Nanuk cases
are also watertight and impervious to
dust and dirt.
Nanuk cases come loaded with
numerous standard features valued by
professionals, such as the PowerClaw
Latching System, which prevents the
cases from opening unexpectedly during
transport or when dropped. Additionally,
the foldable handle is molded from
NK-7 resin and over-molded with soft-
touch rubber for greater comfort. As a
result of the exceptionally robust
construction, Plasticase offers a lifetime
warranty on its Nanuk cases.
“We invested heavily in R&D in
order to develop Nanuk,” says Jean-
Pierre Grenier, president of Plasticase.
“We wanted to produce cases that are
optimally functional, very stylish and
able to endure the toughest environ-
mental conditions. Professionals often
work in rigorous surroundings and
conditions using valuable materials and
equipment. Therefore, you can’t afford
to compromise when it comes to quality
and reliability. With Nanuk, we provide a
product that performs extremely well on
all fronts.”
The Nanuk line of protective
cases currently comes in seven formats
and seven standard colors. Plasticase is
already working on a new generation of
the Nanuk line, which will feature larger
sizes as well as wheels and pull
handles.
For more information, visit
www.plasticase.com or www.nanuk
case.com.

Convergent Design
Ships NanoFlash
Convergent Design has intro-
duced the NanoFlash portable HD/SD
recorder/player. Using the Sony XDCam
422 Codec, NanoFlash records HD/SD
video and audio onto Compact Flash (CF)
cards.
Featuring HD/SD-SDI, HDMI and
analog audio I/O, NanoFlash delivers
exceptional video quality at user-
adjustable video bit rates up to 160
Mbps (XDCam 422 Codec) or 220 Mbps
4:2:2 (I-Frame-only), making its images
virtually indistinguishable from uncom-
pressed, even when capturing high-
motion, complex scenery. 24-bit 48 KHz

uncompressed audio (embedded or

consumer-level analog) complements
the video, and both are conveniently
stored in either MXF or QuickTime file ƩĞŶĚĂĨŽƵƌͲLJĞ
ƩĞŶĚĂĨŽƵƌͲLJĞĂƌĐŽůůĞŐĞƚŚĂƚ͛ƐĂƐĐƌĞĂƟǀĞĂƐLJŽƵĂƌĞ͘
format on CF cards. (The NanoFlash &ŝǀĞdŽǁŶƐŽůůĞŐĞŽīĞƌƐƚŚĞƐƉĞĐŝĂůŝnjĞĚƚƌĂŝŶŝŶŐLJŽƵŶĞĞĚ͘
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boasts dual CF card slots.) The footage ŽŶƚĂĐƚĂŶĚŵŝƐƐŝŽŶƐZĞƉƌĞƐĞŶƚĂƟǀĞĨŽƌŵŽƌĞŝŶĨŽƌŵĂƟŽŶ
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can then be played and edited directly ŽƌǀŝƐŝƚƵƐĂƚǁǁǁ͘ŌĐ͘ĞĚƵͬƐŝŐŶƵƉ͘
ŽƌǀŝƐŝƚƵƐĂƚǁǁǁ͘ŌĐ͘ĞĚƵͬƐŝŐŶƵƉ͘
off the cards or copied to a hard drive via
a third-party external USB or Firewire-
800 CF card reader. ¢
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 Unlike Firewire-based recorders,
NanoFlash bypasses the camera’s built-
in Codec to record at higher-quality
levels. The never-compressed HD/SD-
SDI or HDMI output from a live camera
source is fed directly into the NanoFlash,
maintaining the pristine quality directly
off the CCD/CMOS sensors. Additionally,
NanoFlash offers on-set playback with-
out any of the rewind/re-cue issues
associated with tape.
The lightweight (less than 1
pound), low-power (6 watts when active,
0.2 watts in standby) NanoFlash boasts
silent operation, with no fans or moving
parts, and rugged, solid-state construc-
tion in an all-aluminum case. The near-
universal NLE support — including Avid,
Final Cut Pro, Edius, Vegas and soon
Premiere — provides users with a wide
array of editing options, and compatibil-
ity with nearly all HD/SD formats —
including 1080i60/50, 1080psf30/25/24,
720p60/50 and 480i/576i — allows
NanoFlash to be used with a wide range
of cameras and video sources.
The NanoFlash is now shipping,
with a suggested price of $2,995. For
more information, visit www.convergent-
design.com.

Canon Releases Firmware

Update for 5D Mark II
Responding to user requests,
Canon U.S.A. Inc. has issued a firmware
update enabling manual exposure
control in the EOS 5D Mark II digital
SLR’s video mode.
With the ability to capture full HD
video on a 24mm x 36mm sensor, the
EOS 5D Mark II has been enthusiastically
received by studios, independent film-
makers and professional videographers.
However, the consensus was that the
camera needed manual exposure control
within its video mode if it was to reach
its full potential. Now, after months of
extensive engineering and testing,
Canon offers a free, downloadable
firmware update that gives users full
control over ISO, aperture and shutter
speed while capturing video.
For more information and to
download the free firmware update, visit
www.usa.canon.com.

