Road to Perdition

Guy Meachin · January 11, 2005

Road to Perdition-

In the dramatic scene towards the end where Mike Sullivan (Hanks) massacres John Rooney's (Newman) henchmen - how did they get the light to look so white? Is it possible to get this with a redhead or blonde on a smaller scale - or would I need a a light with a Halogen bulb?

Slightly out of my depth here so take it easy!

Edited January 11, 2005 by Meach

David Mullen ASC · January 12, 2005

Road to Perdition-

In the dramatic scene towards the end where Mike Sullivan (Hanks) massacres John Rooney's (Newman) henchmen - how did they get the light to look so white? Is it possible to get this with a redhead or blonde on a smaller scale - or would I need a a light with a Halogen bulb?

Slightly out of my depth here so take it easy!

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Those are all tungsten lights so on tungsten film would render white -- any slight tint could be timed out if desired. That scene was mostly lit with some 20K tungsten fresnels as backlight.

Guy Meachin · January 12, 2005

Is it possible to get this effect on video? Mini DV 3CCD.

Alvin Pingol · January 12, 2005

If you properly white balance the camera then yes. It'll also be more convincing if you have sufficient lighting - Mr. Mullen mentioned multiple 20k tungstens, something you won't find in your average lighting kit! :D

Greg Gross · January 12, 2005

Multiple 20K's, sweet jesus!!!!!

Greg

Allen Achterberg · January 12, 2005

that movie is beatiful. everytime I watch it I always end up thinking. WHERE ARE THE LIGHTS COMING FROM!? Like in the scene where the 2 kids are in bed, one is reading the comic and the other is bugging about what his father does for a living. The flashlight seems to provide fill when bounced off the book, But I cant image thats it, There must be another light where that book is just giving him slight fill. I dont know, maybe someone else could tell me how he did that one. because Hall freaks me out sometimes haha

Greg Gross · January 12, 2005

Yes, Road to Perdition is a beautiful film,I mean its pretty! His trade marks

are there. Now with this film he had the advantage of modern film stocks.

Have you seen "The Day of The Locust",now here he had only 100ASA to

work with,70's film. David Mullen posted here on the forum about the film

stock used and I believe David said he used #3 diffusion filter throughout

film. There's one scene at a zoo where he has Karen Black's hair back lighted.

I mean he just photographed her beautifully. It looked to me like he tended

you use overhead lighting or lights with stands raised high. I'm guessing the

shot with Karen Black was with a 10K. I mean every actor/actress in this film

has their hair lighted. Now consider 100ASA film and then you start putting

filters in front of the lens. I personally believe Conrad Hall was a master of

light, a shadowmaker in the likes of Sven Nykvist.

Greg Gross

Greg Gross · January 12, 2005

Alvin,

Wouldn't you need a french flag on the camera?

Neutral density filters switched in? Sun glasses?

Greg Gross

David Mullen ASC · January 12, 2005

A 20K backlighting an entire street at night from about four stories up in the air would probably only get you an f/2.8 at 500 ASA -- it doesn't end up being bright that far away and lighting that much space. Yes, you'd need an eyebrow/french flag on the camera if not some lenser flags out in front of the camera to cut the glare from the backlights.

No, I never said Hall used a Diffusion #3, I said that John Alcott used a Low-Con #3 for "Barry Lyndon". Most of "Day of the Locust" was shot through nets.

Guy Meachin · January 12, 2005

At the beginning of the exterior scene as the film climaxes there's a crane shot revealing the whole street. Any ideas what lenses, stocks, filters, apetures etc Conrad used and for what reasons?

Thanks

Guy

Edited January 12, 2005 by Meach

Wendell_Greene · January 12, 2005

that movie is beatiful. everytime I watch it I always end up thinking. WHERE ARE THE LIGHTS COMING FROM!? Like in the scene where the 2 kids are in bed, one is reading the comic and the other is bugging about what his father does for a living. The flashlight seems to provide fill when bounced off the book, But I cant image thats it, There must be another light where that book is just giving him slight fill. I dont know, maybe someone else could tell me how he did that one. because Hall freaks me out sometimes haha

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I'm in awe of his work as well, so there's no way I can tell you exactly how he lit this or any other scene. But in a poor attempt of "cinematic reverse engineering", here it goes: Conrad Hall talks a great deal about adding "room tone" to a scene. He'd bounce a light [maybe a tweenie, or 1K off a white card placed somewhere in the scene [like in the ceiling] and then underexpose it, thus giving him added fill. Yet because the ambient light is underexposed and non directional and you end up "feeling" it's presence in the scene rather than "seeing" where it's coming from.

You see another example of this in the living room scene of American Beauty, when it's raining and Lester is approached by Mena Suvari. AC did a lighting special and did a breakdown of this scene and once again, Mr. Hall talked about using "room tone" .

Tom Stern who was Hall's gaffer and a DP in his own right [Mystic River] uses this method as well.

In the behind the scenes footage, Tom Hanks talks about Conrad Hall's lighting in RTP and I believe he said something to the effect that watching Hall light a set was like watching Rembrandt paint.

Allen Achterberg · January 12, 2005

nice, thanks I'll try to hunt down that issue of AC.

Kevin Zanit · January 12, 2005

A 20k is not that bright of a light. It just has a lot of spread. An 18k HMI has far more punch than a 20k, but far less spread.

A 36 light Dino will give slightly lower output, but a lot more spread than a 20k.

In situations with big backlights, I generally set that first and then light around that. I can?t exactly be like "Walk the condor 10 feet in, heat it up a bit". It just is not practical.

It?s funny how inappropriate tech-talk seems in a Conrad Hall thread.

Kevin Zanit

Greg Gross · January 13, 2005

Thank you David Mullen, I stand corrected as Conrad Hall used nets shooting

"The Day of The Locust". Does anyone know if there is a particular book that

talks about Conrad Hall's method of lighting and style? I have a few books but

each with just a small amount of information. Of course older issues of Amer-

ican Cinematographer probably have a wealth information on him.

Greg Gross

David Mullen ASC · January 13, 2005

There is a good interview with him in the book "Masters of Light" and an older interview in Maltin's book "The Art of the Cinematographer" as well the interview in the documentary "Visions of Light".

There were articles in AC magazine on various films of his too.

January 13, 2005

nice, thanks I'll try to hunt down that issue of AC.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

There's a bit on this online still:

http://www.theasc.com/magazine/aug02/perdition

Guy Meachin · January 13, 2005

In the dramatic scene towards the end where Mike Sullivan (Hanks) massacres John Rooney's (Newman) henchmen - how did they get the colours to look like they do? What sort of filters if any were used? There's like a turquoise look about it.

Cheers

Guy