American Cinematographer - July 2007 - 57

Leshing (Marshall Bell), a caretaker who knew the famous actress who once owned the Drews’ mansion, reveals details about her as the woman’s image plays on a screen. Cinematographer Alexander Gruszynski, ASC and gaffer James Plannette used an LCD projector to simulate the beam of light emanating from the onscreen movie projector. 275mm) and 4:1 (17.5-75mm) Primo zooms. “To a certain degree, I went against my own philosophy on this project,” he says. “I’ve been very strict about using primes because that gives you a certain visual discipline. But there’s a convenience with zoom lenses that justifies using them in some situations.” Asked if he depended on certain focal lengths on Nancy Drew, he says, “When I start a project, I never make a conscious decision to stick to certain lenses, but strangely enough, there often seem to be one or two lenses I end up using much more than any others. I can’t really explain it. It must be intuitive. “The ’Scope format tends to shift you to wider lenses. For Nancy Drew, I mostly used the 21mm and 27mm primes. Of course, the second camera usually had a longer lens; that’s a practical rather than an aesthetic decision, because you have to stay out of the first camera’s view.” The production was scheduled for about 42 days, with roughly half of that time spent at locations in Los Angeles and the other half onstage at Warner Bros. The main set was the Drews’ rented home, the dark mansion. “The house needed its own visual feel that would be different from the outside world,” says Gruszynski. “It’s much darker and more high-contrast, with a lot of dramatic and not necessarily motivated lighting. In post, we desaturated it somewhat, giving it a feeling closer to an old black-and-white movie.” Shafts of light were often brought through windows and glass partitions and broken up in interesting ways by greenery outside, and by imperfections in the glass. The quality of light was hard, resulting in distinct, dramatic shadows. Gruszynski often lit with 7K Xenons bounced off mirrors, which helped him direct and control the light in tight spaces around the large sets. Light depicting moonlight was neutral, while sunlight sources were gelled with 1⁄8 or 1⁄4 CTO to be a touch warmer. In the story, Nancy discovers the mansion is connected to a near- by apartment building by a secret underground tunnel. “That was a great opportunity to create some darkness and visual excitement,” says Gruszynski. “The tunnel breaks at two corners, which allowed me to put some very dim, almost unnoticeable light in the background to pick up a little edge. Of course, Nancy is holding a flashlight, which we reflected back toward her with a bounce card to get some exposure on her face.” “Emma was a dream to photograph,” he continues. “She has a very fair complexion that glows, almost like she’s lit from inside, and that adds a certain innocence and purity to the character she plays. I generally lit her face with less contrast. I couldn’t claim that this formed an entire philosophy, but it affected my thinking on an instinctive level.” Gruszynski used three Kodak Vision2 film stocks on the show: 200T 5217 for most day exteriors; Expression 500T 5229 for Nancy’s hometown, a location rendered in American Cinematographer 57

American Cinematographer - July 2007

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