in its bluntness but the other day when I said I was a cinematographer the person I was talking to skipped all the dreaded ‘what have I seen that you have made’ or ‘who is the most famous person’ etc and went straight for the jugular with ‘are you successful at it?’. It is actually a much better question. My wife sensing an evening of internalised naval gazing jumped in to save the day with ‘well, it depends on how you define success?’ And that is the question really.

Historically, in these blogs, I have focussed on practical solutions to creative decisions in the hope that it might help someone else at some point. This time I am going to ask something more fundamental, what could success look like? The paths you take as a younger DoP will affect your options in later life so I think this is a question that warrants some time, preferably when you are starting out. The midlife dear-diary question often quoted is ‘would the 20 year me be happy with where I am now?’. I think turning the question around is much more useful and asking at 20 ‘where do I want to be in 15 years time?’

As a general rule people who ask about ‘what I’ve done’ are disappointed as most of my films are not on prime-time and it’s not in my nature to talk about famous people so the conversation swiftly moves on. I have colleagues who I’ve known for many years who work on much bigger projects than me and there is definitely a part of me that grumbles that those shoots have not come my way. We make our choices fairly early on and those choices often dictate how our careers develop. I’ve worked with many commercials directors who lament that they have never made a film, despite being hugely successful in commercials. I know a great DoP, with a good agent, who started doing second unit on TV and is now known as the second unit DoP so struggles to get main unit work. It is easier for producers if they can categorise you. I have become known as someone who does brand films and commercials day to day and indie films when the right stories come along. I can see now that I am unlikely to change this perception and I think that’s fine with me.

What I have lost in terms of budget I have gained in terms of control, less budget tends to equate to less people to need sign off! There can be a real sense of adventure that the directors who I’m lucky enough to work with bring to indie films. There is less of a machine to move, more opportunity to seek out moments that work spontaneously and I do find for me, that is very important. I am fortunate to work with highly skilled big teams and the latest tools but that is on my commercials work – not features.

I remember talking to a highly established news cameraman once who was appalled that I had to speak to a director to agree how we might cover a scene. I couldn’t understand how he could see this process so negatively and I guess there will be people working on huge productions who won’t understand what I see as the ’up sides’ of working with small units. Different things are important to each of us, they help us prioritise and whilst I admit that it would be lovely to be offered bigger budget productions, it is not the main driver for my decision to join a film or not.

One thing that is common to the success of all DoPs, regardless of budget, is the success of the images you make. What constitutes a visually successful picture. What visually excites you? What natural leaning do you have for composition, lighting and camera movement? We all adapt these for each project but there has to be a foundation to the approach and that foundation is the DoPs individual aesthetic preferences. For me the keys are;

Depth – even in tight locations I will always try to get something in the foreground, or an open door through to another space. I want to feel that the frame we are showing is a choice, an extract from a bigger space and I do that by having things break the edge of the frame, things that we know will continue past the edge of the frame if only we were allowed to see them. The stills below are all from films that I have shot.

Contrast – There must always be a brighter area and a darker area otherwise you have no reference. If it’s a night scene the viewer won’t recognise that most of the frame is dark if there is no brighter area to give it reference. You do often see frames that are dark throughout and recognise that they are dark but, unless you are watching in the perfect space, it can lead to a frustrating experience of squinting to find the subject you should be able to see. If you have a bright area the other parts of the shot can still appear dark without losing the information for the viewer.

Framing– If we are seeing an actor in frame then their position is key. If there is a power imbalance between 2 actors in a frame their position in the frame must reflect that. Sloppy framing ruins a shot for me. Framing is also inherently linked to the lens focal length or field of view. It creates the relationship between the cast and the environment and trust me, I always have an opinion on that.

Focus – Such a huge and under-rated tool. How much should be in focus – what T stop to use to give the audience the information they need or to signpost the main point of the shot. I will often decide the stop I’m shooting at before I light the shot as it is such a fundamental decision. One of my favourite films ‘Road to Perdition’ shot by the late Conrad Hall ASC has a beautiful example of focus at work. We track straight into one of the lead actors faces but he is completely out of focus as the focus follows 2 people walking away in the back-gound, only to pull focus to the actor in centre shot once the track has settled. It is very beautiful and poetically sets up the motivation for the rest of the events in the film.

I thought it would be interesting to put a few examples of my work here in case people want to see how these foundations show themselves. The first one is a reel I put together to support an unsuccessful pitch to work on the last series of Craith S4C (or ‘Hidden’ on BBC2). It’s a shame it didn’t come my way but you win some, you lose some! All the films in this montage were directed by Chris Crow and I choose the scenes that I felt would translate best for a television drama.

