American Cinematographer - June 1995 - 32

Right: A heavily
smoked, dimly
lit set and

powerful
sources

punching
through a
window allow
actors David

Duchovny and
Gillian
Anderson to
enter into

another
ominous
confine.
Below

right:

The exterior of
a

submarine

emerging
through ice
an

on
arctic set

was

backlit

from each
corner

of a

blacked-out

soundstage
with 6K HMI
fresnels

on

hoists.

Depending on
the angle,
Bartley would
use the lights to
maintain

backlighting,
shutting off the
fixtures that

weren't needed.

for/' says Bartley. One oppor¬
tunity to do so came up in an in¬
terrogation scene with Mulder,
Scully, and a suspect. Pfaster -

set, Bartley is
able to light
with just the

stands

lights and have

poised at the bars of a cell di¬
rectly behind them, evaluating
Scully as his next victim. "We had
just acquired some new blue fluo¬
rescent tubes, so blue they don't
register on a color-temperature
meter," Bartley recalls. "When I

defined beams

walked on the set and saw that
the set decorator had put fluores¬
cent fixtures all around, I put the
blue fluorescent tubes in. Then
above each jail cell I put a spotted

"sometimes
heavier than

out

the true murderer

-

PAR 64

light, one on each bunk,
and used quite a bit of smoke.
That's all that we had lighting the
whole set. The actor (Chinlund)

played the light that

was on

his

forehead; he could feel it."
Another uncanny practi¬
cal fixture used frequently is a
Xenon

ried

flashlight. These

Dantean

30

are car¬

by the actors into various
landscapes and cryptic

Xenon flash¬

cutting
through the
darkness. "We
smoke the sets

quite a bit,"
Tickell adds,

thirty

years, the only lighting
in the halls and cabins are

sources

the Xenon

flashlights," recalls
Bartley. "I use the pebble-bounce
so

the actors

can

shine the flash¬

lights into the reflector, which
light back into their
faces. The actors are good; they
can
light themselves! Otherwise,
I'll supplement the Xenons with

bounces the

others. You can put in just a
little atmosphere and it'll

change the look. You'll see
practicals that you didn't notice
before, and the smoke will pick
up the light and bring the level
up just a notch so you have a bit
of an ambient glow throughout
the whole set."

"John and I had a mo¬
where I
thought he had added too much
little while ago

light; as they come closer I dim
up the light as if it's coming off

ment

the

smoke to

a

flashlights."

a

a

scene," Carter admits.

"It was a scene inside an FBI of¬
fice and I got on the phone and

chambers. "In 'Dod Kalm,' which
ends up in a frigate that is sup¬

Physical special effects
also play an important role in the
tone of the series. Employing the

said, 'Too smokey.' And he said,

posed to have been dormant for

natural fill-effects of smoke

'Not!'

American

June 1995

Cinematographer

on a

Again I said, Too smokey!'
American Cinematographer - June 1995

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