American Cinematographer - July 2008 - (Page 17)

Cvetko and Smith share a moment with Nacker on location. Tuesday was allowed to shoot there “because of our professionalism, because our crew size was 50, and because of our incredibly experienced gaffer, Arthur Aravena,” says Smith. Smith and Cvetko knew they would be working under strict time and location limitations, so they made sure to block out every shot before a single frame of film was exposed, using the APS camera as a storyboarding tool. “I took photos that truly represented what I was looking for,” recalls the cinematographer. “On set, I was trying to match the framing of the stills and keep the natural element of the building. To me, there is no difference between cinematography and photography; I try to compose every frame so it looks like a still photo if you freeze it.” As physical production drew near, Cvetko noticed the quality of the sunlight entering City Hall was changing from day to day. Three months had passed since the first location scout in January, when the winter sun was lower in the sky and entered the building’s windows more directly. By April, many of the naturally lit interior locations she had fallen in love with were doused in shadows. The unpredictable local weather didn’t help, either. “When we did the original scout, we were there on what were probably going to be the two most beautiful days of the year,” says Cvetko. “The day we actually shot it, it was probably the rainiest and darkest day of the year!” Fortunately, she knew ahead of time she’d be shooting almost wide open even on a bright day and placed an order for some big daylight-balanced lamps as backups. “Shooting in City Hall meant facing a challenging combination of some really bright places and some really dark places, and it was interesting to watch Svetlana work with Arthur to balance all that out,” notes Smith. Production wrapped after two weeks of weekend shooting. Alpha Cine Labs in Seattle processed the footage, and Smith, who planned to edit the film, had the footage transferred to HDCam SR 4:4:4 masters at Encore Hollywood, where colorist Steve Porter collaborated with the filmmakers on the digital intermediate (DI). Cvetko and Smith were so pleased with Porter’s work on the dailies that very little color-correction was needed at the DI stage. At that point, most of the work went into properly composing the film’s unique aspect ratio on the final print. Multiple finishing formats were considered, and in the end, the filmmakers decided a flat print hard-matted for 3.18 would be best. The final transfer to film was performed at EFilm, and there was some concern about whether the HD online master transferred to 35mm would retain enough resolution for an acceptable theatrical presentation, “but when we saw the first test print, it looked fantastic,” says Smith. Cvetko adds, “We are both perfectionists, and we wanted to have as great a film as we could afford.” I 17 http://www.theasc.com http://www.theasc.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of American Cinematographer - July 2008

American Cinematographer - July 2008 Contents Editor's Note Global Village: Torn from the Flag Short Takes: On a Tuesday Production Slate: Before the Rains WALL-E Batman Looms Larger A Not-So-Super Hero Spy vs. Spy Laugh Factory Post Focus: CineSynce Streamlines Dark Knight Effects New Products & Services International Marketplace Classified Ads Ad Index In Memoriam: Burton "Bud" Stone, Honorary ASC Clubhouse News ASC Close-Up: Bill Taylor

American Cinematographer - July 2008

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