This is completely different, shots from Solo! a coming of age/romantic comedy feature that was produced by Dudley Dog Films and directed by Nic Cornwall

Lastly I thought maybe I could go back a long way. This is a montage from the second feature I shot, but the first one on a cinema style camera. My first (The Refuge, Dir. Nigel Barker) was on a digi-beta camera that we then transferred to film and I’m very proud of it but don’t have any footage from it. This film, Playing Burton (Dir. Wyndham Price, Spinning Head films) was shot on a RED ONE and I learned an enormous amount from it. It also won Best Feature at the 2014 BAFTA Cymru. You can see the basic foundations of ‘how I see’ in this film. What I shoot now is the product of everything I have shot, the result of continual looking, telling stories and learning that started in the 1990’s. I count that as a success!

Film and TV are so different? It’s a trope. I hear it all the time. Hmmm, they say, you’ve only done films, TV is so different. I counter that it is very much a state of mind and, on the whole, producers profess to want their TV drama to look cinematic but at that point their eyes glaze over and the battle is lost. Obviously there is a difference between top budget Hollywood and any TV drama, but I work in Indie film with my average shoot days being 21 for a 100 minute film. This is similar to TV, the crew is similar in size and it is often multi location. However I do think the directors on an Indie feature approach the visual storytelling in a different way and that is what I am alluding to with the ‘state of mind’ gambit. I of course did cut my teeth in TV, shooting kids drama and then comedy drama and finally a shed load of documentaries but that was a long time ago. However, the knowledge I gained from that became very useful when I was recently asked to shoot an ‘escape room’ competition for Netflix. This was to promote the final season of La Casa de Papal or Money Heist as it is known in the UK

The challenge was to light 6 sets with the highly produced, cinematic Money Heist as a visual reference. The aim was to put 6 finalists through a series of escape room challenges to find the biggest Money Heist fan. ‘Not so tricky’ I hear you say but here is the sting – we had to have 360 degree coverage, the contestants could move to any part of each set, we had to use 2/3rds inch sensor broadcast cameras and mix it live from an OB track. The agency, Amplify, were challenged by Netflix to deliver the edit within 10 days of wrapping the shoot which is why there was a live mix. The obvious, and to be fair, sensible solution would be to dilute the look, keep everything safe and focus on getting the deadlines met. Amplify however do not think like that. They were insistent, much to my joy, that the visual style had to mimic film and not TV entertainment. So how did we go about achieving this?

The key was the ‘state of mind’ that I spoke about earlier. Director, Will Kinder, probably one the most experienced live multicamera directors out there, was clear that all decisions to the approach we took had to fore fill two functions. Firstly he had to have the coverage he needed to deliver a compelling edit and secondly the final programme had to have the look of the original show. If any solutions we found did not meet both of these requirements we needed to find a better solution. His approach of committing to delivering a ‘drama style’ visual look was absolutely key to the success of the project.

With this in mind we started by hiring a film gaffer, instead of a studio Lighting Director. Serjges, the gaffer has lit features for me and knows how I like my drama set ups to look so approached the project with this mind set. We decided pretty quickly that practical lighting should justify most of the sources and so I worked with the fabulous production designer, Sam from Endpoint, to find practical lamps that both looked right and would give us the quality of light we wanted.

We also built vents into the walls which we pushed light through to create hot background points of interest. We used all of this as a base light and then filled in as and where needed with small units and tubes. We had a server room as one set and used the LED’s from the servers to create a low level of fill. By underlighting the space to way below what would normally be used in gameplay television you could see the effect these lights had as the contestants moved towards them. Finally we added a low level of haze to help spread the light a little. To ensure that we felt the progression of the contestants each set was lit to have a different feel with some live lighting changes happening throughout.

The bigger challenge was to make the small sensor broadcast cameras have a similar feel to the S35 gate of digital cinema cameras? In addition, how would we cover the gameplay when we were in 4 wall sets and didn’t want any cameras to be in shot? We had in budget 4 operated cameras which consisted of 2 handheld, 1 steadicam and 1 on a jimmy jib. These could move from set to set as the game moved forwards. Within the Money Heist format there is use of CCTV style cameras and we adopted this to cover areas that could not be covered with the broadcast cameras. These were given a post effect to separate them off from the main action coverage.

We then cut holes in the sets where we needed access for the operated cameras. All this is logistics and achieves the first aim of getting the coverage, but what about the second one of keeping the look of the show? After much discussion we decided to keep the servo zooms that the operators were so comfortable with. This was great as it meant they could adapt to the changing action quickly and instinctively. Having looked at the feel of the pictures from these cameras and lenses I felt that we needed to knock-back the hardness of them a little. For this I went to my favourite filter company, Format Hitech, and we tested a bunch of filters to achieve this. I found the ¼ Black Supermist gave great results. These filters are terrific as they just effect very specific parts of the image, in this case the highlight areas. The edge was taken off the detail and the practical lights had a softness that brought the pictures very much in line with the original show.