92

Mitchell mount: top mount, underslung
and cantilevered; the custom counter-
weight tray should be used whenever the
slider is cantilevered.
That Cat is also offering new,
lower pricing across its entire range of
camera sliders, and the company has
announced that its Silent Cat sliders are
now available in Los Angeles for daily
rental at Birns & Sawyer.
For more information, visit
www.cameraslider.com or www.birn
sandsawyer.com.
IDX Offers High-Load
Batteries
IDX System Technology, Inc., has
introduced the company’s new premier
power system, the E-HL9 Series, a high-
performance, high-load Lithium Ion
battery line designed for the age of
professional HD production.
Specifically geared for the indus-
try’s power-hungry video and film camera
systems, the E-HL9 Series enables
productions to shoot continuously for long
periods, while handling the extreme in-
rush associated with many of today’s most
sophisticated recording and lighting
systems. With a 10-amp capacity and
nearly 50-percent-greater power delivery
over previous IDX batteries, the new
models deliver the battery energy
demanded by today’s intensive production
equipment.
94 September 2009
To sustain performance, E-HL9
Series batteries are designed with a
high-level class of cell specifications,
and an accelerated high-rate discharge
handles up to 10 amps/120 watts. The
series can also be used in critical situa-
tions requiring a high DC power draw,
such as on-board lighting applications.
While delivering a significant power
payload, the high current draw is engi-
neered not to adversely affect the
longevity of the battery. Its architecture
results in an extended overall life cycle
of nearly 10 percent.
The E-HL9 Series comprises two
high-energy Lithium Ion batteries, the E-
HL9 and the E-HL9S. The latter is an
economical alternative battery with the
same single-unit power capacity as the
E-HL9 and a three-LED power indicator
display; this standalone version has the
durability of all IDX batteries, including
triple safety, and features such as a
two-year product warranty. The E-HL9
on the other hand offers one of the most
flexible solutions to expandable capac-
ity, IDX’s PowerLink feature, which can
directly connect two batteries, deliver-
ing a total power capacity of 176 watt
hours. The E-HL9 also supports Digi-
View, enabling a viewfinder reading for
battery levels in many cameras, and a
five-LED power status display delivers
an accurate, incremental capacity read-
ing. IDX’s computer-based Battery
Management System (BMS) can also
be used on the E-LH9 for enhanced
diagnostics and a comprehensive
review of the battery’s history of use.
The E-HL9 Series is safe for air
transport; DOT/IATA regulations make it
possible for unlimited spare Li-ion
batteries under 100 watt hours to be
transported in carry-on luggage.
For more information, visit
www.idxtek.com.
VES Presents Entertainment
Production Summit
The Visual Effects Society will
present a Production Summit for the
greater entertainment industry on Oct.
24 at the Ritz Carlton Hotel in Marina
del Rey. The event will bring together
practitioners from all crafts and offer a
rare opportunity to examine innovative
approaches to producer challenges,
technology developments and the glob-
alization of the production industry.
Eric Roth, the executive director
of the VES, observes, “Because the
entertainment industry is changing so
rapidly — on the creative, technological
and business fronts — we’re bringing
together all industry stakeholders to
discuss the challenges we all face in
looking at our entertainment future. The
Production Summit will be a central
meeting place of common concerns and
challenges that will create new
dialogue and solutions across all guilds
and studios.”
The summit’s sessions will
include “Through the Kaleidoscope,”
three interactive sessions delivering a
multifaceted examination of prep
through post; “XRay: Surviving (and
thriving in) the Postproduction Pipeline
in the 21st Century”; and “Hot, Flat and
(Getting) Crowded: The Business of
Production and the New Global Econ-
omy.” The summit will bring together an
international group of directors, produc-
ers, cinematographers, editors, technol-
ogists and visual-effects leaders
responsible for moving the industry into
the next decade.
“The industry overall is currently
being challenged by enormous
economic constraints, and has
responded by starting fewer projects,”
says Jeffrey A. Okun, VES board chair.
“They want to do them fast and inex-
pensively, while at the same time reach-
ing for the highest quality. This mandate
is causing tremendous stresses and
strains throughout the entire pipeline of
projects. This summit will lead the
discussion on how we all will get to the
future, and by envisioning the future we
can begin to create it.”
For more information and to
register, visit www.visualeffects
society.com/productionsummit2009.
I
SUBMISSION INFORMATION
Please e-mail New Products/Services
releases to newproducts@ascmag.com and include
full contact information and product images. Photos
must be TIFF or JPEG files of at least 300dpi.
 INNOVA
TION
Qua
lity mad
e by Denz

FLANGE DEPTH CONTROLLER

Precision Flange Measurement to

Cineparts Energizes
Slurp-O-Meter
Cineparts has introduced the
Slurp-O-Meter, a voltmeter, ammeter,
power meter and amp-hour meter in one
rugged housing, enabling at-a-glance
monitoring of electrical parameters. All
parameters are shown simultaneously
and update approximately two times per
second.
use with all digital video cameras
fitted with 54 mm PL-Mount
RED One, Sony F35, Arri D-20/21
100 % Precision – Accuracy to
1 Micron (Collimator Technique)
Quick and easy to use
(self-explanatory)
Power Supply: DC 3 V (battery),
AC mains adapter 5 V DC
Easy controlling via the on-screen
display from monitor
154 821 234

