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The camera was mounted at 90º to a rod that extended out from the side of a dolly. It was a kind of ‘spit’, as if you were rotating a hog over a fire. The rod was long enough that the dolly never entered frame.
I would like to point out that one shot in 2001, the scene in which they discover the obelisks, involved the compositing of some 28 separate elements onto a single piece of negative. Imagine passing that same negative through an optical printer 28 times to overlay these elements in perfect registration. And you don’t think Kubrick would have loved to use CGI?
To comment on the first post from Stefano. Protection from a bare bulb is tricky. You can cover the bulb with a wire mesh but that will interfere a little with the sharpness of the emitted light. That was a compromise we used for whenever an actor was below or close to a source. However, for the one corridor shot with the vertical slashes of light we felt there was no need for protection as the bulbs were a ways away from an actor.
As far as lighting a stadium for a 400 meter track race, I couldn’t say. Presumably, the existing location has built in lighting. Whether I would use it or not would depend on many factors: the script, the shots required, budget, the length of the shoot, whether slow motion is involved. I’m sure there are a few more. However, I would suggest that it is most common to augment existing light sources rather than start from scratch. I did light one stadium for a night shoot and I just was not allowed enough units to do justice to the scene – regardless that I had three 96K Musco lights!
The bleach bypass was originally done on all the prints rather than the camera negative. Consequently, as neither Mike nor I were involved in the transfers, none of the previous digital versions of 1984 truly reflected the original. I did oversee the Criterion version so I would say it is more faithful to our original intent.
So many ways to shoot these kinds of shots today but in 1966, what James Wong Howe achieved in Seconds was quite striking. The why of it is beside the point.
The key fob was just what is was whereas the oil lamp was rigged with a small quartz bulb. I could film by the light of the key fob but, for Jesse Jesse and shooting on film, I needed more light than what the real oil lamp would have given me.
For color temperature the oil lamp was rigged with a high wattage bulb than I strictly needed so that it could be dimmed down and appear as the color of a flame.
You choose the practical source bearing in mind how its light will play in the scene. In neither of the situations you refer to would it have been possible to add additional light, whether to dummy the practical or as a totally separate source, without changing the feel of the scene. Inside the hole there was, by definition, no other source. And a moonlight for the train sequence? A very different scene.
I’m sure you could calculate it. Simply use as a reference a series of household bulbs on a batten strip. Relate the distance between the bulbs to the distance to the subject at which the multiple shadows appear negligible and then scale up. I’m sure you could make the definitive graph in this way but I just make a guess based on my past use of multiples.
The numbers of lamps and the distance towards the subject were calculated to minimize the multiple shadow issue. If you looked at the light on your hand you could see every shadow but when there is movement etc. that is not noticeable in the frame.
The doubles, singles etc. referred to scrims, or wires, that act as an ND in front of a lamp and which I used to reduce the light at the ends of each row. The middle of the row was always at full intensity and slightly spotted in. The outsides were slightly more flooded out and contained progressively more dense wires. I felt this technique softened the shadows, while the length of the rows ‘wrapped’ the light around the subject.
Most of the close shots of Mattie were lit using a bounce source closer in. The lights set for the main action would not have reached her as we shot her at a different spot which was easier to access. Some close shots were made later in a studio.
The fight in Vegas was shot to be a little longer and there were many more lighting changes during the “show” but slapstick? I don’t think so. And I have no memory of a “magnificent aerial sequence” in the rain. I will have to ask Joe when I see him.
I think it is lazy to simply put on a longer lens without thinking what the effect will be. I usually use a slightly longer lens for a close shot, shooting an over on a 32mm or a 35mm and a closer shot on a 40mm or a 50mm. That seems to me more reflective of the human view. But I have no rule. You may indeed want to shoot a close up on a 28mm or even a 25mm but, as David says, the eyeline becomes a problem. But an actor may need to look at a mark on the matt box to get a close eyeline even when a 40mm is on the camera.
Well, I wish I could give you a number. It seems to me that you loose saturation immediately you overexpose a surface, whether it be skin or not. The effect of color loss might only become noticeable once you get above a certain level, perhaps a stop or two, but anything above key appears less saturated than at key. Just look at your hand being lit by the light from a window. Take your hand closer to the window and the highlights appear less and less saturated. I’m certain someone will have a more scientific answer. Maybe the magic number!
The original florescent fixtures in this location were very old and stained and I decided I liked the effect. The walls were a warm off white. We added a fixture in the interrogation room and found a stained diffuser to match the two existing ones. We also made sure that all the florescent fixtures in the hallway matched those that were slightly yellow and added a light gel to some that we couldn’t find the equivalent diffuser for. We changed the tubes so that they were all warm white and that was basically it. There was no correction made in the DI or an adjustment to the white balance on the camera. That would have been set at 3200.
