American Cinematographer - December 2003 - 51

"We had

up with
creative uses for the gear,"
notes Baumgartner, who rented his
lighting package from Illumination
Dynamics in Charlotte, North
Carolina. "A lot of the lighting [on
this show] had to be done from
outside or up high inside to avoid
having a lot of stands around. We
often used larger Fresnels [Arri
18Ks], usually with a large Chimera,
either off a Condor or a platform.
"Both Rodrigo and I have
become big fans of the Arri X Light,"
he adds. "We found that it provides
an
incredibly powerful HMI source
that can get very soft very quickly
and doesn't take up a lot of room.
The film's rectory location, for
some

to

come

very

sunlight

coming

through the
keep it off of the
person he's with. After the accident,
which sparks his downfall, I stopped
doing that."
windows but would

Outside the windows in such
scenes,
create

6K

or

12K HMI Pars would

hot spots

that Prieto would
by up to six stops to
the blooming effect. "I had

overexpose

enhance
to

be careful, because when you over¬

expose something by two stops, the
bleach-bypass process immediately
blows away the detail," he cautions.
"Sometimes I'd put up a light that
was
good and bright to my eye, but

then I'd have

to tone

make the result

it down

more

a

bit

to

realistic."

Though the cinematographer is "not
a big fan" of diffusion on the lens,
Inarritu's filming preferences often
necessitated it. "One of the things

instance, had windows on both sides.
On one side, for the sun source, we

primarily used 18Ks and 12K Pars.
For the fill light coming from the
other side,

we

traced the windows

and put a 4K Arri X behind each one.
Those units gave us a very natural

bounce-back

light

-

kind of like

what you would get using an HMI
Par and an 8-by-8 frame. We got that
same

quality without taking

up a

lot

of space."
As

the

lighting was being
designed, the picture's evolving
visual scheme also had
ered.

Prieto

offers

to

be consid¬

example:
his new heart and is
feeling better, I was going for a
sunlight effect as much as I could -
overexposing and having blown-out
sunlight coming in. For different
reasons, I did a similar thing with
an

"When Paul gets

lack." In lack's earlier

scenes, we see

"Every frame of the film is ravishingly beautiful,
thanks to Eduardo Serra's cinematography."

him

counseling a troubled young
man at a
community center and
praying with his family in church.
For these sequences and others,
Prieto used a Rosco Soft Frost gel on
the

camera to

"bloom and blow out"

windows in the frame. He

explains,
"Using that filter gave me an almost
godly religious intensity, a sense of
Jack believing in the holiness of his

Moira Macdonald. Seattle Times

"The film's look, in cinematographer Eduardo
Serra's exceptionally skilled hands, is that of
a Vermeer painting from beginning to end.

GIRL WITH A
PEARL EARRING

life's mission. On interiors, I would

Hugely evocative, the studied approach of
approximating the Vermeer look, with light
slanting in from the side, never feels stilted
or fussy, and an emotionally climactic zoom
in on Griet striking her pose for the picture,
earring finally in place, is breathtaking."
Todd

purposefully light Benicio with the
For

screening info, please call (310) 581-7350

or

McCarthy. Variety

visit www.lionsgateawards.com
American Cinematographer - December 2003

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