From American Cinematographer, A Transcendent Career Foretold by Bob Fisher (February '99)
In The Witches of Eastwick, Zsigmond used colors to create a romantic and slightly surrealistic look. Jack Nicholson portrays the devil, who sets up house with three beautiful witches. Zsigmond manipulated color temperatures with the use of gels to bathe the devil in reddish tones, which were always motivated by identifiable sources. He contrasted those tones with cool, blue lighting that provided a visual signature for the witches.
I read, discuss, and discover new things about cinematography everyday. Most of it, I consider incredibly interesting. Everyday I will share one of those things, maybe more if I have time.
Showing posts with label color temperature. Show all posts
Showing posts with label color temperature. Show all posts
13.7.09
Jean Yves Escoffier: Filtration vs Gels
From American Cinematographer, Card Sharks by Jean Oppenheimer (October 1998)
Whereas many cinematographers would turn to filters to achieve a warm feel, Escoffier prefers gels.
"We did it all in the lighting. Jean Yves uses theatrical gels extensively, as opposed to the normal, color-temperatured correction. If you have a white light and you make it a bit warmer or cooler, that is a color-temperature correction. If you use a theatrical gel, which is a color, then that is coloring the light."
- Scott Ramsey, Gaffer for Escoffier
Whereas many cinematographers would turn to filters to achieve a warm feel, Escoffier prefers gels.
"We did it all in the lighting. Jean Yves uses theatrical gels extensively, as opposed to the normal, color-temperatured correction. If you have a white light and you make it a bit warmer or cooler, that is a color-temperature correction. If you use a theatrical gel, which is a color, then that is coloring the light."
- Scott Ramsey, Gaffer for Escoffier
"There is a tension between opposite colors. And when actors go from one area to another, it's as if they're crossing into a different world."
- Jean Yves Escoffier
14.5.09
Adrian Biddle: Moonlight Approach
From American Cinematographer, Paging 007 by Ron Magid (December 1999)
Cool blue moonlight proved to be an important source elsewhere in the film, though, and Biddle generally creates his version of this lighting effect though some basic timing work. He details,
"I don't particularly like the blue color of HMIs, so instead of using one of those, I'll use a tungsten source for the moonlight, and then warm up my interior lights with some sort of CTO for [temperature] contrast. I then have the lab to print the scene for normal skin tones, which makes my tungsten moonlight key go slightly cold."
- Adrian Biddle, BSC
Cool blue moonlight proved to be an important source elsewhere in the film, though, and Biddle generally creates his version of this lighting effect though some basic timing work. He details,
"I don't particularly like the blue color of HMIs, so instead of using one of those, I'll use a tungsten source for the moonlight, and then warm up my interior lights with some sort of CTO for [temperature] contrast. I then have the lab to print the scene for normal skin tones, which makes my tungsten moonlight key go slightly cold."
- Adrian Biddle, BSC
Paul Sarossy: Balanced Film Stock
From American Cinematographer, A Dramatic Quest by Mark Dillon (December 1999)
"It's such a misfortune that today's film stock technology is doing everything it can to homogenize all of the various [light] sources, with the eventual idea that one day film will see as the eye does. When you do that, you're throwing away a great deal of the cinematographer's visual language."
- Paul Sarossy, CSC
"It's such a misfortune that today's film stock technology is doing everything it can to homogenize all of the various [light] sources, with the eventual idea that one day film will see as the eye does. When you do that, you're throwing away a great deal of the cinematographer's visual language."
- Paul Sarossy, CSC
13.5.09
Peter Menzies Jr: Color Temperature
From American Cinematographer, A Few Bad Men by Jay Holben (July 1999)
"We went pretty saturated with our colors. Sometimes I'd put three of four layers of full CTS on a lamp so it would go into a really weird orange-red spectrum that was close to sodium-vapor in color. As the film went on, we added more color as we got braver about the look, always keeping the actor's skin tones around 2400*k so that they maintained that nice warm look.
I love mixing color temperatures. For the last couple of years, the boys have made fun of me for not using any two lights of the same color. When you do walk down the street in real life, though, nothing is perfect-- there are weird fabulous colors all around you. In my opinion, using something other than white light all the time just makes a scene more realistic. We used a lot of theatrical colors, too. I haven't used traditional CTO for quite a while, since I prefer to use CTS. It drops the color temperature down another 400*K and has a bit more yellow in it than orange."
- Peter Menzies Jr, ASC
"We went pretty saturated with our colors. Sometimes I'd put three of four layers of full CTS on a lamp so it would go into a really weird orange-red spectrum that was close to sodium-vapor in color. As the film went on, we added more color as we got braver about the look, always keeping the actor's skin tones around 2400*k so that they maintained that nice warm look.
I love mixing color temperatures. For the last couple of years, the boys have made fun of me for not using any two lights of the same color. When you do walk down the street in real life, though, nothing is perfect-- there are weird fabulous colors all around you. In my opinion, using something other than white light all the time just makes a scene more realistic. We used a lot of theatrical colors, too. I haven't used traditional CTO for quite a while, since I prefer to use CTS. It drops the color temperature down another 400*K and has a bit more yellow in it than orange."
- Peter Menzies Jr, ASC
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