American Cinematographer - July 1990 - 76

of the Intruder cut it down a bit
and rebuilt part of it to hold the
airplane mockup. "It's very
hefty," Koenekamp laughs, "I
think it could hold the Empire
State building. We're using the
same hydraulics built for Red Oc¬
tober, and we can actually get an
amazing amount of movement
out of them: the rig tips all over,
forward and back, we can even

get a bit of a roll into it. It's a great

piece of machinery.
"The scissor lifts

are a

great time saver," he continues.
"We use them to hold our lights,
because we can move them
around and set the lights in a

hurry without getting

on paral¬
lels. Then we've got ritters -
flash boxes we flash to create the
effect of flak - on some of the
scissor dollies. I've never seen so

Above:

many of these dollies used before,
but we started out with a couple
and kept building up. We're us¬

Filming the

Intruder model

ing about four of them just for
special effects, and we use an¬
other one just to take the actors
up and down."
To give veracity to the
idea that the wingless Intruder
mockup is actually winging its
way through the night sky over

against the rear
projection back¬
ground. Right: The
wingless mockup
on gimbal modified
from Hunt for Red
October.

Hanoi,

Koenekamp added

some

impressionistic lighting inside
and outside the

plane's cockpit.
Using a single high-key source to
simulate moonlight for the tricky
day-for-night sequence, Koe¬
nekamp had liquid nitrogen
blasted in front of the "moon"

light to create the illusion of
clouds passing over the canopy
and the faces of the actors. "The

conspiratorially: "I don't tell this
to many people, but I think the

ting

best in life all

moves

comes

down to

a

metaphorical prize fight where
you throw yourself in the ring
and battle your way out. I guess
that's my view of life. The people
I always admired when I grew up
surfers, older surfers than
and surfing was my whole

were

me,

early life. Surfers have developed
a credo where
they get them¬
selves in situations to
well

74

see

how

up

Koenekamp finishes set¬
the next shot and Milius
off to discuss

important

matters with Willem Dafoe and

Brad

Johnson. Free for the

mo¬

moonlight's reflected in the back¬
ground plate on the rear projec¬
tion screen," he says. "There's
enough light in the plate so you
that the moon is out."
Inside the cockpit, Koe¬

can assume

Koenekamp proudly
points out the finer details of the
massive process photography rig
that takes up two large sound
stages at Paramount. The gimbal
on which the
wingless Intruder
airplane sits was built for the
Hunt for Red October, and origi¬

nekamp rigged a red light on the
pilot and the bomber navigator to
light up the actors' faces, which
were
supposed to be illuminated
by a reflection off the plane's
instrument panel - very neces¬
sary considering that Milius had

ment,

they'll do, but they never
they'll do

nally held the entire Red October

written extensive

want to know how well

submarine deck. The technicians

to

until

they do it."

who

"It's easy to get a

American

Cinematographer

rigged the gimbal for Flight

July 1990

dialogue scenes
play in the plane during flights.

light inside
American Cinematographer - July 1990

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of American Cinematographer - July 1990