The Slurp-O-Meter boasts a low

internal resistance of 0.03 Ohm, so it
does not affect measurement and can
remain in line with the electrical appli-
ance operating for control purposes.
Additionally, the Slurp-O-Meter can be
configured for multiple applications via WE ACCEPT
different Y-adapter cables; Cineparts
offers cables for 12-volt XLR, 24-volt XLR,
www.denz-deniz.com
Arri/Fischer and Red/LEMO connections.
Measuring approximately
5.7"x3.4"x1.4", the instrument features a
protruded aluminum-alloy housing and is
equipped with rubber bumpers and a
4mm-thick hardened multi-coated protec-
tion glass for the display. It is also splash-
water-protected and can operate from
-4°F to 104°F.
Cineparts also offers a “Big”
version of the Slurp-O-Meter specially
designed for users of the Sony F23 and
F35 cameras, providing an overview of
the two separate DC lines simultaneously
on two displays.
For more information, visit
www.cineparts.net.

That Cat Intros 2500 Slider

That Cat Camera Support, LLC has
introduced the Silent Cat 2500 camera
slider. Weighing 30 pounds and featuring
a 29"-long track, allowing 19" of travel,
the Silent Cat 2500 is perfect for working
in close quarters.
The Silent Cat 2500 offers three
camera-mounting positions when
attached to a dolly or any standard

93
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American Cinematographer 97
 Classifieds Advertiser’s Index
16x9, Inc. 96 Deluxe C2 P+S Technik 79, 97
RATES Aaton S.A. 68-69 DV Expo 95 Panasonic Broadcast 7
AC 1, 77 Eastman Kodak 13, C4 PED Denz 93
All classifications are $4.50 per word. Words set in bold face
AFM 83 Photon Beard 97
or all capitals are $5.00 per word. First word of ad and adver- Filmtools 87
tiser’s name can be set in capitals without extra charge. No Aja Video Systems, Inc. 15 Photo-sonics, Rental 66
Five Towns College 91 Pille Film Gmbh 97
agency commission or discounts on classified advertis- Alamar Productions, Inc. 96 Fuji Motion Picture 56-57
ing.PAYMENT MUST ACCOMPANY ORDER. VISA, Mastercard, AmEx
Alan Gordon Enterprises Pro8mm 96
and Discover card are accepted. Send ad to Classified Ad-
96, 97 Gekko Technology 49 Professional Sound Services
vertising, American Cinematographer, P.O. Box 2230, 89
Hollywood, CA 90078. Or FAX (323) 876-4973. Deadline for Arri 39 Glidecam Industries 65
payment and copy must be in the office by 15th of second Arri CSC 53 Golden Animations 97 Rag Place, The 93
month preceding publication. Subject matter is limited to items Rosco 30
and services pertaining to filmmaking and video production. Backstage Equipment, Inc. High Def Expo, Inc. 85
Words used are subject to magazine style abbreviation. Mini- 89 Innovision 97 SAE 87
mum amount per ad: $45 Band Pro 5 Servicevision USA 55
Barger-Lite 6 JEM Studio Lighting. Inc. 12 Sim Video 51
Bron Kobold 6 J.L. Fisher 41 Stanton Video Services 91
CLASSIFIEDS ON-LINE
Burrell Enterprises 96 K 5600, Inc. 31 Super16 Inc. 97
Ads may now also be placed in the on-line Classi-
CamMate Systems 96 Kino Flo 43, 67 Telescopic 96
fieds at the ASC web site.
Internet ads are seen around the world at the Cavision Enterprises 75 Laffoux Solutions, Inc. 96 Thales Angenieux 9
same great rate as in print, or for slightly more you Chapman/Leonard Studio Laser Pacific 81 Tiffen 19, C3
can appear both online and in print. Equipment Inc. 27 Lentequip, Inc. 97
For more information please visit VF Gadgets, Inc. 96
Chimera 63 Lights! Action! Company
www.theasc.com/advertiser, or e-mail: classi- Walter Klassen FX 54
fieds@theasc.com.
Cinema Vision 97 96
Cinematography Lite Panels 2 Welch Integrated 99
Electronics 92 London Film School 89 Willy’s Widgets 96
EQUIPMENT FOR SALE Cinekinetic 96 www.theasc.com 10, 12,
Mac Group US 11 84, 92, 101
Cinerover 96
435 & 535B Package - Sacrifice $135,000. Details Matthews Studio Equipment
at www.big-storm.com/camera Clairmont Film & Digital 23 Zacuto Films 97
97
Convergent Design 42 ZGC, Inc. 29, 79, 97
USED EQUIPMENT. PRO VIDEO & FILM EQUIPMENT Movcam 25
COMPANY. (972) 869-9990. Cooke Optics 29, 79, 97
Movie Tech AG 97
Arri 435ES very complete package plus 18-100 Zoom lens, MP&E Mayo Productions 97
Arri Varicon. Excellent prices Contact rmclach-
lan@mac.com MSM 6
USED EQUIPMENT. PRO VIDEO & FILM EQUIPMENT New York Film Academy 73
COMPANY. (888) 869-9998, providfilm@aol.com.
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98 September 2009
 PRO EDUCATION WORKSHOPS
and Networking Events
Pre-register Online and Get the latest updates
on upcoming Filmmaking Workshops.
Visit: www.studentfilmmakers.com/workshops