The other key difference is the depth of field. The small sensor camera allows so much more to be in focus as you are tending to use much wider focal length lenses than you would on a S35 sensor. To combat this we agreed to shoot the entire film on a stop of T1.8, the widest open the lenses went and to pull the cameras back as much as possible so that we were using the longer end of the zoom lens. This was a huge challenge for the operators and a real risk for production. We would not be able to change the light levels to create a deeper stop once gameplay had started so if focus could not be kept then it would be potentially disastrous for the show. It is a real testament of the ambition to keep the visuals in line with Money Heist that we went with this strategy. I am deeply indebted to the creative director, Adam Heyhurst, and of course Will Kinder who were responsible for making the decision to take the risk. Whilst I’m at it I want to mention how brilliant the operating team was, they had a real challenge and they rose to it magnificently.

The final part of the process was what happened in the OB truck. Normally everything is adjusted and balanced live to keep the pictures even and bright, so if a competitor goes into a dark area it is brightened in the truck. This time I lit each set using a meter and asked Emily, the vision technician not to adjust the gain levels once the gameplay had started. This allowed us to have the feeling that the competitors were traveling through lighter and darker areas, much as actors do in Money Heist. Colours would also be normalised in the truck at this point, balanced to make the whites white. However I wanted to use the difference in the Kelvin rating of the lamps to create different feels for each set so I lit knowing that I would set the cameras to a Kelvin rating of 4300. Some sources were very warm at 2800 Kelvin and others nearer 7000 Kelvin, so a huge mix. We added green gels to the opening truck scenes which again normally would have been graded out in the truck.

The results were very effective and I think we found an excellent balance between making sure the content was captured whilst the emotion of the Money Heist format was respected. It was so lovely to be working with a team of people who are completely committed to pushing the boundaries and who are all absolutely top of their game. Many thanks to all of my camera and lighting teams who gave it their all.

If you want to see the final result here is a you tube link https://youtu.be/OK8OlWo9aF8

OK so the plan was to spend some time at Formatt Hitech to build a fairly comprehensive library of what you can expect from each type of filter – Full disclosure; I am an ambassador for the cine arm of Formatt Hitech. Of course COVID has not allowed the library to happen to the extent that I would have liked but I did manage to spend a day in their testing room. The specific reason for going there was to test the Firecrest ND range on our RED Gemini as I was impressed with the charts  – but charts are charts and sometimes don’t translate to the screen! In this case they did and I bought a set, you can see the results below.

So while I was there I also had a look at what filters they had on site and my daughter very patiently sat in the chair. Apologies that the examples are only seen on 1 skin colour, in the future I’m hoping to make sure we can see how the filters react to a variety of skin colours.

The set up for monochrome red test

At the bottom of this page I have put frame-grabs from each filter and a film sequence that shows 5 seconds of each filter in a family. These are not complete as the testing session was opportunistic and we just tested what we had. My last blog ‘Camera filters are so ‘old school’’ talked about how to create a colour wash with a filter that could then be counteracted with a key light of the opposite colour and I wanted to test this out. Lets start with these. Scroll down if you are just interested seeing examples of common diffusion filters and the ND tests.

The idea is to put a colour filter on the camera such as ‘Whiskey’ and then add the opposite colour to your key light. This will leave the subject lit by the key light as natural but there is a colour shift to the remainder of the image. The process and objectives are explained more fully in the earlier blog but ultimately the effect is to create a warm or cool feel to the image whilst keeping the skin tones natural. For the tests I used a RED Gemini camera with Celere prime lenses. The key light was a Falcon eyes 18. The camera and the Falcon eyes were balanced to 5600 kelvin. I fully accept that this is not a scientific test, I just wanted an idea of what was possible.  In the frame grabs below you can see how the strong filter has forced the background towards a whiskey tone. The bottom 2 frames have had the keylight sent towards blue with half and then full CTB gels applied to the lamp. I have not graded anything, purely an in camera REC709 lut applied. 

No Filter

Key light uncorrected

Whiskey grade 3 filter applied. Half CTB on the key light

Whiskey grade 3 filter applied. Full CTB on the key light

So I think to correct more accurately we would be looking at somewhere between the half and full CTB although grading out the blue in the final image would send everything a little more warm which could be very nice? At the bottom of this blog will be all the video files of these tests if you want to see moving image.

Below is the same principal but sending the background cool with a Cool blue filter. The key light was then shifted to warmer tones using grades of CTO gel on the lamp. 

No Filter

Cool blue 1 filter applied. Eighth CTO on the key light

Cool blue 1 filter applied. Quarter CTO on the key light

Cool blue 1 filter applied. Half CTO on the key light

And finally a middle warm version using a lighter grade suede filter.

No Filter

No correction on lamp

Suede 1 filter applied. eighth CTB on the key light

Suede 1 filter applied. Half CTB on the key light

With very basic grade applied

Since I was in the testing room I thought I’d also have a look at the legacy filter called Monochrome red. Formatt Hitech have a huge selection of their legacy filters which over the next few months I hope to explore more. I can formally announce that the monochrome red does exactly what it says on the tin and allows no frequencies but red through! Below is the set up where the key light was forced green with a green lighting gel and the frame grab of what the camera sensor saw.

