American Cinematographer - November, 2010 - 24

Right: Sam Wynden (Whitney Able) dons a gas mask while exploring the wreckage left in the wake of giant, space-borne creatures in Monsters. Below: Andrew Kaulder (Scoot McNairy), Wynden’s companion through the creature-infested “infected zone,” stands before a mural that filmmaker Gareth Edwards digitally “painted” onto the wall in post.

essentially applied the same methodology to Monsters, serving asthe show’s writer, director, cinematographer and visual-effects supervisor. The movie’s six-week shoot took Edwards, editor Colin Goudie, assistant editor Justin Hall, sound recordist Ian Maclagan, line producer Jim Spencer and the two lead actors on a journey through Mexico, Belize, Guatemala, Texas and Costa Rica. American Cinematographer : How did your work in visual effects prepare you for your responsibilities on Monsters? Gareth Edwards: I think CGI is great training for cinematography. When you make a bad composition with a camera, you can see it straightaway and correct it within seconds, but when you make a bad composition in the computer, you can’t tell until it’s fully rendered — you can end up wasting a whole day. It’s a painful way to learn what makes an image look good or bad, and the lessons really stick. By comparison, being able to move the camera and change a composition in real time on location is the most liberating feeling in the world. More than anything, CGI taught me not to compose images based on the objects in the scene, but to compose based on shapes formed by lights and darks. When you see a wireframe version of a scene, the objects’ outlines seem to be the strongest shapes to compose the shot around, but once those objects are properly lit, you realize the strongest shapes are actu-

Creature Feature By Jon D. Witmer

Gareth Edwards’ feature debut, Monsters, springs from an intriguing premise: after a probe carrying bacteria samples from the Jovian moon Europa burns up during re-entry into Earth’s atmosphere, huge alien creatures begin to appear in Central America, forcing officials to quarantine Mexico as an uninhabitable “infected zone.” Rather than focusing on the creatures’ initial appearance on our planet, Edwards sets his tale a few years later to follow the journey of two Americans, Sam Wynden (Whitney Able) and Andrew Kaulder (Scoot McNairy), who must wend their way through the infected zone — and elude the tentacled monstrosities lurking there — to get home to the United States. Edwards specialized in cinematography while attending film school at the
24 November 2010

Surrey Institute of Art & Design, but he found the experience frustrating. “I was used to having an idea for a shot, picking up a camera and trying to get it,” says Edwards, who recently sat down with AC while promoting his film in Los Angeles. “Learning to do it ‘properly’ meant that what used to be as simple as picking up a camera and shooting became an all-day event costing thousands of pounds. To me, filmmaking shouldn’t be about logistics and money.” After graduating, Edwards pursued work in visual effects and quickly made his mark, earning honors that included a BAFTA Award for Hiroshima (2005) and an Emmy nomination for Perfect Disaster (2006). In 2008, Edwards applied his CG skills tothe kind of small-footprint production he prefers, entering and winning the Sci-Fi-London 48-Hour Film Challenge with the short film Factory Farmed , which he made by himself with just a few actors. He
American Cinematographer

Monsters photos and frame grabs courtesy of Magnet Releasing.

American Cinematographer - November, 2010

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of American Cinematographer - November, 2010