American Cinematographer - January 2019 - 20

camera and the key light. That's not something that should just happen by default."
"On the seventh season of Pretty
Little Liars," Goi recalls, "I had requested a
lens that was wider than they had ever
used on the show. I used it because I had
several scenes where I had to incorporate
the actions of several different characters
in a single shot. I felt the wide lens would
enable me to do that. In one of those
scenes, the characters were wandering in
a forest to find their missing car. I shot it
from high above, extremely wide, so that
they were just dots walking around with
flashlights. This was to give the feeling of
what they were experiencing: a sense of
being lost. It was effective, and those kinds
of shots became part of the visual lexicon
of the show.
"I've never had resistance [from a
Quick Tip
Shot Listing

director or production] about treating
something differently," Goi says. "I think the
main concern is that the choices we make
still feel like the show, and that the characters are presented in a way that is familiar
to the audience. But within that context
there is quite a bit that you can do.
"People will often say, 'Well, in this
room, the light has to come from that
practical source,' but that's not much of a
concern of mine," Goi continues. "I'll have
the light coming from wherever it feels
right. I'll really put it anywhere to give the
audience the feeling I want to convey."
For example, Goi says that when
he was shooting American Horror Story:
Asylum, "We had a very small prison set
with only one door and plain stone walls.
Every time we went into that cell, it was
different. One time I lit directly from the

"Because I read a lot of scripts, it can be difficult for me to
concentrate on understanding a script's intricacies unless I make
a shot list. It doesn't matter if I'm the cinematographer of the
show or the director - I start shot listing right away.
"When I read a scene and start breaking it down into
shots, I'm reminding myself about what is important in that scene.
Why are we in that scene? Maybe the character is going to find
out something about what happened to her mom in the past.
20

January 2019

How does she find out about it? Maybe she gets a letter, or an
email on the computer. Whatever it is, I start to shot list what
needs to be seen to emphasize what is important in the story.
"Once you start shot listing, then you know where you
need a close-up to see how the character is feeling; you start
getting into the psychology of the character and visualizing how
to present that character in the scene. It flows naturally for me
then. Each shot helps to clarify the story for me and helps me
prepare for what we'll need to shoot on the day to tell the story."

ASC 100th Anniversary

- Michael Goi, ASC, ISC

Photo courtesy of Caso.

Caso considers his next move while working on the series For the People.

top, almost like a Gordon Willis [ASC]
Godfather look. Another time I lit through
the gap under the door - a glimpse of
daylight that represented freedom to the
character trapped in that dark space.
Another time I used a hard light so that a
prominent shadow fell onto the wall of
the cell. It was completely unrealistic that
any sunlight would permeate that cell, but
the shadow gave me the image of someone who was stepping out of their own
body and the feeling that there were two
people in that room. Another time I lit it
completely bizarrely, echoing Nosferatu -
the door opened and the long, spidery
shadow of the evil doctor fell on the
woman cowering in the corner."
Caso does concede that "by the
end of a season, if you've got a main set
that is used quite a bit, you're going to run
out of things to do. So you can use some
motifs for certain times and moods -
and maybe it's not such a bad thing to
reprise certain looks and feels. Again, if it's
coming from the page and helping to tell
the story, then that's what's right for that
scene. Ultimately, that's the responsibility
of the cinematographer: to help tell the
visual story. If you do your due diligence to
visually interpret what's on the page, you
can't go wrong. If there aren't a lot of
things that are changing in the script and
there's not a lot of difference from scene
to scene over a series' season, then you
need to stretch out a bit and take some
creative license to shake it up for the
purpose of shaking it up - as long as it
still serves the story."
"There's always room to expand
the visual vocabulary of a show," Goi
concludes. "As long as you're motivating it
➔
narratively, you're doing your job."
American Cinematographer - January 2019

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