American Cinematographer - December 1997 - 91

young recruits who help him con¬
vey this message of hope. The revi¬
talized citizenry eventually takes a
stand against General Bethlehem

5293 for

for the film's nighttime sequences.
The production also commonly uti¬

rior shoot in the

(Will Patton) and his army of ter¬
rorists, who have seized national

lized two

June and July forced the filmmak¬

their arsenal included two Panavision

ers

control in the absence of

Platinums, a Lightweight Panaflex
for the Steadicam, a Panastar for

hours

a

govern¬

Seeing his power threatened,
targets the Postman and

ment.

Bethlehem

teriors,

daytime exteriors and in¬

as

well

as

Vision 500T 5279

cameras on

most

high-speed work and

Through Rain, Hail

an

shots;

8-perf

or

Nuclear Winter
Cinematographer Stephen Windon,
helps director/star Kevin

ACS

VistaVision
fects shots.

camera

for visual ef¬

The film's extensive exte¬
summer months of

to deal with

long daylight
predominantly character¬
ized by direct overhead sunlight. "I
couldn't use any overhead diffu¬
sion because so much of the pho¬
tography consisted of wide exteri¬
ors/' imparts Windon. "We tended

to

use

40mm and 50mm lenses

the closer shots
the camera a lot."

even on
move

-

-

and

When

shooting the wide
generally
position two Condors 80 feet be¬
hind the camera, with Dino lights
vistas, Windon would

and 18Ks mounted

on

them. With

Costner make his rounds in The

the Condor's boom arms stretching
out across the set, the fixtures pro¬
vided fill light for the landscape's

tale set in

Condors, I could get the lamps up

Postman,

a

a

bleak, post-

apocalyptic future.

large shadow

just above the lens without using
parallels," he explains. "It would
since
so

tra

The Postman
and

shot last

summer

we were

spring

in Tucson,

Arizona; Bend, Oregon;
and Metaline Falls,

[actor]

in the frame to

holding a 4' x 4' white
card or foamcore, which lent the
actors' eyes a bit of sparkle and
provided a nice soft-light fill
beneath their hats.

located near the Cana¬
dian border. Approxi¬

mately 90 percent of
was

or two

around

Washington, which is

the film

moving the camera
place an ex¬

much. I would also

hide the bases of the Condors so I
could basically shoot 360 degrees."
For tighter tracking shots,
Windon would follow the Steadicam

youthful recruits.

was

"With the

have been too difficult to keep par¬
allels out of the shot, especially

by Jean Oppenheimer
his

areas.

shot in the

quences,

Shooting the night se¬
however, was a different

Top: Some
bounce fill is
added to
Costner as
Windon (behind
camera in hat)
sets his frame.

The

summer

great outdoors, with
40 percent of the film utilizing a

production

Steadicam.

offered long

During their initial

schedule

daylight hours,

prep

discussions, Windon and Costner

but Costner's

visited the film's locations several

penchant for
wide-angle

times, trying to

decide whether to

lenses made it

shoot the film in the standard

difficult to

1:85:1

spherical format or to em¬
ploy an anamorphic 2.35:1 frame.
"No obvious format stood

confesses the

cameraman.

soften the harsh

glare from
overhead.

out,"

Bottom:
Bethlehem's

"In the

end,

we decided to go with an¬
amorphic, because we wanted to
convey the script's 'epic' quality."

troops on the
march. The lowtech, post-

The decision to shoot in

apocalyptic
setting allowed

anamorphic did influence the
cinematographer's selection of film
stocks. Windon opted to use

Costner to

again explore
the Western

Eastman Kodak's EXR 5248 and

genre.

December 1997

American

Cinematographer

87
American Cinematographer - December 1997

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