American Cinematographer - August 2017 - 45

you're making adjustments to your shot
list, as long as the scene is still about the
same thing - that's the North Star."
Moder adds that while the
production had more time and resources
on the pilot, he hasn't felt the constraints
he'd feared he would on the series' later
episodes. "On a pilot, you have to ramp
up from nothing," he explains. "Now
we've got this moving army that can get
into a place, black out some windows,
light it, and get a good camera angle and
the actors in the right spot very quickly."
In keeping with Amazon's
mandate that all their shows be shot in
true 4K, Moder relies primarily on
Sony's PMW-F55, which he selected
after seeing a demonstration on the
Sony lot. "That's been our camera body
for both the pilot and the series, aside
from a oner we did in the pilot on a
Movi - for that we put on an [Arri]
Alexa Mini," Moder recalls. Shooting in
Cine E1 mode, the Sony camera
recorded 4K raw to AXS cards, with
SxS cards as backup, and framed for the
1.78:1 aspect ratio.
In terms of lenses, Moder adds,
"For the last five years, I've just been
loving the T1.3 Zeiss Super Speeds.
They're very fast, and I would say we're
wide-open more often than I care to
mention. We've got phenomenal focus
pullers, Jason Garcia and Jan Ruona,
who spoil me. They've got this [Preston
Cinema Systems] Light Ranger system,
where the lenses are already calibrated
and they tell you exactly what's in focus
at different distances, so you can be
leading it or following it. It makes my
job so much easier." The Last Tycoon was
captured primarily with Zeiss Super
Speed Mark IIIs. The production made
use of Angenieux's Optimo 25-250mm
(T3.5) and 28-76mm (T2.6) zooms on
the pilot, and occasionally employed
Cooke's 18-100mm (T3) zoom.
Moder credits his second unit
with alleviating some of the pressures of
achieving his vision on a show for which
he was the sole first-unit cinematographer. "It was a welcome challenge
shooting every episode with different
directors, and actually overlapping and

Top: Multiple cameras roll for a scene between Bomer and Collins. Bottom: Moder and his crew
finesse Bomer's lighting.

coordinating crews on 'double-up days,'"
he attests. "Fortunately, my second-unit
director of photography, Mike Ozier, is
a longtime friend and an excellent cinematographer. He and operator Jason
Ellson would take my crew to finish the
last day of an episode, while at the same
time I would be a couple stages away
with capable crew stepping up to start
day-one of the next episode with a new
director."
Moder adds that he's benefited
from smart producing, which has given
him what he needs to move on the fly.
"The production went ahead and spent
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the money on getting us some of the
newest lighting packages," he says.
"Toys like wireless iris control, or LED
lighting with wireless connections to
make it brighter, darker, bluer or
warmer, have allowed us to shoot up to
nine pages a day."
Gaffer Nicholas Kaat affirms that
the LED fixtures were a central part of
his lighting methodology for the show.
"The Last Tycoon is the first time I've
used mostly LEDs in every aspect, from
lighting our sets to lighting our actors,"
he says. "Of course, we still use big tungsten units or HMIs when needed, but
August 2017

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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of American Cinematographer - August 2017