The set up for monochrome red test

Frame grab of result with monochrome red filter applied.

Here are the films of the above examples

Below are some frame grabs and films that show the effects of different grades of commonly used Formatt Hitech filters. They are just here for reference should anyone need to see how they perform.

SOFT SILVER

No Filter

Soft Silver Eighth

Soft Silver Quarter

Soft Silver Half

Soft Silver 1

SOFT GOLD

No Filter

Soft gold Eighth

Soft gold Quarter

Soft gold Half

Soft gold 1

Soft gold 2

Soft gold 3

SOFT EFFECT

No Filter

Soft effect Sixteenth

Soft effect Quarter

CLEAR SUPERMIST

No Filter

Clear Supermist Sixteenth

Clear Supermist Eighth

Clear Supermist Quarter

LOW CONTRAST

No Filter

Low Contrast filter

FIRECREST ND 

No Filter

ND.3

ND.6

ND.9

ND1.2

ND1.5

When I first started out I was shooting for news and current affairs shows in what was the only aspect ratio for international TV which was 4:3 – yes, you’re correct, I am indeed old, although I prefer to think of it as experienced and can still climb stairs two at a time which is my scientifically proven benchmark to youth. Gradually with the jump from Beta to Digibeta came the arrival of 16:9 and boy was I excited. But why was that so exciting? What is it about an aspect ratio that can make you feel different? 4:3 has some great characteristics and recently I’ve watched some terrific new films in that format – ‘Cold War’ for one, if you’ve not seen it stop reading and find it, watch it and come back. It’s tremendous and the 4:3 aspect ratio (or Academy as it’s known) feels absolutely right. It, of course, has its history in cinema as the first format used by film makers but I had grown up on the 1.85:1 ratio which was tantalisingly close to the 1.78:1 that is 16:9. So all of a sudden I was shooting something that looked more like the cinema of the day. For me, it was like being allowed to speak another language – one that I could only listen to previously. And film language is a language – we use frame size, focus, colour, framing and of course aspect ratio to help us tell the visual side of the stories. Audiences know this vocabulary and instinctively use their learned reading of these tools to tap into what we are trying to express. I recently shot a series of films for British Airways (Directed beautifully by Theo Gelernter). These were a series of six films and told the story of 100 years of BA heritage. Between the six films we jumped between 3 different aspect ratios to help tell that story. The aspect ratio helped set each of the films emotionally and we added to that by using 3 sets of lenses of different ages and changing lighting styles.

For early years we used full frame and shot with Nikon 1970’s lenses. This chapter used a grade 1 promist also.

For early years we used full frame and shot with Nikon 1970’s lenses. This chapter used a grade 1 promist also.

For early years we used full frame and shot with Nikon 1970’s lenses. This chapter used a grade 1 promist also.

For early years we used full frame and shot with Nikon 1970’s lenses. This chapter used a grade 1 promist also.

Chapter 3 was more about people and so we set the frame in a little to suggest cine film

Chapter 3 was more about people and so we set the frame in a little to suggest cine film.

For chapter 2 we used full frame and shot with Canon 1980’s lenses. No filtration but plenty of haze.

For chapter 2 we used full frame and shot with Canon 1980’s lenses. No filtration but plenty of haze.

For early years we used full frame and shot with Nikon 1970’s lenses. This chapter used a grade 1 promist also.

Chapters 4,5 and 6 were more contempory and so we used 2.35:1 to link with a cinema experience.

Chapters 4,5 and 6 were more contempory and so we used 2.35:1 to link with a cinema experience.

Chapters 4,5 and 6 were more contempory and so we used 2.35:1 to link with a cinema experience.

Chapters 4,5 and 6 were more contempory and so we used 2.35:1 to link with a cinema experience.

Chapters 4,5 and 6 were more contempory and so we used 2.35:1 to link with a cinema experience.

There were some more relaxed shots dotted around in chapter 6 which we framed in 4:3 as we wanted to keep the frames about individuals

There were some more relaxed shots dotted around in chapter 6 which we framed in 4:3 as we wanted to keep the frames about individuals.

For us, today, aspect ratio is another part of film language but historically it was decided for you by the shape of the negative. The more of the negative you use the more space there is for the picture information and hence the better the quality. The most negative was used with the aspect ratio of 1.33:1. Don’t forget film stocks were no where near what they are now in terms of resolution and colour so every bit of negative counted.

Anamorphic was then designed to Oscar winning approval giving the longer Cinemascope frame whilst still using the whole negative – albeit with the addition in both origination and projection of squeeze/de-squeeze glass. There were lots of variations of this which included a push to use 65mm negative and this resulted in aspect ratios of anything between 2.2:1 and 2.76:1. We saw a great use of Panavision’s Ultra 70 at 2.76:1 from Robert Richardson in Tarantino’s ‘The Hateful Eight’.

