Principal Photography

  A: The Hughes brothers lived in Pomona, California at that time. I drove out to their house, and they pulled out a scrapbook from the seventies of their father sitting in chairs in different outfits, in different cities. That was the bible reference book. It told me the color sense. There was a lot of ochre, brown, orange, yellow, and lot of purple in the seventies. That photo album from their father was the key to the film.

  Q: How did you light the apartments in the seventies sequences?

  A: They're very saturated. We directed a lot of hard light and then flagged it to control it and create contrast. It was a very standard lighting package of tungsten and HMI, and it was fairly direct lighting. There was a trend for a while where moonlight and street light was very blue. I was moving away from that, towards streetlights being warmer. Color takes on cold and warm psychology and emotion. It felt right to have a blue tone as the cold interior tone and a warmer tone for the outside world existing as a hot, vibrating world.

  Q: How did you utilize smoke?

  A: Sometimes we used smoke for an effect, like in the party scenes, and other times we used it ideally just for more atmosphere. It wasn't a world that was meant to feel particularly clear, it was a night world, a hazy world, a stoned world.

  Q: What kind of smoke is available for filmmakers?

  A: There's Mole Foggers, now outlawed because of toxicity, smoke cookies, there's fire, oil crackers. There's a new kind of oil cracker which is safer and diffuses and hangs in the air a lot better. The trick in smoke is in getting the same level in every shot. Also, you have more to the eye than you see on film, so it's becoming familiar with how much that amount truly is. A Mole Fogger looks like an oil can with the bellows. An oil cracker is a larger machine you turn on and off. It makes a noise. If you want exterior smoke, a bazooka is a long, thin bullet-like shape which makes a huge, loud sound. Which type of smoke you use depends on the size of the space. Smoke is very hard on the crew and on actors. We used much less smoke on Dead Presidents, almost none. Smoke also has a tendency to give away where the light is coming from-it rises towards the source. So it's a real telltale lighting diagram for the viewer. On a good film, you shouldn't be watching the lighting.

  Q: The party scene in Menace II Society, where the camera moves from one end of the house to another, was a good use of the Steadicam. Was lighting this shot complicated?

  A: The lighting was tricky because the shot covered a lot of territory, moving from the front of the house, through it, then out into the backyard. The ceilings inside were low. It was not as hard as if it had been daylight outside. You want that balance between stylized yet natural. You want the viewer to feel like they are walking into the party. They may never have been at a party like that. So you have to plant a seed for what it would feel like and then you have to hide all the lights because you're moving through an immense amount of space. You're putting lights at the edge of the frame and if you're operating yourself, which I often do, you're missing them by millimeters. You're doing a retake because you hit a light. We didn't do many takes on that shot. You don't usually get to light until lunch, which is six hours from your call, but we had agreed we would light until lunch and then shoot because there were two scenes that night. We had to be out of there early because of the neighborhood.

  Q: Were there exposure changes in that Steadicam shot?

  A: No, it was night, so we could control it. If it was day, we might have to do an aperture pull from the outside to the inside. We were able to control that more easily than had it been f2.8 outside and we had to light inside the house to f2.8. Then you need to have aperture pulls and a way to camouflage them.

  Q: The interrogation sequence was very effective. What was the concept behind the repeated 360-degree passes of the camera?

  A: We wanted it to feel like his head was starting to spin, that sense of vertigo. He was getting a big finger pointed at him, and it was beginning to affect his ability to keep clear.

  Q: How did you move the camera during that shot?

  A: The grips laid down a big dance floor around the table. I was operating. We went around and around on a dolly. We would start in one direction and then go in the opposite direction to create that off-balance, trying to catch your breath, out of control feeling.

  On Dead Presidents, we did a 360-degree shot which was more straightforward and less psychological. There was a group of men sitting in a circle. So to show what each character was doing, we used a track and went around the circle once. It was much more precise and specific. Not working on a track is less precise, but it has a beauty to it.

