Shifting Colors

To take an image of the warm English twilight and bring it around to match the look of Children of Men, I shifted the colors toward cyan plus a little extra green.

I started with this:And I shifted to this:When the two images are side by side (future dystopian look in panels A & C, warm look in panel B) the differences are easier to see. Notice especially the differences in the red color of the roof tops and car. Because the color is shifted away from red, that color becomes more muted, and darker. A significant reason this color shift is so effective here is that so much of the frame is made up of neutral colors - tan, beige, and grey.

Both versions can be accepted as normal-looking, but they both give a very different feel.

Only color balance was adjusted in these images. Nothing was done to change contrast or saturation, so these exact effects can be achieved in a film post production process. There's nothing new or fancy going on here; no Digital Intermediate needed.

nb - click pics to make big

Choice Colors

These are more examples of the use of limited color palette in Children of Men.
The strategy is the usual approach. Limit the colors that appear in front of the camera. Then, at the DI stage the task is merely to adjust saturation, finer shifts in color, and of course, gamma.

Compositionally, the work is quite classical. The lighting in Children of Men is also usually very conventional, and appropriately so. There are loads of great acting and production design in this film and the cinematography avoids getting in the way.

Children of Men

Anybody see this movie yet? Cinematography by Emmanuel Lubezki, Production Design by Jim Clay and Geoffrey Kirkland, Directed by Alfonso Cuarón.
They created a nice dystopian, near future look. The pictures on the internet don't quite have the high-contrast gamma and deep blacks that I saw in the theater, but one can see the narrow choices of colors that contribute to the feeling of bleakness - cool, muted, achromatic. This was an excellent example of Digital Intermediate used to its maximum potential

Phoning It In

When we're watching video on our phones, we'll know that times have changed. The deal between Verizon and YouTube to get the latter's content onto the former's phones is a pretty big deal. What's going to look good in the age of mobile delivery?

This commercial presents an obvious, but intriguing idea. As usual, sex will lead the way.

Think about this, anybody with a nice phone will be able to make and watch video from anywhere they can get a signal. What will be watched, and what will be made?

What will you make? (You, Person of the Year, you.)

ps - Here's a story from today about Verizon phones and TV shows.

Chatty Camera

As a cinematographer, I really enjoyed watching John Fauer's film, Cinematographer Style, but I was also a little bit embarrassed. The feature length film is a series of talking head interviews (sound bites, really) with famous DP's. I love to hear these guys talk but I was uncomfortable with what I was learning, which is that cinematographers like to talk about themselves and their work. There's no greater proof of that than the fact that the director of this yak-fest is also a DP, who includes himself as a talking head, too.

I think Cinematographer Style has trouble knowing who its audience is. It was made by three companies who depend on celluloid image acquisition so, to an extent, it's corporate propaganda. But to whom? -the DP's appearing in the film? (Is that why there is 110(!) interview subjects? -Shoah, for its nine hours, needed only 33.)

We don't really get to see the work of these venerable cinematographers because there are no clips from their films. In that sense Cinematographer Style doesn't at all achieve a very good use of the film medium. As nothing but a series of interviews, it doesn't really go any further than the plethora of books that are nothing but interviews with cinematographers. (I own and love at least 7 such books.)

The film is sort of a vanity film and soapbox for the field of cinematography. For example, digital intermediates are discussed as places where a cinematographer could lose control over the image. While traditionally DP's play a great role in creating the look of a film, we're not the only ones who can craft an excellent image. The world is filled with brilliant designers. We collaborate with art directors and camera operators, so in the case of post staff messing with our pictures, we just have to hope that we can work with good people.

Post production happens.

Anybody else see this movie? Whatcha' think of that music?

ps - There was a lot I liked about this movie, too, and maybe I'll post about that later on.

Reality TV

A fine example of reality became an image that helps define how we perceive ourselves and recall these times, an image seen by millions. A question I have is this: If you were to create a scene at a gallows, would it look like this?


Or, maybe it would look more like this:
PS - Have you not seen the Saddam hanging?

Nokia Advert

This ad for Nokia caught my eye recently. I like the lighting. It's a very simple portrait, but it has some stuff in it that's less than conventional, for example, the key light placed in a low position.


The light is so soft that it's very unobtrusive and natural looking, even though it's coming from an unconventional position. The back light coming from screen left is also quite gentle. It has a soft quality and warm, yellow-ish color.

The kid is also 'short-sided' (composed so that s/he's looking toward the nearest frameline). Print ads often need to leave space for copy text, as this does in the upper left. These subtle and slightly unconventional techniques give this ad a tiny bit of hipness.

It seems like 80% of the shots in a movie are pictures of people's faces. Perhaps a good exercise would be to recreate this ad, meaning recreate the look of this ad,the lighting, composition. This should also include the level of depth of field that leaves the odd door discernible in the background. What is that? -the door to a stable? It's curious, and therefore, contributes to the off beat nature of the piece. The same could be said about the pearl necklace visible under this hipster's hoodie. (or should I say 'jumper'?)

Why not do a version of this and post it on this blog?