Call for Workshop Instructors

We invite filmmakers, cinematographers, directors, editors,
sound engineers, producers, and screenwriters to submit a
syllabus and brief biography for consideration.
Reach us at: http://www.studentfilmmakers.com/contact.shtml
 American Society of Cinematographers Roster
OFFICERS – 2009-’10 ACTIVE MEMBERS Ernest Dickerson George Koblasa David B. Nowell
Thomas Ackerman Billy Dickson Fred J. Koenekamp Rene Ohashi
Michael Goi,
Lance Acord Bill Dill Lajos Koltai Daryn Okada
President Lloyd Ahern II Pete Kozachik
Bert Dunk Thomas Olgeirsson
Richard Crudo, Herbert Alpert John Dykstra Neil Krepela Woody Omens
Vice President Russ Alsobrook Richard Edlund Willy Kurant Miroslav Ondricek
Howard A. Anderson III Frederick Elmes Ellen M. Kuras Michael D. O’Shea
Owen Roizman,
Howard A. Anderson Jr. Robert Elswit George La Fountaine Anthony Palmieri
Vice President James Anderson Geoffrey Erb Edward Lachman Phedon Papamichael
Victor J. Kemper, Peter Anderson Scott Farrar Ken Lamkin Daniel Pearl
Vice President Tony Askins Jon Fauer Jacek Laskus Edward J. Pei
Charles Austin Don E. FauntLeRoy Andrew Laszlo James Pergola
Matthew Leonetti, Christopher Baffa Denis Lenoir Don Peterman
Gerald Feil
Treasurer James Bagdonas Steven Fierberg John R. Leonetti Lowell Peterson
Rodney Taylor, King Baggot Gerald Perry Finnerman Matthew Leonetti Wally Pfister
Secretary John Bailey Mauro Fiore Andrew Lesnie Gene Polito
Michael Ballhaus John C. Flinn III Peter Levy Bill Pope
John C. Flinn III, Andrzej Bartkowiak Ron Fortunato Matthew Libatique Steven Poster
Sergeant-at-Arms John Bartley William A. Fraker Charlie Lieberman Tom Priestley Jr.
Bojan Bazelli Tak Fujimoto Stephen Lighthill Rodrigo Prieto
MEMBERS Frank Beascoechea Alex Funke Karl Walter Lindenlaub Robert Primes
OF THE BOARD Affonso Beato Steve Gainer John Lindley Frank Prinzi
Curtis Clark Mat Beck Ron Garcia Robert F. Liu Richard Quinlan
Richard Crudo Dion Beebe Dejan Georgevich Walt Lloyd Declan Quinn
Bill Bennett Michael Goi Bruce Logan Earl Rath
George Spiro Dibie Andres Berenguer Stephen Goldblatt Gordon Lonsdale Richard Rawlings Jr.
Richard Edlund Carl Berger Paul Goldsmith Emmanuel Lubezki Frank Raymond
John C. Flinn III Gabriel Beristain Frederic Goodich Julio G. Macat Tami Reiker
John Hora Steven Bernstein Victor Goss Glen MacPherson Marc Reshovsky
Victor J. Kemper Ross Berryman Jack Green Constantine Makris Robert Richardson
Matthew Leonetti Michael Bonvillain Adam Greenberg Karl Malkames Anthony B. Richmond
Richard Bowen Robbie Greenberg Denis Maloney Bill Roe
Stephen Lighthill David Boyd Xavier Perez Grobet Isidore Mankofsky Owen Roizman
Isidore Mankofsky Russell Boyd Alexander Gruszynski Christopher Manley Pete Romano
Daryn Okada Jonathan Brown Changwei Gu Michael D. Margulies Charles Rosher Jr.
Owen Roizman Don Burgess Rick Gunter Barry Markowitz Giuseppe Rotunno
Nancy Schreiber Stephen H. Burum Rob Hahn Vincent Martinelli Philippe Rousselot
Bill Butler Gerald Hirschfeld Steve Mason Juan Ruiz-Anchia
Haskell Wexler
Frank B. Byers Henner Hofmann Clark Mathis Marvin Rush
Vilmos Zsigmond Bobby Byrne Adam Holender Don McAlpine Paul Ryan
Antonio Calvache Ernie Holzman Don McCuaig Eric Saarinen
ALTERNATES Paul Cameron John C. Hora Seamus McGarvey Alik Sakharov
Fred Elmes Russell P. Carpenter Gil Hubbs Robert McLachlan Mikael Salomon
James L. Carter Michel Hugo Greg McMurry Harris Savides
Steven Fierberg
Alan Caso Shane Hurlbut Steve McNutt Roberto Schaefer
Ron Garcia Michael Chapman Judy Irola Terry K. Meade Tobias Schliessler
Michael D. O’Shea Rodney Charters Mark Irwin Chris Menges Aaron Schneider
Michael Negrin James A. Chressanthis Levie Isaacks Rexford Metz Nancy Schreiber
Joan Churchill Andrew Jackson Anastas Michos Fred Schuler
Curtis Clark Peter James Douglas Milsome John Schwartzman
Peter L. Collister Johnny E. Jensen Dan Mindel John Seale
Jack Cooperman Torben Johnke Charles Minsky Christian Sebaldt
Jack Couffer Frank Johnson Richard Moore Dean Semler
Vincent G. Cox Shelly Johnson Donald A. Morgan Eduardo Serra
Jeff Cronenweth Jeffrey Jur Donald M. Morgan Steven Shaw
Richard Crudo William K. Jurgensen Kramer Morgenthau Richard Shore
Dean R. Cundey Adam Kane M. David Mullen Newton Thomas Sigel
Stefan Czapsky Stephen M. Katz Dennis Muren John Simmons
David Darby Ken Kelsch Fred Murphy Sandi Sissel
Allen Daviau Victor J. Kemper Hiro Narita Bradley B. Six
Roger Deakins Wayne Kennan Guillermo Navarro Dennis L. Smith
Jan DeBont Francis Kenny Michael B. Negrin Roland “Ozzie” Smith
Thomas Del Ruth Glenn Kershaw Sol Negrin Reed Smoot
Bruno Delbonnel Darius Khondji Bill Neil Bing Sokolsky
Peter Deming Gary Kibbe Alex Nepomniaschy Peter Sova
Caleb Deschanel Jan Kiesser John Newby Dante Spinotti
Ron Dexter Jeffrey L. Kimball Yuri Neyman Robert Steadman
Craig Di Bona Alar Kivilo Sam Nicholson Ueli Steiger
100 September 2009 George Spiro Dibie Richard Kline Crescenzo Notarile Peter Stein
S E P T E M B E R 2 0 0 9