  Q: Did you and the Hughes brothers screen films prior to production on their second feature, Dead Presidents?

  A: We screened Superf7_y, The Mack, Shaft, Taxi Driver, and GoodFellas are big influences for them. GoodFellas in terms of Steadicam, that shot through the Copa. A lot of their references are to films because they love films. I was really excited to find out they had seen and loved Midnight Cowboy because to me it was a visual and emotional, synchronous experience. It was so perfect, even the imperfections were perfect. There were two years between Menace II Society and Dead Presidents. Albert and I kept up a big fax relationship, "Look at this, look at that." For Dead Presidents, it was Martin Scorsese and Sergio Leone, they love the framing in those two. For Menace II Society, there was a lot of Scorsese referencing. One of the first films I brought to them was Stanley Kubrick's The Killing. There's a scene in Sterling Hayden's apartment where the walls were removed and the camera moves across the apartment. I was really intrigued with that, and I remember saying, "Can we do this?" Albert loved it. When we did that shot moving across the removed wall in Menace II Society, there were so many negative voices, "This isn't going to work! This is going to be cut out of the movie," but we wanted to do it. There's a scene in which a fight breaks out in an apartment and at the very end of it, the camera tracks across from the living room to the kitchen to other rooms with the walls removed. You come out on the other side into someone's bedroom, so it looks like a seamless cut. I was operating the camera. After we lit it, set it up, and got to the end of the track, I remember seeing scowling faces still not wanting us to do it. The Hughes brothers wanted to do it.

  Q: Did you bring the Hughes brothers any references from painting or still photography?

  A: Yes, because I love still photography so much. I showed them photographers I like, such as Robert Frank; it makes it very quick to see the lighting.

  Q: What was the visual approach to Dead Presidents?

  A: The film was about a young, middle-class black man who doesn't want to go to college and instead goes off to Vietnam. It's set between 1968 to 1972. He goes to Vietnam, he has some experiences, it affects him, he comes back, and America is not waiting with open arms. We wanted it to quietly feel like there were different looks. In terms of color and lighting, we tried to play the film like a three-act experience: before Vietnam, brighter, more saturated, more hopeful, more sun; Vietnam, it's own world, hot, somewhat drab, frenetic, urgent, confusing. There was a lot of handheld camera and handheld on a dolly. Then, coming back from Vietnam was colder, drabber, less known, more dangerous, more mysterious, more darkness.

  Q: What preproduction was done on Dead Presidents?

  A: Albert and I shotlisted. We had two storyboard artists, one did the rough sketches, then the second did extensive sketches. There weren't too many conceptual conversations on the set of Dead Presidents because it had happened in preproduction. The discussions on the set had to do with minute nip-and-tucks in terms of lighting and operating. The prep time between a director of photography and a director develops rapport, references, guidelines, and a shorthand to be used on the set. The shotlists are a blueprint and sometimes a jumping-off point. Once the scene is rehearsed with actors, a new life is brought to it in a way that imagining it couldn't. Changes and adjustments are frequently made, and rightly so. Still, I cherish the time of talking through the script with the director and listening
to them describe how they imagine it. I have also worked without shotlisting or storyboarding-more wild-style, or designing completely on the set after rehearsal. This is more European. We worked this way on Lisbon Story, a film by Wim Wenders. Wim is such a visualist and has such a strong sense of where to put the camera. It is a pleasure to work with someone so embracing of the visual aspect of storytelling.

  Q: What was your overall approach to lighting Dead Presidents?

  A: In the past, I worked with a lot of hard light. On Dead Presidents, I wanted to work with much softer, bounce light, but made sure to maintain contrast. We wanted the film to feel natural, but somewhat dark. We wanted always to be appropriate. We agreed to shoot the master shot of one of the scenes in the church in silhouette. There was no light on the faces in this shot. In the close-ups I agreed by the directors' request to have enough light to see the faces when we lit for the close-ups. A preacher was being asked to come in on a heist, so it was appropriate to play that scene in silhouette. Another time we were able to do a silhouette, when Anthony is walking forlornly down a cold winter street.

