American Cinematographer - January 2007 - 79

was more

subtle and believable than

what I would've achieved with
another stock

work

took

exposed normally."

Calvache used 5218 for

original gaffer, Russ Engels, had left
to

a

another film,

on

gaff for Antonio. This
worked out very well."
the film's final

ball games

tensions

Calvache also used 5218 for
scenes,

when various

head

during one
explosive night. "I wanted those
scenes to be
intriguing, dramatic
and suspenseful," he says. "I wanted
the purest blacks, and for that I went
to

come to a

5218, because I welcomed that

extra

bit of contrast."

ular, Calvache tried

deep blacks while dealing
with some degree of underexpo¬
sure." Field explains, "We had to
make some very practical decisions
in our approach to the football
and skateboarding scenes. David
Wagreich, our second-unit direc¬
tor/cinematographer, was working

mood of the Crewdson

very

ahead of us

at

those locations,

and Antonio had

to come

up

so

he

with a

to re-create the

photo¬
graphs. "We used the brightest and
sharpest possible lenses, the Arri
Master Primes, which are great for
night shooting," he says. "We were
very fortunate, because at the time
there were only two sets in use; we
had

one

and

Michael

Ballhaus

[ASC] had the other [for The

Departed]. All through

prep we

lighting scheme that would work

waited with bated breath until

for first unit

arrived from Munich." In

as

well. That meant

a

stripped-down package. [Rigging
grip] Billy Patsos broke off from
first unit to key-grip for David, and
Tim Guinness was his gaffer. When
first unit arrived

at

the field,

our

these

scenes,

logic of the
cases

were

"we tried

those wonderful lenses
using our lighting
only to reinforce what the streetlamps were doing."
Filming at night inside the
playground, a Staten Island location
open as

In

would allow, and

Ronnie,

where

was no

the

to

ours

lighting

follow the

which in most
streetlamps. I avoided

sources,

resorting to an even, strong back¬
light. We were exposing as wide

of the

one

unfolds,

was more

final

scenes

difficult. "There

motivation whatsoever for

lighting in that park,"

Calvache. "On

says

hand, we wanted
darkness, but I also felt that having a
few visible

During night scenes in partic¬

5218 because I knew it would pre¬
serve

Tim

over to

handful of night scenes that needed
more visual
punch, such as the foot¬

Brad plays with ex-cop
Larry (Noah Emmerich) and other
men from the
neighborhood. "We
shot the football scenes using exist¬
ing lighting fixtures in the stadium,"
explains Calvache. "I knew I was
going to be playing in the underex¬
posed area of the negative, so I used

so

one

light

would cre¬
light and shad¬
ows, and would definitely help me
sell the light without relying on a
moonlight effect. We had the art
department create a few practical
lamps, and our key grip, George
Patsos, rigged a homemade 'mini
Musco,' four 12K Pars gelled with Vi
sources

ate contrast

between

CTS

80-foot Condor with

on an

photographing
a

registered
offender,

sex

one

of

Calvache's
was

to

goals
bring out

"those blue eyes
his mother
loves." He notes,
"In these
scenes, we

needed to

approach Ronnie
with humanity,
in contrast to
the monster
everyone else
sees him as."

a

20-by-20 frame of grid cloth in
front. That was the ambient light for
the park, and for backlight we had a
Condor outside the park holding
two lOKs. The key was usually a 5K
shooting through an 8-by-8 grid
cloth. Using tree branches, we broke
the light up as much as possible. At
times

we

had

a

dozen C-stands and

Hi-rollers with branches

breaking
American

Cinematographer 77
American Cinematographer - January 2007

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