Robert M. Stevens Emory M. Cohen Iain A. Neil

Tom Stern Sean Coughlin Otto Nemenz
Rogier Stoffers Robert B. Creamer Ernst Nettmann
Vittorio Storaro Grover Crisp Tony Ngai
Harry Stradling Jr. Daniel Curry Mickel Niehenke
David Stump Ross Danielson Marty Oppenheimer
Tim Suhrstedt Carlos D. DeMattos Walt Ordway
Peter Suschitzky Gary Demos Larry Parker
Alfred Taylor Richard Di Bona Michael Parker
Jonathan Taylor Kevin Dillon Warren Parker
Rodney Taylor David Dodson Doug Pentek
William Taylor Judith Doherty Kristin Petrovich
Don Thorin Don Donigi Ed Phillips
John Toll Cyril Drabinsky Nick Phillips
Mario Tosi Jesse Dylan Jerry Pierce
Salvatore Totino Jonathan Erland Joshua Pines
Luciano Tovoli John Farrand Carl Porcello
Jost Vacano Ray Feeney Howard Preston
Theo Van de Sande William Feightner David Pringle
Eric Van Haren Noman Phil Feiner Phil Radin
Kees Van Oostrum Jimmy Fisher Christopher Reyna
Ron Vargas Scott Fleischer Colin Ritchie
Mark Vargo Thomas Fletcher Eric G. Rodli
Amelia Vincent Steve Garfinkel Andy Romanoff
William Wages Salvatore Giarratano Daniel Rosen
Roy H. Wagner Richard B. Glickman Dana Ross
Ric Waite John A. Gresch Bill Russell
Michael Watkins Jim Hannafin Kish Sadhvani
Jonathan West William Hansard David Samuelson
Haskell Wexler Bill Hansard, Jr. Peter K. Schnitzler
Jack Whitman Richard Hart Walter Schonfeld
Gordon Willis Robert Harvey Juergen Schwinzer
Dariusz Wolski Charles Herzfeld Ronald Scott
Ralph Woolsey Larry Hezzelwood Steven Scott
Peter Wunstorf Frieder Hochheim Don Shapiro
Robert Yeoman Bob Hoffman Milton R. Shefter
Richard Yuricich Vinny Hogan Leon Silverman
Jerzy Zielinski Robert C. Hummel Garrett Smith
Vilmos Zsigmond Roy Isaia Stefan Sonnenfeld
Kenneth Zunder George Joblove John L. Sprung
Joel Johnson Joseph N. Tawil
ASSOCIATE MEMBERS John Johnston Ira Tiffen
Alan Albert Frank Kay Arthur Tostado
Richard Aschman Debbie Kennard Bill Turner
Volker Bahnemann Milton Keslow Stephan Ukas-Bradley
Kay Baker Robert Keslow Mark Van Horne
Joseph J. Ball Larry Kingen Richard Vetter
Amnon Band Douglas Kirkland Joe Violante
Carly M. Barber Timothy J. Knapp Dedo Weigert
Craig Barron Ron Koch Franz Weiser
Thomas M. Barron Karl Kresser Evans Wetmore
Larry Barton Lou Levinson Beverly Wood
Bob Beitcher Suzanne Lezotte Jan Yarbrough
Mark Bender Grant Loucks Hoyt Yeatman
Bruce Berke Andy Maltz Irwin M. Young
John Bickford Steven E. Manios Michael Zacharia
Steven A. Blakely Robert Mastronardi Bob Zahn
Mitchell Bogdanowicz Joe Matza Nazir Zaidi
Jack Bonura Albert Mayer, Jr. Michael Zakula
Michael Bravin Andy McIntyre Les Zellan
William Brodersen Stan Miller
Garrett Brown Walter H. Mills HONORARY MEMBERS
Ronald D. Burdett George Milton Col. Edwin E. Aldrin Jr.
Reid Burns Mike Mimaki Neil A. Armstrong
Vincent Carabello Rami Mina Col. Michael Collins
Jim Carter Michael Morelli Bob Fisher
Leonard Chapman Dash Morrison David MacDonald
Mark Chiolis Nolan Murdock Cpt. Bruce McCandless II
Denny Clairmont Mark W. Murphy D. Brian Spruill
Cary Clayton Dan Muscarella 101
 Clubhouse News
Delbonnel, Notarile, Stoffers
Join Society
Bruno Delbonnel, ASC, AFC
was born in eastern France. The son of a
soldier, he broke with family tradition to
pursue his interest in the arts.
At La Sorbonne in Paris, he
studied philosophy and
watched two films a day,
frequenting theaters scattered
throughout the city.
Delbonnel got his start in
filmmaking when he received a
government grant to direct a
short film; renowned cine-
matographer Henri Alekan
shot the film and inspired
Delbonnel to pursue a career in cine-
matography. After working as a camera
assistant for 15 years, he moved up to
cinematographer, earning his first cred-
its on commercials. His feature credits
include Amélie (AC Sept. ’01), Infamous