  There was a scene in which the characters are planning the heist at a table, and they lean in and out of light. The Hughes brothers had seen The Asphalt Jungle. They said, "We want people to lean in and out of sharp cuts of light." So we worked with a raw 2K bulb, which is very rough on faces, not beauty light. There was no diffusion on the bulb, no diffusion on the lens. People had eye sockets, depending on how steeply overhead the light was placed. It was not meant to be pretty. The character Delilah was in that scene, played by N'Bushe Wright. She's a beautiful woman, that was not a flattering light, but it was agreed upon and it was appropriate to that scene.

  There was a character called Skip who dies of an overdose, and as I read that scene, I thought, "Green is a good color for death by overdose." I asked the production designer, David Brisbin, "Could you give me a green lamp?" so I could motivate the light, and he did. It was a light shade of green, so people spent a lot of time gelling that oval shade darker and so you didn't see the gel.

  We used a lot of strip lights on Dead Presidents, which are multiple bulbs. We used a lot of incandescent bulbs, a lot of dimming. Sometimes we used ring lights, bulbs in a circle, and a couple of times we had to throw up some cuts or diffusion for Keith Gardner, the boom man, because multiple bulbs can make multiple shadows. Albert got into shooting with two cameras. We had made a handshake deal at the outset there would be no 45degree or 180-degree opposite, double-camera set-ups. There would be different lenses on axis so that lighting wouldn't be compromised-we tried to stick pretty close to that.

  Q: How did you employ camera movement in Dead Presidents?

  A: Handheld camera was used for Vietnam. Even in the earlier parts of the film, there was some handheld. We did a shot in the pool hall scene handheld on this little speed rail cart dolly made by the key grip, Dennis Gamiello. It was a fairly big shot, and I thought if it was all handheld it might be too rocky in this location. The operator handheld the camera in the cart. So it's a combination of both feelings. There was always a lot of movement in the film. You're dealing with a young character. He was meant to be eighteen, and the character moves a lot. The Hughes brothers were twentythree, so there's a lot of energy going on. There were some static shots and a lot of close-ups in the film. It's hard to move on a big close-up, you really need a reason, but there was a lot of camera movement. We used the Steadicam more judiciously and sparingly on Dead Presidents. We didn't use one Steadicam shot in the Vietnam sequence-we used it in other parts of the film when appropriate.

  Q: What film stock did you use on Dead Presidents?

  A: I used 5293 for exteriors. I had toyed with using 5245 for the more bright, cheerful, saturated sequences because it's fine grain and lovely, but daylight was fleeting. It was fall, and 7:30 to 4:00-Bam!-the light was done. So it was 5293, which is contrasty, and 5298. Dead Presidents was shot in Super 35mm, and I didn't want to use 5298 for the interiors. I started with 5293, but because of the 200 ASA, we would have needed more lights and more people, so we went to 5298 because we could use a little bit less light and have a little bit more f-stop. I considered 5287 for Vietnam, but 5293 is a much more contrasty stock.

  Q: There must be a lot of homework to do when new film stocks come out.

  A: Yes-intense homework. We tested a lot of filtration, which I threw in the garbage. We used the lightest, lightest, black ProMist. Dead Presidents is almost a nonfiltered film.

  Q: What camera and lenses did you use on Dead Presidents?

  A: Panavision. The Primos are nice sharp lenses. They're very flare free. For a Super 35mm blow-up, you don't want flare and you don't want soft focus. Shooting Dead Presidents in Super 35mm, I found a little bit longer lenses were better. A 35mm lens became the normal. If you use wide-angle lenses, the backgrounds become far away in a hurry, so a little bit longer lens is good. A 75mm is great for a close-up.

  Q: How did you work with the production designer, David Brisbin, on Dead Presidents?

