American Cinematographer - February 2014 - 16

Short Takes

Killer Visuals
By Iain Stasukevich

When cinematographer Eben Bolter first worked with director Paul Davis, on the 2012 short film Him Indoors, he found Davis
to be "the sort of director I love working with - he has loads of
ideas, and he's very good at adapting, listening and collaborating."
The production went well, but the filmmakers agreed their next
project had to be more ambitious. That led to The Body, a short film
about a murderer who uses Halloween as a cover to get away with
his crime.
The script for The Body presented Bolter with scenes in a
mansion, on the streets of London, at a loft party, and in the woods.
"We had a bit more kit and crew for this one - a gaffer and two
sparks [electricians], a very good key grip, a great Steadicam operator, and a core camera team of a focus puller, a loader and a
trainee," says Bolter. "That allowed us to dream a little bigger!"
Bolter shot The Body in the 2.40:1 aspect ratio with an Arri
Alexa Plus, recording in ProRes 4:4:4:4 Log-C internally to SxS cards,
and Cooke S4i prime lenses from Arri Media. "I'd shot a couple of
features with Cooke S4s, and in this world of digital ultra-sharpness,
I like their warmth and elegant softness," says the cinematographer.
"Also, our references for The Body were some fairly recent horror
films that had more of a classic 35mm look." Davis adds, "Specifically, we wanted this movie to look as though it could be a segment
of the anthology Trick 'r Treat [2007, shot by Glen MacPherson, ASC,
CSC]. We wanted that Halloween look, with the browns, the
oranges, and the deep blues in the shadows."
The Body opens with a long establishing shot that begins with
a high, wide view of London at night, then pulls back through a
window and tracks across an apartment, up a set of stairs and
16

February 2014

through a bedroom, finally landing on the bathroom-mirror reflection of the Man (played by Alfie Allen). "We wanted to challenge
ourselves, and a shot like that tells you the filmmakers are being
ambitious," says Bolter.
"Originally, the opening was set up to play as a montage, but
once we set up the Steadicam and all the lights, I realized we could
do it all in one snaking camera move," Davis explains. The shot is set
to the strains of a theme from Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake, and the
filmmakers were able to take advantage of the location's built-in
speaker system to play it in every room, which helped Steadicam
operator Rob Hart hit precise marks at certain points in the song.
"We did shot lists, but often we'd get to the set, work out
the blocking, and then come up with [different] Steadicam shots
that allowed us to develop the story in a smooth way," Bolter recalls.
"The continuous shots helped us to build tension, whilst gradually
revealing story information in a more organic way."
He lit with an eye towards reality and used practicals to
provide motivation. In the mansion location, it was a matter of turning practicals on or off, swapping out low-wattage bulbs for brighter
ones, and dimming and diffusing bulbs to set the right look. "In that
way, the film is quite 'lit,' but we always tried to give ourselves
enough flexibility that the actors could move around," says the cinematographer. "After that, it was about supplementing practical
lights to give things a bit more pop and shape, and to be more deliberate than completely naturalistic."
After the bathroom-mirror scene, a second Steadicam shot
follows the Man downstairs. A 150-watt Dedolight with 250 diffusion provided a backlight on the stairs, and a tungsten-balanced
Litepanels 1x1 LED positioned down the corridor created an edge for
the actor when he hit a mark at the bottom of the steps. The parlor
where the body is found was lit from overhead with a 500-watt

American Cinematographer

Unit photography by Colin J. Smith. Photos and frame grabs courtesy of the filmmakers.

A murderer
(Alfie Allen)
attempts to use
Halloween to
cover up his
crime in the
short film The
Body, shot by
Eben Bolter.

American Cinematographer - February 2014

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