American Cinematographer - March 2014 - 61

ing off the windows of moving boats.
The creative team decided early
on that each location should have a
distinct personality and tone. Emily's
beach house is warm and pretty, with a
strong feel of the ocean right outside,
while Grayson Manor has a harder look
and feels more walled off from the
outside world. Pusheck often takes the
whites in the manor a little toward blue
to accentuate the contrast with Emily's
house. The Stowaway Tavern has more
reds and warm hues, giving it a cozier
feel than the other two key locations.
Nolan's house is all white walls, vaulted
ceilings and sliding glass doors, mandating a lot of negative fill. "The pool at
Nolan's house allows us to play with
water reflections and dancing light, and
that's been a visual theme in that set
since season one," adds Pusheck.
Instead of working with a digitalimaging technician, the production uses
a FilmLight Truelight LUT Box, and
Pusheck and Smith have 10 "looks" to
choose from. The camera reports indicate which LUTs were used that day,
and dailies colorist Will Lawrence
applies them accordingly to the dailies.
"We get dailies on an SD card and look
at them on our iPads," says Smith. "It's
a wonderful way of working."
To ensure that Revenge's actresses
look as glamorous as possible, the cinematographers favor large bounced or
diffused sources, as well as Dome lights,
Lowel Rifas, Barger Baglites with
Chimeras, Source Four Lekos, Lumos
and Sumos. Pusheck is especially
pleased with the Sumos. "Our gaffer,
Andrew Smith, often handholds the
Sumos when we need a little fill or ping
in someone's eyes, and he does a great
job of dancing around Tom's Steadicam
to get the light in just the right spot,"
she says. "The Lumos' and the Sumos'
color are incredibly clean, so we never
see color corruption when mixing them
with tungsten or daylight." Bleached
and unbleached muslin and white
Duvatyn are used for diffusion on all
lights.
Also helping to enhance glamour
are the lenses. "The Primos are kinder to

faces than some of the newer lenses
would be," says Smith, who typically
keeps a 1⁄8 Hollywood Black Magic
filter on the lens, switching to Schneider
Classic Soft for actress close-ups.
Pusheck also uses Black Magic and
Classic Soft, but varies them with Tiffen
Black Pro-Mist and Black FX. She
tends to keep filtration light to give the
post team maximum flexibility. "Pankaj
does a wonderful job of softening and

smoothing out skin tones," she notes.
"On Brothers & Sisters, our colorist,
Chris Boyer, did a great job of softening
the ladies without losing the crispness in
the eyes, and I wanted to use that technique on Revenge as well."
Lighting in Grayson Manor
became a lot easier this season, after key
grip Stuart Abramson and his team built
two lighting grids on motorized chains,
one in the foyer and one in the living
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American Cinematographer - March 2014

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