This is a frame grab from Robert Richardson’s work on The Hateful Eight

Cinemascope is really rather splendid

Film stocks improved over time which lead to S35 which just extracted the centre from a standard 35mm negative. This made life easy with equipment being much smaller and, very importantly, cinemas world-wide not needing new projectors or lenses. And weirdly this is the key to the freedom we have today with aspect ratios – Digital projection and the huge gamut of distribution available to us now.

Historically distribution only meant theatre release and that was tied to the projection gates available, not just locally but throughout the whole world.  The first film that I shot as second unit DoP was shot on film and originally framed in 1.66:1. This was chosen by the first unit DoP as there were a lot of two-handers which suited the slightly taller frame. It had a theatrical release but nearly all theatres couldn’t project 1.66:1 so the distribution framing became the much commoner ratio of 1.85:1. With the emergence of digital projection we can now distribute in any framing we choose.  We even see aspect ratios changing mid-film – especially IMAX where many directors like to shoot set piece scenes in IMAX 65mm cutting back to 35mm for the less dynamic sections.

You can see the extra vertical frame you get in the IMAX 65mm format

There is a lot more height than the S35 frame

The size of the cameras and the cost to production makes shooting the whole film in 65mm questionable with action heavy films

However distribution is much more than just cinemas nowadays. If it’s a commercial then people will potentially see it in the cinema and television of course, but more likely also on tablets, phones and computers. Within the world of phones we then also have platforms like Facebook which favour the 1:1 and 9:16 formats. Networks such as Netflix also are keen on 2:1 which is thinner than the standard 16:9 TV screen so you get some black bars top and bottom but not as much as the widescreen 2.35:1 format – a nod to the epic cinema format but better value for money as you have less black?!

This was shot for Hulu and we used the 1:2 aspect ratio. Directed by Ben Steiner.

This was shot for Hulu and we used the 1:2 aspect ratio. Directed by Ben Steiner.

This was shot for Hulu and we used the 1:2 aspect ratio. Directed by Ben Steiner.

We tried not to just use the centre of the frame

Shot on the Celere HS lenses. These are taken from prorez transcodes with a rec 709 LUT applied

Lenses coped well with detail in back lit set ups

Shot on the Celere HS lenses. These are taken from prorez transcodes with a rec 709 LUT applied

Personally I am very happy to shoot to whichever aspect ratio works best for the content – the challenge comes when one film needs to meet all aspect ratios. This is not necessarily new – in my youth I saw many a pan and scanned 1.85:1 film on video in 4:3 but the severity of the extraction is greater now. I recently completed, with Joe Shaw directing, a set of films for Tesco Mobile which needed delivery in 16:9,9:16 and 1×1. These were performance led vignettes of family life so could not be shot 3 times with appropriate framing for each delivery. In addition, the location was great as it gave all the options for different spaces needed but there were elements in each room that were not on-brand and so needed to be framed out. We ended up shooting in 6K on a RED Dragon and extracting the 9:16 and 1×1 from the 16:9 frame.

The frame had to work for 16:9 and 9:16

The frame had to work for 16:9 and 9:16

The full frame for Tesco where 9:16 was extracted

The frame had to work for 16:9 and 9:16

The full frame for Tesco where 9:16 was extracted

The full frame for Tesco where 9:16 was extracted. We used foreground detail to fill the 16:9 frame more

The frame had to work for 16:9 and 9:16

The frame had to work for 16:9 and 9:16

The frame had to work for 16:9 and 9:16

The frame had to work for 16:9 and 9:16

The frame had to work for 16:9 and 9:16

Well that sounds easy, and from a practical level it is, but there are compromises that aren’t immediately obvious. Firstly we will have to use wider lenses or be further away from the subject to achieve the same vertical frame size in 16:9 when compared to shooting in 9:16. If you look at the examples below where the picture on the right was extracted from a 16:9 frame and the one on the left was originated in 9:16. They both used the same lens (35mm on an APSC sensor) and the same stop of T2 for night and T4 for daytime. The difference is the distance to subject which is closer in the 9:16 example. You can see there is a change in depth of field with the drop off of focus being greater in the image on the left which was shot specifically for 9:16. Just look at the detail in the zebra crossing or the awning to see what I mean.

With the current trend of shallow depth of field this is something to be considered when talking with the director. The other main consideration is that the area to light and dress is much bigger. This will add time/lamps/crew/props to the budget which can be vexing for the producer! It’s fine if it is agreed that the only format will be 9:16 as you can just ignore everything outside of that area but I have never been on a shoot where the client has not said that although they don’t think they will use it, they might so can we just make sure…It’s very easy to say but it has a considerable effect on schedule and equipment costs.

