American Cinematographer - September 2011 - 69

Opposite page: Location manager Albert Epps enjoys the more idyllic aspects of his job as he walks a beach while scouting for t he TV series Cougartown. This page: During a commercial shoot in Brentwood, Calif., Epps and the production team were temporarily stymied by a massive tree that fell across a road. He recalls, “We had to run around the neighborhood and find some gardeners to chop off enough [branches] so we could get cars and people [through].”

with Sweden and lacking time to scout locations, Burum and Winters picked postcards with appealing settings at the airport shops upon their arrival. An SAS airline rep helped them make the necessary arrangements to reach the sites. Whether you’re telling a story in a feature, commercial or TV show, it has to take place in a suitable environment. At times the solution is to build a set in a studio, but most motion-picture projects involve at least some work on real locations. It’s less common today for cinematographers themselves to seek out locations, but there is much they need to know about making suitable selections. And, as Willis points out, there are many considerations when looking for and evaluating the right locations for a production. As the industry has evolved, this has become the

professional specialty of the location scout and the location manager, who work under the art director/production designer. Lori Balton is a founding member and the current president of the Location Managers Guild of America. She has worked as a scout on productions helmed by numerous A-list directors, among them Michael Mann, Steven Spielberg and Martin Scorsese. She explains, “We started the LMGA because … the way our job evolved made us the proverbial ‘red-headed stepchild.’ When the industry started, anybody could find the locations, and the assignation of the job was a very random thing. Over the years, we’ve developed a lot of skills, but I think many people don’t really understand what it is that we do.” Balton says that when she worked
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on Rob Reiner’s Ghosts of Mississippi, she spotted a house that was suitable for the film’s main location as she was driving down a street in Los Angeles one day. The initial plan was to use the location only for exteriors and build the interiors onstage, but when Reiner and the cinematographer, John Seale, ASC, ACS, arrived at the location, Balton encouraged them to reconsider. “I said, ‘I know you’re planning to build it onstage, but this house is just so magical and evocative, can you humor me and have a look at the inside?’” They took one look inside and agreed with her. Location professionals fall into two key categories. Location scouts do the initial searching and finding, and location managers handle the subsequent logistics. Balton thinks of the two categories as left-brain and right-brain functions. “There are very few people
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Photos on pp. 68 and 69 courtesy of Albert Epps.

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American Cinematographer - September 2011

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