American Cinematographer - November 2017 - 40

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A New Testament
The adoring
masses descend
on the home in
a night-exterior
sequence filmed
on location.

everything as it moved from room to
room, no light stands could be placed on
the floor either inside or out. Instead,
Messina explains, "There was a lot of
lighting incorporated into the ceilings in
the interior rooms and above the
windows on the wraparound porch."
"I didn't want the lighting to be
noticed," Libatique adds. "I tried to
make it as soft and omnidirectional as
possible, like the quality of light bouncing off the room."
The cinematographer used iris
pulls to maintain exposure while the
camera moved, and key grip David
Dinel flew 12'x20' solids above the
kitchen windows to control the light
coming in from the south. A combination of ND.3 and ND.6 Rosco hard gels
40

November 2017

were used as needed on the windows
themselves.
"The skylight [above the center of
the house] was really the only source I
had any control over," Libatique
remarks. "We could always match the
intensity of the light at the center of the
house to what was coming in naturally
through the windows."
On location, gaffer Jean Courteau
bounced eight Arri M40 HMIs into a
bleached-muslin rigged above the
skylight; the light was then diffused
with either 1⁄4 Grid Cloth, 1⁄2 Grid
Cloth or 1⁄2 Soft Frost rags positioned
inside the set. On stage, the crew
employed a 20'x20' soft box with 18
Arri SkyPanel S60s and 1⁄2 Grid Cloth;
this was sometimes double-diffused
American Cinematographer

with a 1⁄4 Grid rag hanging low above
the staircase.
A convincing daylight atmosphere
throughout the rest of the house was
achieved by surrounding the location set
with Arri M40s on chain-motor box
trusses and bouncing those off bleached
muslin sheets laid beneath the windows
outside. 18K Fresnels gelled with Rosco
1⁄2 CTS further enhanced the inside
ambience, or created beams of sunlight
and sunset effects.
Libatique describes another light
inside the house as a "jellyfish": A
SkyPanel S60 rigged to the ceiling and
bounced into a corner, then doublediffused with bleached muslin. Courteau
- who refers to that setup as a "spider's
cocoon" - says via email, "Since most of
the film was shot on one set, we needed
tools that could easily adjust to any situation. The Arri SkyPanel gave us that
versatility by being able to switch to any
color. We used it not only in the skylight
over the staircase - which was the heart
of the house - but extensively all around
the set as our go-to lamp for backlights,
bounces, or direct fill through a thick
diffusion like Depron."
The crew also employed a custom
eye light made with multi-layered strips
of bicolor LED tape from Moss LED
rigged inside a Chinese lantern by LED
technician Daniel Gagnon, who used the
same LED tape in all of the practical
sconces around the staircase.
"A lot of the practicals were there
American Cinematographer - November 2017

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