American Cinematographer - March 2011 - 47

Fringe Cinematographers: David Moxness, CSC; Greg Middleton, CSC, and Tom Yatsko From the very beginning, Fringe was a special television program. Cocreated by J.J. Abrams, Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci, it evokes the spooky procedural elements of classic shows like The X-Files and The Twilight Zone but also incorporates the speculative science and futurism of Michael Crichton. The title refers to the FBI’s Boston-based Fringe Division, a group of scientists and agents who deal with all the “weird, mysterious events that threaten the safety of the United States and its residents.” In the show’s first two seasons, mad scientist Walter Bishop (John Noble); his estranged son, Peter (Joshua Jackson); and FBI agent Olivia Dunham (Anna Torv) thwarted a bioterrorism plot and discovered a parallel universe. In season three, they raced to stop a doomsday device that could destroy both worlds. Cinematographers David Moxness, CSC; Greg Middleton, CSC and Tom Yatsko are shooting the series’ current season. Filming Fringe has always been a collaborative effort; Yatsko shared the first season with Fred Murphy, ASC, and Michael Slovis, ASC, and when production moved from New York to Vancouver for seasons two and three, Moxness and Middleton joined Yatsko as regular series cinematographers. (Michael Bonvillain, ASC shot the pilot.) More and more single-camera productions are putting cinematographers on an alternating schedule to save time and money, but Moxness notes that the strategy has creative benefits as well. “It gives you more prep time with the director, the locations and the script,” he says. “You come in better prepared to steer your team down the correct path.” The overall visual strategy is to understate the strangeness of the events in a given script. “Even though this is a

Fringe photos by Liane Hentscher and Michael Courtney, courtesy of Fox Broadcasting Co.

Above: Walter Bishop (John Noble) enjoys a Red Vine while examining a cadaver in the Fringe episode “A New Day in the Old Town.” Left: Cinematographer Tom Yatsko studies the light in the show’s alternate universe for the seasontwo finale.

science-fiction show, we all agreed that we could make the strange things resonate by taking a realistic approach — odd things make a bigger impact when they seem to be happening in a normal world,” says Yatsko. “But the cinematography also has to make sense for each episode, so I don’t think you can say there’s a typical Fringe look.” Subtle, recurring details in the cinematography include a contrasty image, a constantly mobile camera, and defocused objects in the foreground of many shots. “We utilize the foreground to generate interest in the shot, shooting through objects or glass,” says Middleton. “If something like that isn’t part of a set, we’ll often put steel rods or
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pieces of [lighting] stands right in front of the lens, out of focus.” Shooting 3-perf Super 35mm, the production employs three Panaflex Millennium XLs (one built for Steadicam use), Panavision Primo prime and zoom lenses, and three Kodak Vision2 film stocks, 500T 5260, 200T 5217 and Expression 500T 5229. “Shooting film is a real treat,” says Moxness. “Film stocks are versatile, and our cameras can go anywhere instantly; we’re not tethered to any DIT station or monitors. That gives us a nice amount of creative freedom.” (A Canon 5D Mark II HDSLR has been used for select shots this season, including underwater work and rear-screen
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American Cinematographer - March 2011

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