American Cinematographer - December 1996 - 34

Right: An
artificially

and is close to 3,000 square feet in
size. But it is on the third very high

created

floor, and I can't get any heavy
stuff, such as Condors, in this small
courtyard. Therefore, I have almost

rainstorm lends
ambience to the
moments

leading

up to
Eichmann's

no

over

the windows. I

on natural
this. Tomorrow is a

capture. Below:
Members of the

scene

production team
listen

control

dependent
in

one

room, so

am

light to get

four-page
I had better

drag out the BL-3 (the "old grinder")

as actor

and shoot with two

Arliss Howard

♦

(far right) offers
a suggestion to

cameras.

Well, it worked out pretty

well. In the first

place, the scene
staged down at one end of the
room, so I really only had to worry
about one large window source. I

director Billy
Graham (far

was

left).

had

access

two stories

to the

roof, which was
above, across a large

courtyard. At
world stood

by." Rita Zohar is a
great actress, and it was especially
poignant, as she had actually been
born in one of the camps. We made
a company move and still
wrapped
by 5:30. If this continues, it will be
a
pretty easy schedule.
♦

Fernando,

our

first, for a sunny

day look, a 4K
Par was enough
to bounce

off the
floor from the
roof. This was

pretty convinc¬

1st A.D.,

ing. However,
for a soft light

got ripped off today. It was right in
front of the hotel while loading up
for work. One of the P.A/s put his

look I had to pa¬
per the window
and hit it with

bag in the trunk of the car, and
while nobody was looking, the
thief took his bag, which contained

two

up

his $4,000 Powerbook, $800 in cash,
etc., etc. It was an unbelievably

where Denny Clairmont and Otto
Nemenz show us all of these hot

to the roof. A combination of natu¬

professional job.

cameras,

I

dailies the other

Moviecams and such, and
here I've got a couple of old Arri BL

on a television set that had a
fatal "loss of chroma" attack. It lit¬

clunkers! I wonder if I will ever get
to have the state of the art
again.

erally died before our eyes while
we were
watching the first day's

They are working okay, though, af¬
ter the BL-3 went into the shop for
an
emergency sound check. We

We

saw

day

dailies. Greens became a rich shade
of vermilion that washed through
the low

lights, and the highlights
feeble pink. This was
not cool. I knew it was coming, too,
because a warning flag went up in
my head when I heard that the 3A"
machine was coming into the of¬
were a

fice. I
did

sort of

was

out at

the lab, and

never

follow-up quality check. So
that was kind of disappointing, but
a

have it worked out - sort of.
We still have the big old sick TV,

tried to

but it does

use

it in

a

two-camera situ¬

ation, but the sound department
revolted. It

way,
eras

was

pretty bad. Any¬

the next day a tech from Cam¬
came
nervously to us

Y Luces

for a sound test, and it was pro¬
nounced usable. There were many

smiles, handshakes, and apologies,
so

the

camera

has worked out all

right, but it is still

a
The errant

we

grinder.
zoom

motors

from Cine-Video Tech in Miami fi¬

job on audio
tiny 9" monitor that we are
watching the picture on. It is a
great picture, though. You just

nally made it to the party - so far
so
good. I have primes from 14 to
135mm, all Zeiss. Most are high¬

have to sit kind of close.
I had to laugh

zooms seem

a

better

than the

the other
day about our camera gear (which
is working pretty well). I am in the
ASC, and I go to these meetings

32

12Ks, taken

laboriously

American

Cinematographer

speed,

so

that is cool, and the
pretty good.

I have

an

apartment to

shoot in tomorrow (we shot there

today) that is absolutely gorgeous.
was
probably built in the 1920s,

It

December 1996

ral

light and the various HMIs that
able to bring to bear from a

was

distance did the trick.
♦ We did

in Tel Aviv. It

a

street scene set

was a

long walk-

and-talk, and the art department
did a great job with signage, Arabs
and Hassidim. We shot it with a
150-600mm zoom, and it was pretty

convincing.
♦ Today was
frustrating.
Whenever you do a tow shot, you
always seem to take longer to get
started than usual. Everybody
knows it, and everybody tries to
make it better, but it is just slow.
The actors were perhaps a little
late, not much

as it turns out, but
had a Nagra go down in the
middle of the thing, and that was
another pull-over-and-stop situa¬
we

tion. I wasn't

even

trying to light

from the windshield. All I had in
there was a little fill from a couple
of Kino Flo tubes. We are not on a

trailer, because there is none to be
had here, nor a truck to pull it.
Thus, I can't rig light outside the
windows, because it is too big a
American Cinematographer - December 1996

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