American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 70

◗

Love and Dystopia
Right: Silas'
apartment
interior - which
features
retractable
furnishings such
as a bed, couch
and dining
counter - was
built onstage in
Singapore. The
set's design
encouraged
Guleserian to
frame Equals in
the 1.85:1 aspect
ratio. Below:
Guleserian gets a
shot of Hoult in
the apartment
set. The view
outside the
window was a
rear-projected
cityscape.

Such "sentient" lighting also
appears in a scene in which Silas and
Jonas (Guy Pearce), a fellow "sufferer" of
SOS, discuss their shared affliction. The
night exterior was shot at the
Hyakudanen, or 100 Stepped Garden,
located at the Awaji Yumebutai
complex, which features 100 small
gardens within concrete flowerbeds.
Guleserian keyed the scene with Kino
Flo Celebs adorned with Rosco's Cyan
30 and Cyan 60 gels, and also used a
quartet of Celebs for backlight that were
70

August 2016

placed in the frame for the wide shots -
to get the necessary kick - and then
were painted out in post. Each of the
garden squares visible on screen was
given an LED pixel bar to light its
concrete façade.
The filmmakers referenced The
Man Who Fell to Earth and Fahrenheit
451 while prepping Equals, but
Guleserian points out that the inspiration for the movie's color palette actually
came from images taken by the Hubble
Space Telescope, which has been recordAmerican Cinematographer

ing its cosmic observations from just
outside of the Earth's atmosphere for
more than a quarter century. "For the
scene at [the 100 Stepped Garden] we
took all of these different colors from the
Hubble telescope and had the pixel bars
constantly shifting between them," the
cinematographer explains. "The society
in Equals looks up to space travel as
something that's almost spiritual, so we
considered that when thinking about
how they would light their world."
Balancing those bold colors with
Equals' low-contrast aesthetic was one of
the difficulties faced by Peak during the
digital grade - as was seamlessly blending-in multiple layers of visual effects
from different vendors. "One of the
bigger challenges was bringing all of
these CG effects into Equals' very soft,
organic look," says Peak, who colored in
Blackmagic Design's DaVinci Resolve.
"Visual-effects vendors aren't used to
working in very subtle, slightly desaturated and cool tones, so all the interfaces
came in from the vendors very saturated
and contrast-y. We had to dial all that
back - separate from the photography."
The colorist's most laborious
scenes, though, had little to do with
incorporating visual effects. The meet-



Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of American Cinematographer - August 2016

Contents
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - Intro
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - Cover1
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - Cover2
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 1
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 2
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - Contents
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 4
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 5
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 6
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 7
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 8
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 9
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 10
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 11
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 12
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 13
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 14
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 15
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 16
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 17
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 18
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 19
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 20
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 21
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 22
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 23
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 24
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 25
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 26
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 27
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 28
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 29
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 30
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 31
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 32
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 33
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 34
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 35
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 36
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 37
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 38
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 39
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 40
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 41
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 42
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 43
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 44
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 45
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 46
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 47
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 48
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 49
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 50
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 51
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 52
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 53
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 54
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 55
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 56
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 57
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 58
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 59
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 60
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 61
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 62
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 63
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 64
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 65
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 66
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 67
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 68
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 69
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 70
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 71
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 72
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 73
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 74
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 75
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 76
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 77
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 78
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 79
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 80
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 81
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 82
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 83
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 84
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 85
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 86
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 87
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - 88
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - Cover3
American Cinematographer - August 2016 - Cover4
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