The 4th and Final week

Here we are. One last week of trying to obtain perfection. The heart of the movie,the love story is in our sights. We've filmed hundreds of people picking soy beans at night, choreographed complicated football plays with multiple characters and multiple points of view. Some of those scenes are filmed at 500 frames per second, can you imagine the amount of light needed to expose an image like that? the tricky part is lighting it too match the rest of the game so that it matches. All of these logistical aerobics are only prologue to what we have to capture this week. If you could go back in time and meet your life partner as a teenager, how would you change things? would you?

These are the scenes that drew me to this project, they shade the football part of the film and bring new light to the choices we make and why we make them. We have AMAZING actors! last week Christine Lahti just killed us/me with her performances. God. what a pro.

While I've not given loads of details about the techniques in filming or DP jargon, all of which I find kind of boring because who really cares about process. What I will say is that my job is create an environment where the actors can play and feel comfortable. I have the best seat in the house, through the eyepiece, I'm the first to witness a performance and that is one of the finest privileges of my lifetime, so far, in my 43 years on this earth, not counting my family, or Mom's potato chip fried chicken.

My body is wired to nights now and we are shooting days. I'm sleeping about 3 hours and my clearest thought is incoherent at best. I'm super sensitive and my feelings get hurt at the smallest things,I'm moody, insecure and half depressed but elated at the beauty that we capture everyday. I can't even blame PMS. WTF?

My point is - here we are, at the altar, our bodies sacrificed, our defenses nil and our emotions are as raw as the food at any LA east side party. How can we do our best work? My answer is that sleep is overrated during these circumstances and being tired invites clarity. I don't have the time or energy to engage the multitude of nuances and subtext, I only have the energy to be present and precisely where I am. In the moment.

That, for me is the most important place to start in capturing truthful and beautiful work.

Hey, I'm really sorry for the psycho babble and for the mis-direct. The premise of this whole blog was to illuminate the job and process of a DP at work. I solve those problems all day and night and the last thing I want to do is write about them. Final note on this for now:

Love your actors unconditionally and LISTEN to the Director. If you want to be heard, you have to listen. If you are sensitive to the needs of the scene than you will find your voice and create beauty. That is the process that I surrender to everyday and it seems to work.

Lastly, it also helps if you have a tactile orgasm every time you use the tools of your trade. The new RED Mysterium camera - Amazing. Angenieux and Cooke lenses - Amazing. Balloon light at night? - Amazing. Whispering about F-Stops all day and quality of light? - well, that's just plain divine. To see an actor (we can call them people) in your light and lens and then both of you surrendering yourselves to create a moment of beauty that will hopefully inspire? That is why I live! (except for my family, or Mom's potato chip fried chicken)

(in re-reading this I realize that I use the words "truth and beauty" about 1000 times. That would make me a Bohemian, I did love Moulin Rouge")