American Cinematographer - November 2008 - (Page 65)

Tomorrow (AC Oct. ’04) — but 70 to 75 percent of the scenes in an episode of Sanctuary take place in CG environments; there are 300 to 400 visual-effects shots per episode. So you might say Sanctuary is breaking virtual ground. Created by writer/producer Damian Kindler (Stargate SG-1), Sanctuary stars Stargate series alum Amanda Tapping as the brilliant and age-defying Dr. Helen Magnus, who, with daughter Ashley (Emilie Ullerup) and forensic psychiatrist Will Zimmerman (Robin Dunne), tracks down strange creatures that secretly live among us. Magnus, who was born during the Victorian Era, houses and studies these creatures in what is known as the Sanctuary. The series also marks a first for cinematographer David Geddes, CSC, and visual-effects supervisor Lee Wilson, in that they had never before worked with the Red One. “I was keen from day one because I’m a bit of a ‘technoslut,’” says Wilson, who, along with partners Lisa SeppWilson and Sébastien Bergeron, owns Anthem Visual Effects in Vancouver, British Columbia, where Sanctuary is shot. “Early in the game, before David came aboard, I asked production what they thought about the One, because everything I’d seen about the camera at that point was pretty exciting,” Wilson continues. “The big question was whether we could get the camera, but I happened to know someone who could get us a few, and by the time we got ready for tests, David had joined the show. It was one of those hold-your-breath-and-jump situations.” “I had been following the One’s development but had never put the camera through its paces,” notes Geddes, whose credits include the series Men in Trees, Dark Angel and 21 Jump Street. “Sanctuary offered a chance to make a virtualreality series with new camera technology that had never been used in this situation before. The challenge was impossible to resist.” Red announced the One at NAB in 2004, but the camera has remained something of a mystery since then, partly because of production delays. For a long time, few cameras were in the field, but Red claims there are now close to 3,000 in use. A typical hardware camera company will render a product obsolete with a new model after a year or two, but Red exhibits a software-company mentality; like a computer program that is released and then updated over time, the One is constantly evolving with patches, updates and additions via download. (The camera is on firmware build 16 version 3.2.5, and build 17 is on the horizon.) Looking right at home on a sci-fi set, the One is a 4K camera with a 35mm PL mount and a Super 35mm-sized, 4520x2540 12megapixel CMOS sensor that is suitably called Mysterium. It records 12bit RAW imagery to onboard Compact Flash memory or harddrive memory. These seemingly unwieldy files are recorded using RedCode compression, a waveletbased compression similar to that in Jpeg 2000, which is Digital Cinema Initiatives’ digital-projection standard. The aim of the One is to save the majority of image processing and color correction for post. “Another thing that attracted me to this project was the mystery Opposite: The age-defying Dr. Helen Magnus (Amanda Tapping) enlists forensic psychiatrist Will Zimmerman (Robin Dunne) in her search for the strange and secretive creatures that populate the series Sanctuary. This page, left: Zimmerman considers Magnus’ invitation. Below: Henry (Ryan Robbins) and Ashley (Emilie Ullerup) lend their services to Magnus’ work. Photos and frame grabs courtesy of NBC Universal. American Cinematographer 65

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American Cinematographer - November 2008 Contents Editor’s Note Letters Short Takes Production Slate Forging a Bond The Making of a President Thunder Down Under Habitat for Inhumanity Saluting Television’s Top Talents Post Focus New Products & Services International Marketplace Classified Ads Ad Index Clubhouse News ASC Close-Up

American Cinematographer - November 2008

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