(2006), Harry Potter and the Half-Blood
Prince (2009) and A Very Long Engage-
ment (AC Dec. ‘04), for which he won an
ASC Award. He is currently shooting
Faust for Alexander Sokurov.
Raised in Brooklyn, N.Y.,
Crescenzo Notarile, ASC attended
the Nikon School of Photography before
earning a bachelor’s degree in film
production and communication at the
New York Institute of Technology. Begin-
ning his professional cinematography
career in the 1980s, he shot music
videos for such artists as The
Rolling Stones, U2, Steve
Winwood and Bruce Spring-
steen and commercials for
such companies as American
Express, Pepsi, Revlon and
Cover Girl.
Notarile’s credits include
the features Bullet (1996), Truth
Be Told (2002) and Timecop:
The Berlin Decision (2003); the
pilot for Skin, and the pilot and
102 September 2009
series Hawaii. He is currently working
on the series Ghost Whisperer.
Rogier Stoffers, ASC, NSC
was born in Utrecht, Netherlands, and
studied French language and literature
and theater and film at the University of
Utrecht. He was admitted to The
Netherlands Film and Television Acad-
emy’s cinematography program, where
he shot the thesis project Alaska
(1989), directed by Mike van Diem; the
film won the Dutch Golden Calf for Best
Short and a Student Academy Award.
Stoffers and van Diem reteamed for the
feature Character (1997), which won
the Oscar for Best Foreign Language
Film and the Golden Frog at Camerim-
age.
Stoffers’ feature credits include
Quills (AC Jan. ’01), John Q (2002),
School of Rock (2003), Disturbia (2007)
and Lakeview Terrace (2008).
Baker, Band, Chiolis
Named Associates
Kay Baker of Telecorps Sales
& Leasing, LLC, began working in
Colorado’s film industry through
Denver’s Film/Video Equipment Service
Co. Her efforts helped revitalize the
Rocky Mountain Vid Expo, which over
the years has attracted numerous ASC
members. Baker has helped organize
seminars at the ASC Clubhouse and
has also assisted with the ASC
Awards.
Amnon Band was born near
Nahariya, Israel, and grew up in the
agricultural settlement of Moshav
Lehman. An early interest in agricultural
engineering sparked a lifelong passion
for machines and technology, and after a
stint in the Israel Defense Forces, Band
moved to Los Angeles and dove into the
film industry. In 1984, he opened Band
Pro as a one-man operation. He contin-
ues to serve as the company’s president
and CEO, and he has overseen its expan-
sion into Israel, Munich and New York.
Grass Valley’s Mark Chiolis,
who currently serves as senior marketing
manager, has been with the company for
more than 15 years. He has been active
in the company’s development of digital
cinematography solutions, most notably
the Viper camera, and has collaborated
with the ASC Technology Committee.
Prior to joining Grass Valley, Chiolis
worked in operations, news and produc-
tion management for a number of televi-
sion stations. He also notched a number
of credits shooting video for such events
as the Reno Air Race.
Deluxe Dedicates
Bud Stone Building
Deluxe Laboratories recently
hosted the dedication and ribbon-cutting
ceremony for the new Bud Stone Build-
ing at the company’s Hollywood campus.
Named for Burton “Bud” Stone, an
honorary ASC member who died last
year, the building will enable Deluxe to
meet increased demand for motion-
picture film processing and print delivery
while reducing utility and chemical
usage, and reducing, reusing and recy-
cling raw materials during the produc-
tion of film prints.
“As Deluxe continues to expand
its worldwide footprint to fulfill growing
demand for both film and digital
services, it is an honor to officially open
our newest facility in Hollywood in Bud
Stone’s name,” says Ronald O. Perel-
man, chairman of Deluxe. The company’s

