American Cinematographer - February 2014 - 80

Filmmakers' Forum

Shooting a "Bromance" on a Budget
By Nic Sadler

There is one thing we all learn as cinematographers: rarely
does a project have an adequate budget, at least when it comes to
camera, grip, electric and color grading. Whether the budget is $500
or $500,000,000, you'll probably never hear a producer say, "Sure,
you can have everything and everybody you need."
Low-budget independent filmmaking starts with that
premise. Everyone involved knows that what you're trying to achieve
is overly ambitious to the point of wishful thinking. We've all been
there. You read a script you really like and think, "I'll give my all for
this one." And from that point on, you'll do practically anything to
make the film look as good as the script reads.
I met Herschel Faber shortly after reading his screenplay for
Cavemen, a "bromantic comedy" that appeared on Hollywood's
Black List. It read like an updated version of the 1996 indie hit
Swingers, a film I love. I liked both Herschel and the script, so I
decided to throw myself down the rabbit hole, knowing it would be
an 18-day shoot with a very modest budget. I did not want the film
to look typically "indie," but hoped to instead lend it some of the
production value we ascribe to films with much bigger budgets. In
the romantic-comedy genre, it's all about making the actors look
their best.
When shooting quickly, you have to accept that you will not
get all the control you would like, and you often make compromises
that can be addressed in post. The primary difference between
shooting on the Canon 5D in H.264 and an Arri Alexa in ArriRaw
comes down to flexibility in post. Given time to exercise the proper
care, a cinematographer can make a shot on a 5D with a domesticquality lens look fantastic, even on the big screen. But if you are
rushed and shooting with a 5D, the camera's lack of flexibility in post
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February 2014

becomes its Achilles' heel. Problems arise not with individual shots,
but with how those shots work as a sequence. From experience, I
knew that an Alexa recording in ArriRaw would be data intensive, so
when it came to color grading, I could make the images match from
shot-to-shot and have the best chance at maintaining control of skin
tones. Therein lies the paradox: Cameras with greater latitude are
more forgiving, more flexible and ideal when you need to shoot
quickly, but they are far more expensive than most indie budgets will
allow.
Every cinematographer needs allies, and Rufus Burnham of
The Camera House in Los Angeles is one of mine. I had a big favor
to ask. I knew they had recently acquired a set of Kowa anamorphic
lenses, and I wanted to test them for Cavemen. Pete Berglund, an
experienced first assistant who was working for Rufus at the time,
helped me do a quick test of the Kowas on an Alexa. We agreed
that if I were to use them, I should maintain a minimum shooting
stop of around T4 . At wider apertures, the lenses rapidly fell off in
contrast, and the anamorphic flares washed the image out and
became a bit unpredictable. At T4 , all four lenses (40mm, 50mm,
75mm and 100mm) looked pretty good. I also wanted to give my
first AC, Chris Keth, a fighting chance of keeping our actors in sharp
focus.
I knew anamorphic flares would contribute to the look of the
film, but that wasn't the primary reason I wanted to shoot anamorphic; I wanted to squeeze every last drop out of the Alexa sensor, yet
still work in widescreen. Cavemen is set largely at night. The main
interior is the "cave" where the protagonists live, a windowless
bunker lit with small practicals. The exteriors are predominately night
scenes shot in downtown Los Angeles, which is not an especially
well-lit area. We also had a sequence to shoot in the subway. Lowlight sensitivity was going to be a concern. My plan was to shoot
with an Alexa Studio, fill the entire 4:3 sensor with the anamorphic

American Cinematographer

Photos and frame grabs courtesy of the filmmakers.

Pete (Kenny
Wormald, left)
and Jay (Chad
Michael
Murray) scope
out a bar in a
scene from
Cavemen.

American Cinematographer - February 2014

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