American Cinematographer - February 2012 - 28

Left: Hurlbut takes a handheld 5D Mark II into the fray. Above: Hurlbut prepares to shoot with a shoulder-rig configuration. “The 5D was the only camera that could keep up with the SEALs,” he says.

the skylights, and some 6Ks streaming in for backlight. When I showed up at 5 in the morning [on the shoot day], the gaffer, Sergey Svetnoy,and his crew had everything rigged exactly where I wanted it! When the SEALs rescue Morales [Roselyn Sanchez], they hit the ground at night, and the action is mostly played in silhouette. Hurlbut: That was at the John C. Stennis Space Center’s live-fire range. I wanted the lighting to be as minimal as possible, so I backlit the soldiers with one Nine-Light Maxi on an 80-foot Condor; we splayed the bulbs and shot at 1,600 ASA. For a little tickle of fill light, we used a mini Nine-Light bounced into a 12-by-12 UltraBounce on the other side of the stream. [Production Designer] John Zachary and I designed practical lighting around the hooch [where Morales is held captive]. We wanted to illuminate the compound with an array of light, so we talked about metal halides outside and warm practicals inside. About 90 percent of the lights I used on this movie were from Home Depot and the Grainger catalogue! Once the sun rises, the sequence kicks into full gear, and it looks like you captured the action from some truly precarious angles. Hurlbut: Well, the camera only costs $2,500, so we didn’t hesitate to put it in harm’s way! We steel-plated our crash boxes, and we put a ¼-inch piece of steel right in front of the CF card. Even if the camera got shot, the card was all right. I think we only lost six cameras [over the entire production]. We only had six and a
28 February 2012

half days to do the 28-page sequence at Stennis, so we divided into three units: Scotty did all the shots in the SEALs’ pickup truck, Mouse did all the action shots on the river and I did all the shots in the bad guys’ vehicles. The SEALs eventually trace the terrorist plot to a Mexican village, where you cut between a normal night look and a night-vision look. How did you create the night-vision effect? Hurlbut: John Zachary built that village at the [Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL] training facility on San Clemente Island. We got night-vision adapters for the 5Ds, but we had to shoot in both regular mode and night-vision mode [at the same time], and in terms of their response to light, those two modes don’t mix. When we put on the adapters, it was like an old video camera — all of the light sources would burn in. So we decided to set the cameras at 6,400 ASA, embrace all the video noise, and then dial in the monochromatic greenish tone in the final color correction. Where did you do that work? Hurlbut: All of the visual-effects work was done at Bandito Post, with Jacob Rosenberg at the helm. Our budget was tight, so once the picture was locked, I asked [ASC associate and colorist] Stefan Sonnenfeld at Company 3 to do me a big favor, and he delivered in spades. Later, when Relativity purchased the film, I asked [ASC associate and colorist] David Cole at LaserPacific to do the final color correction. We also worked with a company in Albuquerque called Cinnafilm, which has an algorithm that strips the noise off the
American Cinematographer

footage and then allows you to layer in whatever grain you want. We used that technology for the entire movie, even the pieces we shot on film, and it’s seamless. After many tests at Company 3, we found that the best recipe was to color-correct the whole movie and then texture it. When we tried texturing the files beforehand, they would look too plasticky. Was there a particular film-stock grain you wanted to emulate? Hurlbut: Kodak [Vision2 200T] 5217. You see it, but it’s not too intense. For some of the noisier scenes, when we were shooting at 1,600 [ASA], we went more for 5219 pushed one stop, and it looks really good. As a cinematographer, you use the tool that best tells the story. If the audience is immersed in the film and it takes them to a place they’ve never been before, then we have succeeded. The 5D was the only camera that could keep up with the SEALs. I think this would have been just another action movie if we’d shot it on film or a high-end digital camera.

TECHNICAL SPECS
2.40:1 Digital Capture; 3-perf and 4-perf Super 35mm Canon EOS 5D, EOS 7D, 1D Mark IV; Arri 435 Xtreme Panavision Primo, Zeiss ZF, Canon L Series Kodak Vision2 50D 5201; Vision3 250D 5207, 500T 5219 Digital Intermediate ●

American Cinematographer - February 2012

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