It’s a real luxury to have this freedom of aspect ratios and the range of distribution formats means that your films are more likely to be seen by a broader range of people which is great. It can be a double edged sword also though as you can lose control of one of the keys tools a DoP has, that of framing.

What’s the ‘just’ all about? This perception that the value a film can be ascertained by how much money has been spent on it is bewildering to me. You hear it all the time though, my friends tell me “I’m starting a film in a couple of weeks, just another low budget one though” or people sometimes ask me “What’s happening with that little film you were doing?” (when I said bewildering, I also meant sometimes bloody annoying). I’m not saying there are no differences in films of different budgets, or in the way that as a DoP you need to approach them, just that the smaller budget films can be fantastic, or crap, in just the same way that big budget films can be so let’s not be judge and jury before the shoot even starts.

This was for a promo for BBC with David Hasselhoff

BTS as we record the Hoff pieces to camera on greenscreen

We used very heavy backlight for a stadium feel

Despite all efforts gradually the camera accumulated stuff

Working with the lovely Henry Cole on a promo for Travel Channel

Second Unit DoP on Dangerous Parking

Sir Michael with Angela Hartnett

Behind the scenes

I cut my teeth, as what was called then a lighting cameraman, in the world of documentary film-making. This, I think, gave me a heightened awareness of budget restrictions and the value of spending budget that still stays with me today. It was always starting from the point of “will the story be told better if we spend this bit of the budget” as opposed to will the shots be better, will they look more impressive? When I started shooting commercials I had to constantly remind myself that 1. Low budget has a completely different meaning to the low budget of the world of documentary and 2. More impressive shots hold greater value and if a commercial is told in a more impressive way it is likely that the story is being served by this even if the story is a small scale human story. So I get that we need different budgets, I just question whether one is always better than the other. I remember a time when I was shooting a promo with Lord David Attenborough for the BBC. It was to be used to promote international sales of one of the first Planet Earth series. We really stretched the budget out, getting deals, minimising crew and kit to put as much value as possible on screen. We were in a studio, it was dressed nicely, had 2 film cameras going on track and some on-set catering but in our opinion we had done this low budget. It was whilst we were eating the on-set catering that I heard David saying to a colleague how they could have made a whole episode for what this must have cost. It’s just a good example of perception of budget. I know what we made was good value for money and the sales that it brought in helped fund future documentaries but it must have seemed to him as excessive. In the same way the budgets I work with on the films I shoot (usually about £300K) must seem impossibly micro to a Hollywood team but huge to some of the indie film-makers in the UK.

This was the final look on the Lord Attenbourgh promo

This was the final look on the Lord Attenbourgh promo

Whilst I have shot on a range of budgets as second unit DoP I must state that all five features I’ve shot as first unit have been low budget. What are the cons of this? Well obviously we get paid less but for me this is not really an issue as I’m fortunate enough to earn well when I’m on commercials. The biggest issue is always time. Any testing is done in my own time and normally we shoot for between 18-21 shoot days which is never enough. It means that you have to shoot very precisely which is great when it all works but desperate when the plan stumbles. Any number of issues can occur which can include poor decision making by me, or the blocking drastically changes, the location doesn’t behave as we expected, the weather does a ‘U’ turn etc… It’s these moments where low budget really sucks as the only time you have is for plan A, once plan A is set and in motion that’s it regardless of whether you see a better option as the scene develops. Sometimes the temptation to change is so great that you do it but that always leads to compromise later (as the 1^st AD never fails to remind me). There just is no time to pick up dropped scenes. People often ask if it’s the lack of equipment and skilled team members that makes the difference and I have to say I have not found that at all. My teams in the camera, lighting and grip departments have always been terrific as so many people love making films and some will come with me from the commercials whilst others will be stepping up. Equipment is greatly reduced but, with occasional exceptions, I find we can stay true to the story with what we have – I should point out that I’m fortunate enough to have a RED kit which has been fantastic and film-makers today are incredibly lucky to have so many affordable tools at their fingertips. Again the commercials satiates that urge to use all the latest kit which can be fun and appropriate for those shoots but mostly not necessary for the feature stories that I seem to tell.

Celere HS lenses

Our RED kits gets out on all sorts of shoots

Ash set the tone in the first week for Aggie to continue

We needed absolutely zero movement on the camera so my grip got to work and made sure.

There certainly was a time where I saw my perfect career development as heading towards the big budget films but as I get older I realise that for me this is no longer high on the agenda (just as well as I can’t see the next Bond, Marvel or Star Wars coming my way). I would certainly enjoy and indeed relish the chance to have bigger budgets to work with, and should the opportunity come along I will grab it with both greedy hands, however if the choice is big budget with less interesting script or small budget with intriguing script I will stay with my limited kit and time and make the script that grabs me the most.