  A: David presented a color palette and worked with me beautifully in terms of the lighting and colors. We enjoyed an active collaboration. Around eight sets were built, but the tour de force was the Kirby's Pool Hall set. It felt old and lived-in. It was a russet orange with checkered linoleum. David was very attached to wanting a tin-patterned ceiling, and I felt we needed ducts to hide the occasional lights placed up in the ceiling. David had worked very hard on the tin ceiling and had never seen ducts in any of his research of pool halls. But in order to accommodate the cinematography, he found a real existent pool hall that had a tin-patterned ceiling with ducts. We were always trying to motivate the light through windows orexistent practical sources. Occasionally, we had to rig from over top. We also tried to work with bounce lighting whenever possible and maintain contrast by flagging.

  Rochelle Edleson, the camera scenic, could age down a wall within seconds if something was too white or too new-Bam!-she'd spray it down. If something was too bright for me, David would find every way to accommodate it for lighting and make changes without compromising what felt right to him. He was very concerned about wardrobe because those patterns and colors also function within the set.

  Q: What shot in Dead Presidents was particularly challenging?

  A: We ended the movie with a reflection shot that was outside of a bus window. Anthony is being taken off to jail in a prison bus. We meant to make a series of shots of shackled feet up to faces. We're driving back from the location scout, and Dennis Gamiello said, "Why don't we just do it as an overhead shot?" It was a joke. Albert's ears perked up, "Yeah, that would look great!" I was actually really attached to some of the other shots-they were simple and beautiful. You'd see how forlorn the character was, but the reflection is the moment.

  The bus was parked in a studio and the top was cut off, as if with a can opener. We shot the reflection shot first, saw the dailies, and picked which lighting we had to match. Bill O'Leary, the gaffer, set up a bank of l OKs on one side and nine lights on the other. Two electricians ran through the 1 OKs with wooden, jerry-rigged items simulating trees so that a moving reflection would go by. A truss bridge was built over the top of the bus that dollied down over the top and to the side at the same time. It was a costly shot. It took a big rig and time, but everyone was pleased with it.

  Q: What does the director of photography contribute to an actor's performance?

  A: It's a multifaceted process, where you have to support the director and how they're approaching the character and the subject. There are some directors who don't want to ask the actors to do so much and some that are more willing. Sometimes hitting marks gets in the way of the acting. It depends on the experience of the actor, if they're more or less willing to have those demands put on them. Sometimes it's not comfortable to say to a young actor, "This is your key light, favor this way. Lift your chin up," because it's too much information for them. They're trying to stay in character. Other times, with
a more veteran actor, I'd say, "This is where your light is. You don't have to lock to that light, but know it's there-hit it." They embrace it as a tool that is going to make them come across. Some directors like actors to come to dailies and some don't. A young actor may need to see what a close-up means, to see what light does on their face.

  As cinematographers, we have our own perspective, our own feelings, our own opinions. I try not to take scripts I can't relate to on some level. I have my own feelings about the characters. I try to listen to that, but also moderate and try to remain true to what I feel the scene and that character is meant to be portraying at that moment in the script. Characters change a lot, there might be a moment where someone's angry. There might be a moment where they're making love, and you have to light it and photograph to support that mood. So directors of photography do contribute to expressing those moods. It's especially tricky with women because often there are powers-that-be that want the actors to look beautiful, and there are times when it's not appropriate to look beautiful. There are more actors now that are willing to not look beautiful if it's not appropriate.

  Camera blocking is an important way to work with actors because the actors are working with the camera as a tool, as a character. At times it is aggressive, at other times it's more subtle. Moving actors within a frame in relation to a camera is a form of manipulating-not in a negative way-but as a tool in storytelling language. It might be more quiet. It might not be shooting and violence, but by moving actors within a frame in relation to the camera, there's a psychology of movement that's not conscious. It's all part of the language. If an actor walks into a close-up, it affects you one way. If the camera moves toward the actor, then the camera is doing something the opposite way-it's all affecting the viewer. You feel it viscerally and it affects your perception of the story.

  Q: In the past, you have operated the camera yourself. How do you work with a camera operator?