Frame by Favourite Frame.

In my spare time I've been working on something small, a cinematography study book, which I'll document all my favourite scenes, frames, camera movements, motivation, blocking and many more! Inspired by Matt Workman's breakdowns, (@cinematographydb go check him out!)

I decided to compile my favourite scenes from movies that I love, with annotations, a mini colour palette (inspired by @colorpalette.cinema definitely check them out!) and some technical info to boot. By no means am I the authority by which these scenes were lit. But it's a great way for me to visually break scenes down as well as write my thoughts. After I compile about 30 movies or so, I plan on releasing the book a long with a refined template so that everyone can put down their own annotations etc. I'll drop these sometime on the near future. So pretty much soon™ Thanks!

Discussing Cinematography #3: Concordia pt.3 – Creating Mood.

During the final parts of the film the audience can hear the sound of a heart beat monitor slowly creep in, foreshadowing Emily’s deteriorating health. I needed to create the right mood on screen, which consisted of 3 components: lighting, motion and environment. Arguably you can omit motion but I’ll argue its case later.

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First, lighting. To match the dire situation I needed something dimly lit, evenly distributed and warm (light temp was a preference). This created a sombre mood in which empathy would be easily accessible. Motion. When I mentioned motion, I was specifically referring to the talents motion. How they move, how they stand and their demeanour (very similar to body language). The way in which Emily walks off defeated , greatly aides the narrative (along with the lighting!) Concordia was edited and delivered back to front, a lot of the scenes were shown in non-chronological order.

Emily is shown walking away after the phone call before having the phone call. This is more of my developed style rather than a device, it just adds flavour to the motion. Nothing fancy :). And lastly, Environment. (This ties in to lighting) Having the lobby lights spread out, and bouncing off the marble floor greatly helped with diffusing the light, and I was able to produce 2 types of shots with it. The spacious and empty lobby really emphasized Emily’s position. We were not able to shoot inside the lobby but the outside work well, dare I say better! 

Discussing Cinematography #2: Concordia pt.2 - Focal lengths and positioning.

 I used to detest wide focal lengths, upon seeing The Tree of life and Knight of cups (Emmanuel Lubezki @chivexp). I discovered my new found love for wide angle photography. A whole new world was revealed to me and my creative bank account had more than just pennies inside it. Traditionally I am a photographer, and my forte; documenting people. So I've always stuck to 28-35-50mm focal lengths, never going below nor above. 28mm was the boundary that I considered "wide", the wide focal length lent a lot to my images, allowing me to wash the audience with the scene while still allowing their eyes to breathe.

The "wide" angle focal gave off an uncanny but familiar feeling, but later on I'd come to understand that this feeling was in the vein of reality. Think about this whenever you're outside or talking to someone, ask yourself what focal length would you use to get the same field of view as your eyes at that moment. Most likely a wide angle. Hence why I shot most of Concordia utilising wide angles. I wanted the audience to feel like they were standing next to Emily smoking. I wanted to the audience to feel like the skyscrapers were towering over them, making them feel small and insignificant, just like Emily. I also wanted to discredit some of the "reality" I was trying to instil; by keeping the camera tilted, looking up at Emily.

This way the audience would feel some form of authority from Emily but see the buildings behind her and quickly discredit the former. Achieving shot 2 was a bit of tough one. I had Vitalija upon a ledge about 2 knees higher than me, I then laid on the floor and used my stomach to support the back end of the camera whilst resting the front just off my knees. This way I could tilt my knees to track. While limited it was smooth enough and covered a good sizeable area. For the shot I could not use cine lenses, as I didn't have any wider focal length that 24mm. So I opted to use canon's kit lens 18-55mm at 18mm.

Discussing Cinematography #1: Concordia pt.1 - Utilising natural light.

When I began writing Concordia, the main driving force behind the story was the exposure of the character's emotional state. With time running out and only a few months to live, I really wanted the audience to feel what Emily (played by @vitaaaliyah was feeling. What better way to send that message than a dying sunset.

I knew that I wanted that natural golden hour glow. Capturing the sunset alongside the talent
was tricky and knowing when to begin shooting was even trickier. Thankfully I had an app on hand, that allowed me to check at exactly what time the golden hour would arrive. The app is called magic hour ( Recommended by the talented @mrpeterant This allowed for an image that could push the message very subtly but still have a powerful effect. The results were merely a combination of luck, good timing and a astute appreciation for composition. I wanted neither the talent nor the sunlight to take the center stage. I needed balance! Placing the talent in front of the sunset produced a lovely rim light, that still reminded the audience of the sunset but also brought attention to the talent.

Another method utilised was the reflection of the sunset. This would give me the same powerful orange glow but not as intense as facing the actual direction of the sun. A great trick to use when you want to keep a correct exposure on the foreground and background! By using the pillars (picture below) as a tool for composition I was able to limit the reflection of the sun, which again gave me the balance I needed, to not over shadow the talent! Using the environment to shape natural light is a great technique to use on location!