I was going to put some scenes from the features I’ve shot but as I was going through I realised that you can pick scenes from pretty much any film that look good and prove how you can successfully shoot on a low budget. Individual scenes are fairly easy to ‘win’, it’s the consistency that is so much harder. Making a film that has a consistent look and a consistent quality is the real challenge of low budget. With that in mind I have put 2 full shorts that I wrote, directed and shot below and a no-budget pop promo which was directed by Chris Crow but shot by me.

Framegrab, Promo for Dear Lover, Folk Grinder

It was wet and cold shooting on a beach in South Wales

The first on was a film I made in 2000. It was originally conceived to prove to producers that they could trust me with 35mm film as I was struggling to step up from 16mm but as these things tend to go, it grew into a narrative piece. Total budget was £1800 which was self-funded. It was shot on 35mm short ends over 2 days. Looking back I can see errors in the script and I obviously didn’t have a very good grasp of ethnicity but I’m not sure I would shoot it very much differently if we had a lot more cash.

I shot this second one on impulse for the Nikon Film festival challenge (it had to be under 140 seconds) and there is an earlier blog (going to the dark side) on this site if you need to know more. We used a 5Dmkiii and my rehoused Nikon lenses. Crew was limited to 3 – myself shooting and directing, James my son on sound and Nic Cornwall (an excellent director whose house we used so no pressure there) as art director. Total budget was under £200. I think this is a good example of how lucky we are to have so many affordable tools at our disposal. Of course as this was shot in HD on a 5D it is not going to hold up well on the big screen but its main market is for viewing on phones and computers so not sure it’s a huge issue. Again, looking at it now I’m not sure how much I would do differently with more money other than improve the quality of capture with more pixels, colour depth and bit rate!

This last one is just a great example of what a director like Chris Crow can do with no money. We shot it hand held on a 5D and 7D (Chris took charge of the 7D and me on the 5D) for a zero budget in a morning. We used a canon 16-35mm T2.8 prime, a lensbaby and lens whacked with some old Canon FD primes that I’ve got. I love it and think it suits the track absolutely perfectly. If anybody wants to check out the band they are ‘Folk Grinder’ and the track is ‘My Lover’

When people talk about ‘looks’ it generally goes down one of two routes, either period based in the sense of  ‘I want that 70’s look’ or lens based as in ‘give me that Cooke look’. The first of these is a complex request that involves all departments that come together to create a colour pallet, costume range, production design, make up, lighting style, framing etc. The combination of these add up to the sum of setting the action in ‘a period in time’. The second is of course much easier to achieve – you hire in a set of Cookes, and boom, your ‘Cooke look’ is achieved. The issue is that the ‘Cooke look’ is a subjective thing. Sure the lenses tend to have attributes that give common ground – for instance with Cooke – people would associate maybe warmth or a more forgiving sharpness but they are also a victim to association. In this case Cooke is often associated with comedies, feel good films, human stories etc so for those who don’t test the lenses the ‘Cooke look’ becomes partially about genre. I’m talking mainly here about a good proportion of producers, some directors and most audiences, not about DoP’s who spend days testing. The Cooke look ends up being a combination of the lens attributes and the colour pallet, costume range, production design, make up, lighting style, framing etc (sounding familiar?) that those genres are known for. So the point is that in my head the lens choice should be the final part of the discussion of ‘the look’, the icing on the cake to complete the ‘look’. It does have an effect and as a DoP it feels hugely important – some lenses flare more easily, some are faster so will give a very narrow depth of field, some are older and have more aberrations or character, some have higher contrast, some flatter… It plays a part but, and I know I’m opening myself up to being ritually ridiculed here, it is a smaller part compared to the combination of all the departments coming together to achieve the ‘look’.

I own a set of Celere lenses that are building a sense of what they look like but are not recognised as having a recognisable look outside of the group who use them. I use them because to me they look pleasing and suit the body of my work. I don’t shoot everything on them but probably about 75% of the films I shoot. If you want to know more about my choices on those lenses there is another blog entry on this page called ‘Never discuss, politics, religion or lenses’ but if you just want to see a variety of short-form projects all shot with these lenses then click on the film below. All shots on this film used the Celeres and mostly orginated on a RED Dragon. I have tried to pick a range of work – some greenscreen, some motion control, some location, some low budget, some high budget. I have left it at a higher bit rate than I would normally for the net for those who want to see the nuances so you might need an element of patience! Hope you enjoy.

Well with VR you can put your head wherever you want but how does this set of limitless possibilities reflect on the role of DoP? And with everything in shot, do you need a DoP at all? Surely our role as DoP is to take an extract from the construct in front of us that best suits the need of the story? I always love seeing the detritus of the set that is needed to create an environment – rain bars, lamp stands, fans, props people, boom mics…. And then looking at the manicured end frame which appears set in a life-like real world.

