American Cinematographer - March 2014 - 67

should crest a hill on a white stallion.
The director recalls, "Everyone said,
'Forget the horse. It will kill us timewise.' After an hour's sulk, I came back
and said, 'I'll figure out something in
the schedule we can squeeze, but we've
got to do the horse.'" By 8 the next
morning, they had their horse. "That
became a running joke," says Thomas.
"Now, if there's something people say
we shouldn't do but we decide to go for
anyway, we call it 'the horse shot.'"
It isn't just the scale that's
increased. Not long ago, the show
might greenlight a film piece for every
other episode, but now it often features
three or four per show. That has led to
the rise of a B unit ("the Beast Unit," as
they call themselves): directors Matt
Villines and Oz Rodriguez and cinematographer Jason Vandermer.
"Now That's What I Call
Christmas," which Buono was filming
when AC visited the set, was a walk-inthe-park compared to several other

recent Film Unit projects. (The Wes
Anderson parody The Midnight Coterie
of Sinister Intruders, for instance,
required the full-scale re-creation of a
theatrical trailer.) The faux holidayalbum spot called for just one big lighting setup on a single stage. The
controlled environment is exactly why
Buono chose to try the new Red
Dragon that night. "We don't know
exactly how the workflow will go, so I
didn't want to try it on a logistically
crazy shoot that would have us out on
location till 7 a.m.," he says.
"The Epic has a lot going for it,
including 5K resolution and all these
super-high frame rates, but I always feel
I have to be a little more careful with the
shadows and highlights," Buono
observes. "The Dragon is supposed to
offer more dynamic range, and that's
what I'm most excited to see in this little
experiment."
Though the Dragon is capable of
capturing in 6K, the Angenieux

Optimo 24-290mm zoom Buono is
using can't cover the entire sensor and is
vignetting on the wide end, so he
captures in 5K instead. By night's end,
the camera has received thumbs-up
from both him and Thomas. "The
image is nice and rich," Thomas
comments.
Buono had both cameras rigged
with Ki Pro Minis recording ProRes
4:4:4 "so that our editor, Adam Epstein,
could start editing in ProRes immediately and we could just conform the 5K
files at the color-grade stage," he says.
"It was a really smooth process - no
hiccups." More critically, the workflow
passed the test. Colorist Emery Wells of
Katabatic Digital had spent the week
testing a Red Rocket-X card (necessary
to process the Dragon files), and delivered the finished footage in time for the
show's Saturday dress-rehearsal deadline.
- Patricia Thomson
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American Cinematographer - March 2014

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