From American Cinematographer, Cinematic Glory by David E. Williams (March 1998)
"CinemaScope lenses also couldn't focus very close, but Jack wanted the camera to be in tight with the actors. We had to use a lot of light to build up the stop and increase depth of field. We had a huge garden set built on the stage at Shepperton Studios, and we couldn't get nearly enough light on it for the stops we wanted, so I had the art department paint one side of the foliage silver and white to create a false highlight. That way, our fill could be what our key would have been. We had to do all kinds of tricks like that."
- Freddi Francis, BSC
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 leaves. Show all posts
Showing posts with label leaves. Show all posts
12.5.09
Oliver Stapleton: 'Dingle' Branches
From American Cinematographer, Enchanted Forest by Chris Pizzello (May 1999)
"I knew that the forest was supposed to feel artificial. The lighting concept was intentionally very artificial, with these very warm golden night exteriors, so I wasn't bothered by that. And then Oliver figured it out. He said, 'Nothing's moving.' And that was a major, major [discovery]. How are we going to make the forest move, yet not ruin the dialogue?"
- Michael Hoffman
Stapleton's solution was a simple but effective illusory technique known in England as "dingle" lighting.
"In England, when you set up a branch in front of a source and you get the shadow of a tree, we call it 'dingle.' In both of the forest worlds, dingle was one of the psychological tricks I used to make the scenes feel like night without going too dark. That way, I could use directional light that would feel like moonlight, rather than just having soft light blasting all around the place. Through the whole movie, I could be seen carting around dingle number 1, dingle number 2, and so on, like a kit of gels. I had branches of certain leaves and certain shapes that I would use in different situations, depending on whose face was in the scene and what kind of effect I wanted. I don't think I made a single shot throughout A Midsummer Night's Dream without some sort of branch in my hand!
We then had to figure out how to get a sense of movement in the frame. Fans make too much noise, particularly the ones they make in Rome! Instead, we had dozens of Italian crew members holding pieces of wire strung between all of the leaves and trees, and they would shake them to make the woodland move. They did this for weeks on end, which was quite tedious! But I had to make sure that was always happening, because if there was no movement in the trees, the scenes immediately felt quite dead and stagey."
- Oliver Stapleton, BSC
"I knew that the forest was supposed to feel artificial. The lighting concept was intentionally very artificial, with these very warm golden night exteriors, so I wasn't bothered by that. And then Oliver figured it out. He said, 'Nothing's moving.' And that was a major, major [discovery]. How are we going to make the forest move, yet not ruin the dialogue?"
- Michael Hoffman
Stapleton's solution was a simple but effective illusory technique known in England as "dingle" lighting.
"In England, when you set up a branch in front of a source and you get the shadow of a tree, we call it 'dingle.' In both of the forest worlds, dingle was one of the psychological tricks I used to make the scenes feel like night without going too dark. That way, I could use directional light that would feel like moonlight, rather than just having soft light blasting all around the place. Through the whole movie, I could be seen carting around dingle number 1, dingle number 2, and so on, like a kit of gels. I had branches of certain leaves and certain shapes that I would use in different situations, depending on whose face was in the scene and what kind of effect I wanted. I don't think I made a single shot throughout A Midsummer Night's Dream without some sort of branch in my hand!
We then had to figure out how to get a sense of movement in the frame. Fans make too much noise, particularly the ones they make in Rome! Instead, we had dozens of Italian crew members holding pieces of wire strung between all of the leaves and trees, and they would shake them to make the woodland move. They did this for weeks on end, which was quite tedious! But I had to make sure that was always happening, because if there was no movement in the trees, the scenes immediately felt quite dead and stagey."
- Oliver Stapleton, BSC
Oliver Stapleton: Trees on Film
From American Cinematographer, Enchanted Forest by Chris Pizzello (May 1999)
"One of the first things we discovered was that Lucianna Arrighi, our production designer, couldn't afford to build the woodland from scratch. Instead, Lucianna had real trees brought into Soundstage 5. It's cheaper to do it that way, but it's also a nightmare, because the leaves can fall off or change from being glossy, watery things to dead, horrid crispy things. After looking at tests, we decided to paint all of our branches, leaves, and trees. The trunks of the trees in particular were very dull and boring in tests. The green and brown colors of trees in woodlands really absorb light, so they tend to look dead on film. I think just about every cinematographer has been caught shooting dead forest at night. It's a very tricky photographic thing, because when you look at it by eye, you think, 'That looks all bright and nice!' Then you photograph it, and it barely shows up on film.
One of the reasons Michael wanted to make this film was that he didn't think any of the previous movie versions of the play were any good. But I thought the 1935 film was kind of interesting from a photographic standpoint. An operator friend of mine, Chris Lombardi, faxed me a magazine article in which Hal Mohr talked quite extensively about tricks they had used in the film. They put sparkles and diamonds all over the leaves and trunks. Photographically it's very subtle but quite effectivel the audience is not going to come out of theater saying, 'Gosh, what were they doing with those trees?' The highlights we added made the light and environment much more substantial and magical, which is what you're trying to do with A Midsummer Night's Dream."
- Oliver Stapleton, BSC
"One of the first things we discovered was that Lucianna Arrighi, our production designer, couldn't afford to build the woodland from scratch. Instead, Lucianna had real trees brought into Soundstage 5. It's cheaper to do it that way, but it's also a nightmare, because the leaves can fall off or change from being glossy, watery things to dead, horrid crispy things. After looking at tests, we decided to paint all of our branches, leaves, and trees. The trunks of the trees in particular were very dull and boring in tests. The green and brown colors of trees in woodlands really absorb light, so they tend to look dead on film. I think just about every cinematographer has been caught shooting dead forest at night. It's a very tricky photographic thing, because when you look at it by eye, you think, 'That looks all bright and nice!' Then you photograph it, and it barely shows up on film.
One of the reasons Michael wanted to make this film was that he didn't think any of the previous movie versions of the play were any good. But I thought the 1935 film was kind of interesting from a photographic standpoint. An operator friend of mine, Chris Lombardi, faxed me a magazine article in which Hal Mohr talked quite extensively about tricks they had used in the film. They put sparkles and diamonds all over the leaves and trunks. Photographically it's very subtle but quite effectivel the audience is not going to come out of theater saying, 'Gosh, what were they doing with those trees?' The highlights we added made the light and environment much more substantial and magical, which is what you're trying to do with A Midsummer Night's Dream."
- Oliver Stapleton, BSC
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)