American Cinematographer - February 1995 - 62

cold and

contrasty. So instead of

an 85 filter in the camera I
used an 85C which corrects 600 de¬

using

an 85B filter. No
used in the radio sta¬
tion because the old school audito¬
rium in which it was shot was so

grees

cooler than

smoke

was

drafty we couldn't keep the smoke
in the room."

Joyce's account of Mac
interrogation, Style 3B, al¬
though not directly witnessed by
Joyce, stays with the cooler look of
Style 3A, but instead of using the
Brazel's

85C to correct the color tempera¬
ture to 3800 degrees, no correction
was used. "The
interrogation was
shot in the same place, but was

heavily smoked because

we were
able to put up a Duvateen barrier
to block out the daylight coming in
and contain the smoke," reveals
Poster. "This
Above: The
main street of

Bisbee,
Arizona,
dressed

camera

movement and

Boswell, New

the

complish that I

styles launches

removed the 85
and used HMIs.

story. Directly following the

behind which
he'll encounter

We created the shot in black &

a

"#4

or

UltraCon and

5"
a

1/2 ProMist to
knock down the
extreme

Right:
Secretary
contrast.

Forrestal

(Eugene Roche)
approaches a
top secret door,

an

emissary

from

a

land.

distant

white with the idea that

we were

going to do some manipulation of
the image, in effect telling the au¬
dience that this is not your normal
linear material."
To achieve the desired
blurred effect, the shot was cap¬
tured at 6

fps with

the entire
a

would be back to real-time but
with an eerie, staccato effect. "We
wanted the burned-out look," adds

Poster, "so
con

we

duped onto highgrain and

stock to increase the

contrast."

Lending further credibil¬
ity to the recollections of Marcel,
Roswell also relates the experiences
of Frank Joyce (Bob Gunton), a lo¬

rancher who discovered the wreck¬

"Hard-mounting a Steadicam on
anything is a great way to shoot.

age, and then follows
scotch coverup of the

on an

insert

car

driving shots at the debris

field."
To

compensate for the
subsequent change in exposure
due to the slow film rate, Poster
elected to vary the aperture rather
than the shutter, imparting to the
images a degree of blur which,
when

multiple-frame printed,

American

Cinematographer

a

Chimera Soft

without track," Poster recounts.

a

scene:

4K Par in

daylight senior

cal radio reporter who is drawn
into the episode. Joyce covers the

We also mounted it

60

Actually, there
was
only one
light used for

Steadicam
hard-mounted to an Apollo crane
equipped with pneumatic tires.
"We moved right on the Tarmac

for the

ac¬

representa¬

opening titles' documentary mon¬
tage, a blurred POV rushes toward
a hanger at night. This shot, for
Kagan, was instrumental in accli¬
mating the audience to the concept
of switching perspectives and vi¬
sual styles.
"From the beginning,"
Poster explained, "this shot would
serve as a flag that there are things
coming later that are not 'normal.'

used

to be

bluer. To

tive of these two

Mexico. Poster

scene was

view.
A critical shot

as

point of

breaking news of the UFO find¬
ings, interviews Mac Brazel, the

press
low.

the hop¬
military
releases in the days that fol¬

The scenes recounting
Joyce's memories, Style 3A, reveal
Joyce's cool, controlled perspective
on

the situations he encounters.

Poster

employed Eastman's 5296

tungsten-balanced stock for the in¬
teriors, which

were

lit with HMIs.

"We wanted this section to be very

February 1995

over

the table.

Light hanging
straight down
Except for an occa¬

sional white show card, I let the
smoke do the rest."
For the exteriors in

recollections, Poster had

a

Joyce's
trickier

situation at hand. "The main street
in Bisbee was very narrow; it was

winter, low-in-the-sky light, and
the street faced east to west. That
meant that hard

sunlight would hit
down the street in the
morning, but in the afternoon it
would go behind a mountain and
the buildings

the whole street would be in
shadow. I was hoping for overcast,
but had no luck, so we had to
schedule the shots for the morning.
Some of the background was as
much as five stops over key!"
To control the extreme
contrast of the scene, a

UltraCon filter

was

#4

or

#5

combined with

Vi ProMist. "We snuck in some fill
from several 4K Pars bounced off

a

Griffolyns hidden behind the cam¬
era in the
alley. We also put up a 12'
X 12' Griffolyn on a
building across
American Cinematographer - February 1995

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