This was a promo for a BBC Christmas trail

BBC Christmas trail. Behind the Scenes

A motion control shot

From the motion control rig

But VR is much more akin to documentary in the sense that we need to show the whole space, to let things appear to happen in an unrestricted way. We want people to be able to explore that space as they choose, no lines of action to cross, no lens choices to consider, no T stop to match, no geography to establish… so why use a DoP? I did find myself pondering this very question during prep on my last VR shoot and you’ll be pleased to hear that I found an answer, more of which later.

By linking VR to documentary and stripping out many of the choices that us DoPs need to make it is tempting to think that VR has no rules, this I have to tell you is a long way from the truth. There are lots of rules it’s just that they are constantly changing. VR is so new a form that it is developing phenomenally quickly and the rules of acceptable practice change at the same pace. I remember on my first VR shoot saying to the director, Chris Vincze, “You’ve done more VR than me so if it looks like I’m doing something stupid do tell me, I don’t really know what I’m doing!”, to my great relief he laughed and said “It’s VR, nobody knows what they are doing, we do it and hope that it works!” This was 18mths ago, at the time of writing, and things are different now, we know a lot more about what we are doing but the original rules of a) don’t move the camera as the audience will feel sick, b) you must use the whole 360 degrees and c) don’t allow the action to come closer to 1.5m to the camera rig are all seen as things you should break if the viewing experience is to be interesting.

We used sunstrips to create flare as the camera entered although we did have to back this off a little to help the stitch

We used lots of single kino tubes wrapped in the o2 blue as ‘in shot’ lighting sources

Monitoring is always difficult. We used an ipad monitor/playback system for this shoot

This is a great stabilised remote dolly for extended tracking shots

The first time I really started thinking about what my role was in these films was when we were shooting a large scale VR experience for o2 music venues. The director was again the very talented Chris Vincze and the production company was Happy Finish. Chris knows a lot about VR, Happy Finish are one of the market leaders in VR with a highly experienced internal team, what could I add? I think it was unusual for Happy Finish to have an external DoP come in, a request by Chris, but by the end I do believe that we all benefited from the experience. What Chris and myself brought to the project was our experience of TV commercials, the quality of image and detail that is expected at this level. The internal VR Dop’s, Elliot and Jamie were really great at understanding the technology, how that would translate to the final VR world, how to solve stitch line problems but they did not have so much experience in creating environments with the tools that we use in drama and commercials. We broke many rules on that shoot including using haze, heavy smoke, intentional flaring and long twisty camera moves.

We lit the spaces to deliberately include light and shade, brand colours and atmosphere. It was painstaking and my excellent gaffer, Tim O Connell, spent his days meticulously hiding lights and making others practical. It worked very well and everybody was delighted with the results, in fact the material is being used by Nokia on their showreel (we used a Nokia OZO camera).

The ceiling was replaced and some haze was added in the background to add atmosphere.

Hints of brand blue for o2 and heavy smoke from the stage area

Very brand heavy in the blue colours. Single kino tubes covered with blue, 1×1 panels and image 80 added level.

Again a very dark area. We added haze in the background, kino tubes, floor cams and lite ribbons. Keyed with a 1×1 panel

Tiny environment meant careful placement of cast. Lit by 2 x kino flo tubes and blue in the corridor

I’ve just finished another VR shoot, this time with MPC who are top of the game. I can’t talk about what this was or the end result as I had to sign one of those pesky NDA things but it cemented my understanding of what an experienced DoP can bring. Again Chris directed, you can probably sense a pattern by now, and this time it was a mixture of VR and green-screen. My favoured way of working now is to have a team who deal with all the camera aspect including set up, syncing, playback and media organisation (the DIT on these jobs needs to be very much on the ball). These are enormously complex setups and to have a team dedicated to this means that I am free to concentrate on the details of the image – in much the same way I would with a commercial or a drama. And this I think is one of the main areas of my responsibility – keeping the stress of making the technology work away from the director whilst having time to still discuss the shot development, lighting and cast placement.

It’s a lot of stuff that all has to work!

To monitor VR live is a struggle and this was a particularly good solution. Director,Chris Vincz, in the goggles

On this shoot  we tested for a couple of days to find the best rigs and camera settings  as there was a range of environments that we needed to capture, finally settling on a 5 x ‘Z Cam’ rig for smaller spaces and a 5 x A7Sii rig for the larger spaces. After testing I said to Chris that I realised my job was to make sure we weren’t just getting the pictures we needed but that we were getting them in the highest quality possible. He replied, “yes, and to make it look nice” and that is the crux. If you are having to deal with the camera build and the monitoring system you just don’t have enough time to concentrate on finessing the detail in the shot. The crew we had on this shoot were excellent and extremely experienced in VR. They work as DoPs in VR constantly but the advantage of bringing in someone like me, who is from a different arena,  is that I can bring the experience of that arena with me, as well as being able to focus on all the things that can get lost due to restrictions of time on the day. I think it’s a win win for everyone – apart from maybe the accountant!