president and CEO, Cyril Drabinsky
(above, right, pictured with Perelman
and Los Angeles Mayor Antonio
Villaraigosa), an associate member of
the ASC, adds, “By keeping Deluxe’s
extensive array of creative and produc-
tion services here in Hollywood, we
encourage the highly skilled labor pool
and creative community leaders in the
motion-picture industry to stay within
the community.”
3 ASC Members Invited
to Join Academy
Society members Russ Also-
brook, Henner Hofmann and Rodney
Taylor are among 134 artists and exec-
utives active in theatrical motion
pictures who were recently invited to
join the Academy of Motion Picture Arts
and Sciences. “These filmmakers have,
over the course of their careers,
captured the imagination of audiences
around the world,” says Academy Presi-
dent Sid Ganis. “It’s this kind of talent
and creativity that make up the Acad-
emy, and I welcome each of them to our
ranks.”
McGarvey in Conversation
at Edinburgh Fest
Seamus McGarvey, ASC,
BSC, who recently became an official
patron of the Edinburgh International
Film Festival, interviewed photogra-
pher/filmmaker Willie Doherty and cine-
matographer Anthony Dod Mantle, BSC,
DFF, in two separate events at this year’s
festival. McGarvey and Doherty, a two-
time Turner Prize nominee, discussed
their shared sensibilities and their
collaboration on Ghost Story. McGar-
vey’s conversation with Dod Mantle,
who won ASC and Academy awards
this year for Slumdog Millionaire, honored with this year’s Cine Gear Life-
covered the craft of cinematography time Achievement Award at the Cine
and the state of the art. Gear Expo in June. Phillips launched his
first company, Waynco, when he was 20
Kurant at the Cinémathèque years old. He joined Matthews in 1971
Willy Kurant, ASC, AFC and has since been honored with two
recently visited the Cinémathèque Technical Academy Awards, a Scientific
Française in Paris to lead a discussion
about cinematographer Henri Alekan’s
work with filmmakers Agnès Godard,
AFC; Jean-Louis Leconte; and Denys de
la Patellière following a screening of
Wim Wenders’ The State of Things
(1982). The film also features the cine-
matography of Martin Schäfer and Fred
Murphy, ASC.
Kodak Hosts Greenberg at
Los Angeles Fest
The spotlight was turned on
Robbie Greenberg, ASC for this
year’s Kodak Focus presentation during
the Los Angeles Film Festival, which and Engineering Award, and an Emmy
was held in June. Greenberg, a four- Award for developments in camera-
time ASC Award winner, shared his support technology such as the Tulip
insights into the artistry and technology Crane and the Cam-Remote.
of filmmaking while screening clips “We all congratulate Ed on this
from his work, which includes the award,” says George Spiro Dibie,
ASC. “His commitment to our industry,
support and services is exemplary. He
cares so passionately … and he is
always available to help and assist the
pros and emerging filmmakers.” Phillips
says, “Over the past 40-some years, I’ve
enjoyed a very special relationship with
this industry. I’ve listened to production
needs and have done everything I could
to give our artists the best tools avail-
able. Being honored with this award
says we’ve been doing something right.
And I’m not slowing down!” I
Emmy-winning Introducing Dorothy
Dandridge and Winchell, the Emmy-
nominated Warm Springs, Iron Jawed
Angels and James Dean, and the
features The Milagro Beanfield War,
Save the Last Dance and Wild Hogs.
Phillips Receives
Lifetime Achievement Award
ASC associate member Ed
Phillips, president and CEO of
Matthews Studio Equipment, was
American Cinematographer 103
 ASC CLOSE-UP
Alexander Gruszynski, ASC
When you were a child, what film made the strongest impres-
sion on you?
I grew up in Communist Poland, and most of the movies playing in
theaters were Soviet social-realist dramas that nobody wanted to see
because we lived it in our everyday lives. At the time, the only Ameri-
can movies distributed in Poland were Westerns, and when I was 7, the
local cinema showed Winchester ’73 (1950), starring Jimmy Stewart. It
played for six months, and it made such a strong impression on me that
I sneaked in to see it once a week. I must have seen it at least 20 times.
Which cinematographers do you most admire?
Without question, Conrad Hall, ASC. Also, ASC members Gregg Toland
and James Wong Howe for their artistry in black-and-white cinematog-
raphy.
What sparked your interest in photography?
I got it backwards. In my teens, I decided I wanted to be a filmmaker,
and I found out that in order to apply to a film school, one had to submit
a photographic portfolio, so I picked up my father’s still camera — a
Russian camera, a Zenith. Once I started looking at the world inside the
rectangle, I was hooked. My first inspiration was a photo album by
Irving Penn.
Where did you train and/or study?
At the Danish Film School in Copenhagen.
Who were your teachers or mentors?
The man who taught me the most about light and lighting was a Danish
gaffer named Ove Hansen. He was a guileless and unassuming man;
you’d never hear him mention Caravaggio or Vermeer, but he had an
infectious passion for light. Gunnar Fisher, who shot Ingmar Bergman’s
early films, was also an influence.
What are some of your key artistic influences?
The iconic black-and-white movies — Touch of Evil (1958) and Andrei
Rublev (1966) among them — were particularly important to me in
developing my craft. I felt black-and-white was truly a cinematogra-
pher’s medium; knowing how to interpret, manipulate and translate
colors into shades of gray was essential to creating the look of the film,
whereas in color cinematography, the look is to a greater extent a
collaboration with the production designer. Also, studying Eisenstein’s
drawings and storyboards was very important to my understanding of
the art of visual storytelling.
How did you get your first break in the business?
While at film school, I teamed up with a fellow student, a director
named Jon Carlsen. After we graduated, we collaborated on several
short films, which led to an opportunity to shoot my first feature.
What has been your most satisfying moment on a project?
When my collaboration with the director becomes intuitive, and he
doesn’t need to explain his intentions in detail anymore.
104 September 2009
Have you made any memo-
rable blunders?
Just after film school, I was
hired to be one of three camera-
men on an industrial about the
construction of high-voltage
power lines. In order to film the
workers hanging the wires, they needed someone to climb to the top of
a tower just above the insulators and jump into a cart that was
suspended on the wires 150' above the ground. There were no safety
lines, and no other cameraman wanted to meet the challenge. Seeing
this as my chance at a break, I volunteered. When I reached the top, I
was petrified with fear but somehow managed to get the job done.
When I finally came down, I kissed the ground and felt very proud of
myself — until the next day. It turned out that all the footage had
vignetting because the bellows matte box was extended too far, and I
hadn’t noticed it the entire time I was shooting. Needless to say, it was
my last day on the job.
What’s the best professional advice you’ve ever received?
I think it was Sven Nykvist, ASC who once said, ‘Take chances, but
when you do, lower the ASA setting on your light meter.’ To this day, no
matter how great the latitude of the film stock is, I always calibrate my
meter to a lower setting than what the manufacturer recommends.
What recent books, films or artworks have inspired you?
The book Color: A Natural History of the Palette, by Victoria Finlay, is a
fascinating account of how colors are represented in the physical world
and how pigments originated. All of us cinematographers who commu-
nicate with production designers through color swatches or pick
theatrical gels with our gaffers have experienced how difficult it is to
convey our intended use of color. Color is a compelling read, and even
though it doesn’t directly deal with photography, I found it very inspir-
ing and highly relevant for practitioners of our craft.
Do you have any favorite genres, or genres you would like to
try?
Perhaps because of the movie I saw 20 times as a child, I’ve had a life-
long fascination with Westerns.
If you weren’t a cinematographer, what might you be doing
instead?
I would be a Sanskrit scholar.
Which ASC cinematographers recommended you for member-
ship?
Francis Kenny, Jacek Laskus and Jerzy Zielinski.
Photo by Alissa White.
How has ASC membership impacted your life and career?
I was a nervous wreck when the ASC Membership Committee viewed
my reel. When Owen Roizman, ASC said, ‘Your reel speaks for itself,’ it
meant more than any award or accolade I’d ever received. It’s not a
coincidence that the three cinematographers whose work I admire the
most bore the insignia of this honorary society. I
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ONFILM
LARRY FONG

