American Cinematographer - May 2018 - 70

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High-School Horrors

Top: In the episode "Silent Night, Deadly Night," Betty struggles with the darkness she's discovered
inside herself while searching for the Black Hood. Bottom: Betty is overwhelmed by stress in
"The Tell-Tale Heart."

her reality, to play with focus and bring
your eye to her and her mom in a way
you wouldn't normally connect them.
Because the Leica primes have such a
beautiful, soft quality, as soon as you cut
to the Swing/Shift lens, it's in its own
world - it means something."
The murderer at hand is Betty's
long-lost brother, Chic (Hart Denton),
and Uegama says he particularly
enjoyed lighting a key shot of that character shortly after he arrived in
Riverdale. "We introduced Chic in
Episode 10 ['The Blackboard Jungle'],
and he's a little creepy. Betty is kind of
70

May 2018

onto him and he knows that, so there's
a bit of tension between them. That
episode ends with Betty asleep in her
room, and Chic walks in and just stares
at her. The idea was to end the episode
giving the audience the feeling that this
character is creepy and potentially
threatening. The first shot shows Betty
sleeping, and then we cut to Chic
standing by the door. We had our cyan
moonlight coming through the
windows for a nice, cold feeling, and
behind Chic is this very warm tungsten
light in the hallway.
"As he stands there, I kept him
American Cinematographer

almost completely silhouetted, with just
enough light to register the expression
on his face," Uegama notes. "When he
walks into the room and leans in to look
at her more closely, we created a little
slit of cyan light for his eyes, just enough
to make them the brightest part of the
shot. We cut a thin slit in a show card,
shined a light through it and tented it
in, and then we worked with Hart to
find that point where it would land on
his eyes. When I watched the final edit,
it almost gave me chills! Hart played the
moment so well you could really feel the
danger."
Riverdale's final color grade is
performed at Encore Hollywood by
colorist Shane Harris. Although
Uegama has only been able to sit with
Harris "a few times," the cinematographer says, "we have come up with a
strategy that works for us. They send
me a link for each episode, which I'll go
through, using the timecode to reference specific shots and what I want
adjusted. This has been a great solution
thanks to our great post team.
"In general, I've always
approached cinematography with the
idea of 'natural' in mind," Uegama adds.
"However, with Riverdale it felt right to
introduce a color palette that is more
striking and vibrant than I'd done in the
past. The exaggerated colors and the
shafts of light have become a character
and support the show's overall visual
approach."
Click here for a selection of lighting
diagrams from the series.
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TECHNICAL SPECS
1.78:1
Digital Capture
Arri Alexa XT, Alexa Mini
CW Sonderoptic Leica Summilux-C,
Angenieux, Century Precision Optics
Clairmont Swing/Shift

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