American Cinematographer - October 2005 - 94

The textures and

were

compositions of
early 20th

and

(near right,

we

Ganaskidi, and
below, The
were a key
inspiration for
Dear Wendy's

When

scouting a mine
Germany, Dod

with the

struck by a small
talisman (far

diffusion filters, the picture went quite
far away from anything I'd ever seen on

right) he

HD. The lenses' natural

discovered at
the entrance. "I

portraits of
figures," he
recalls. "These

things always
me deeply

affect
on

research, and
I often

try to

inject them into
the film

somehow."

watched the first test, I

why Anthony wanted to go
old lenses. Especially in combi¬

nation with Tiffen Soft/FX1 and Soft/FX2

was

masks and small

we

understood

in

slightly

-

than the Ultra Primes.

visuals. While

reminiscent of
some Curtis

had to shoot close to wide open

especially the 32mm! Anthony liked
them because they were much smaller

Vanishing Race)

found it

mainly for student films. At

Speeds. They weren't perfectly sharp,
they also vignetted like hell because

century stills

Mantle

used

first, I was a bit skeptical of the Standard

Edward S. Curtis'

vignetting

gave

the

suggested he might use some video
goggles. We ordered a pair, and I
constructed a cap that enabled them to
be hung under the shade. It was a very
odd-looking device, and they didn't work
very well because the angle of view was
way too narrow. So Anthony usually
alternated between using the monitor
and the viewfinder.
The next

thing was to construct a
rig from which to hang the whole T-cam
system. I made a boom on a pole
attached to an operator's vest and
balanced with a bungee cord in low-fric¬
tion bearings, so it was possible to walk
with the whole package without trans¬
ferring all of the up-and-down body
movements to the camera. Of course, as

ments was

difficult, but he's not afraid to

try something new, and he got better and
better during the production. It's not easy
to frame without any friction at all, but
it's not possible to build friction into a

piece of string.
Ciupek: Anthony had a very
clear vision of what Wendy should look
like, and he often showed
and-white

me

old black-

also

like.
We tested three different lens

Zentropa's good old Zeiss Standard
Speed primes, which for quite a while

we

used, and it

Dod Mantle: In addition to my
about the brutality of the digi¬

tal format

quality - very far removed from
anything I imagined hi-def could look

which lens

greatly reduced flare problems.

Indian). They were beautifully soft, largeformat compositions that had a painterly

with

using it. At
Anthony felt that isolating the
camera movement from his body move¬

the constant level of diffusion

concerns

first

systems, it took some time

was

no matter

pictures of Indians taken by

to learn the small tricks of

new

this

Edward S. Curtis (The North American

setups: the brilliant, ultra-sharp Zeiss
DigiPrimes; a Pro35 adapter with a set of
Zeiss Ultra Primes; and a Pro35 adapter

with all

pictures a touch more depth that was
quite different from what we could have
accomplished through grading only. We
decided to go behind the lens with the
Soft/FX filters. Throwing the NDs out of
the filter wheel, we put in Soft/FX Vi, 1
and 2 instead. The greatest benefit of

-

which would be

exacer¬

bated

by high-noon sunshine burning
down on baking asphalt in semi-uncon¬
trollable lighting situations - I had to
be prepared to physically follow the
actors for 10 hours a day non-stop in a
style I'd committed to: namely, a meet¬
ing of the embedded war camera and
the gentle, centered peace of Curtis' still
photography. This was clearly also going
to give me problems, if not a bad back.
Steadicam was not an option, partly
because Thomas wanted

So

we

me

to

operate.

had to break down the size of the

well as the signal. My aim
becoming clearer, and Wendy's
visuals were heading toward a more
painterly quality, but debate on these
matters would continue through editing
camera, as

was

and well into post.
Thomas and I

hoped to shoot
Academy 1.33:1 for the high headroom
and anti-Western look, but a week

before shooting we were ordered by
producer Peter Aalbaeck Jensen to go to
1.66:1. That still allowed for headroom,

which is very

much

an

echo of Curtis'

stills, and Thomas and I both liked it for
90 October 2005
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