KPAX

jordan kersten · January 24, 2005

Anyone have any thoughts on this one? I think it was a beautfuly shot film: Both the film stock and technique. Anyone else???

Max Jacoby · January 24, 2005

Personally I preferred John Mathieson's in 'Gladiator. 'K-Pax' was shot on E-Series', which are his favourite anamorphic lenses.

Andy O'Neil · January 25, 2005

Don't recall much about "K-Pax," but I'm excited about "Kingdom of Heaven." Though some shots in the trailer scream "Gladiator."

jordan kersten · January 25, 2005

I agree, I loved Gladiator as well...I just thought KPAX, espically in the very first seen was shot very well...very clear. Anybody happen to know the stock he used?

Felipe Perez-Burchard · January 25, 2005

The old vision 5279 500T was used on the interior sets and the exteriors were shot on 5245 EXR 50D.

-felipe.

jordan kersten · January 25, 2005

The old vision 5279 500T was used on the interior sets and the exteriors were shot on 5245 EXR 50D.

-felipe.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Thanks felipe! Did you work on the set? Or do you just have a keen set of eyes? :D

Michael Nash · January 25, 2005

I was just thinking about his lighting, having watched Hannibal again the other night for the umpteenth time. What an exquisitely lit movie; so dramatic and yet fairly naturalistic for the most part (okay, the Florence night exteriors were a bit of stretch...). But I mean the way he worked in silhouettes, soft and hard light, and two-source modeling in almost every shot without having it appear unmotivated. He had a way of managing the blocking so that almost all scenes could be backlit and have a naturally motivated edge from somewhere. Nice control of key and contrast throughout.

K-Pax looked great, but the main thing I remember from that one was the way that EVERY scene modeled faces exactly the same way; a soft key and an edge from the same side with negative fill (no edge opposite the key). At least that's the way I remember it. It's a good look, but it starts to look contrived when every scene is done that way. That's one of the things I really liked about Hannibal, that he mixed up the modeling and motivation of sources in different scenes and they all looked consistent. Examining this is where I discovered that the consistent thread is that every face almost always gets light from two directions; just different directions and qualities depending on the scene and location.

I must have watched that movie five times before I noticed that Julianne Moore has a dedicated soft frontlight in every scene. It's so subtly controlled and unobtrusive that it doesn't betray the contrast and moodiness of the lighting otherwise.

I was actually on my way to imdb to check out other movies he's done when I ran across this thread (other than the Ridley Scott films). He's got a way of making the light in every shot look beautiful, but very consistent from angle to angle. I think this is a real asset and skill that keeps the viewer in the world of the film. Compare that to someone like John Schwartzman, who lights just as beautifully and dramatically, but takes so much liberty with continuity from angle to angle it starts to look like a commercial. For example, if a scene starts off backlit with hardlight, when Mathieson cuts to the reverse angle he'll keep that same hard light as front light but cut it up with shadows to maintain a consistent contrast (rather than cheat the direction of the key light). Kind of like what Caleb Descannel did in The Natural.