“When I was a kid, I got a magic set for

Christmas. In my teens I shot short films using
my dad’s Bell & Howell 8mm camera. For me,
both magic and filmmaking give an amazing
sense of wonder to the creator and viewer,
one that takes us out of our everyday lives
and transports us to a place of mystery. My
passion for both of these disciplines has led to
incredible experiences and friendships that I
will never forget. But sometimes making things
look effortless is not so easy. To me the biggest
challenge in cinematography, like any illusion,
is to make an elaborate and often difficult
situation appear to be completely natural.
Not only is skill and mastering of the craft
necessary; one must get into the mind of the
director to read his thoughts. Then you must
interpret his dream, understand his vision,
collaborate, improvise, and deliver. But as
organic as the process may be, recording the
image is not something I leave to chance. The
color palette, latitude, grain, and contrast that
are unique to film all contribute to the ultimate
emotional response of the audience...and that’s
where the real magic is.”

Larry Fong launched his career by shooting

hundreds of commercials and award-winning
music videos. His narrative credits include
episodic television such as the pilot for
Lost, which earned an ASC Outstanding
Achievement Award nomination, and the
feature films 300, Watchmen, and the
upcoming Sucker Punch.

[All these films were shot on Kodak motion picture film.]

For an extended interview with Larry Fong,

visit www.kodak.com/go/onfilm.

To order Kodak motion picture film,

call (800) 621-film.
www.motion.kodak.com
© Eastman Kodak Company, 2009.
Photography: © 2009 Douglas Kirkland