John Allardice

It's a little unfair that Chrisopher Probst only gets a brief mention for Mindhunter, as he set the look of the whole series, with the Fincher-directed episodes 1 & 2

...or teleconverter, whichever's your favorite moniker. Anyone ever come across one of these?..preferably a 2X..Or know where I could get my grubby mitts on one? Cheers

Some great classical anamorphic work there Stephen...couple of quick questions if you don't mind. What was the schedule, overall & in the trench set? Was the project heavily boarded or previs-ed beforehand, or dd you have a fair amount of input compositionally?..and as a supplement to that, I suppose, how much did you end up using of b-camera stuff, or was that mainly as coverage during heavy SFX shots? Gorgeous stuff John Allardice

Thanks for these Stephen, the Biddle and Cronenweth ones in particular will be helping with a project I'm on at the moment. Given your style choices...How about John Schwartzman or the other Darius..... Khondji? Also, as untimely as it is, what about a look back at Harris Savides? Although no doubt AC will cover him soon anyway. Cheers John

Bay is also, in part responsible for the re-embrace of anamorphic...His refusal to shoot super-35 on CG laden shows started to erode the fallacy touted by a lot of FX Houses that anamorphic is just way too difficult to use on big FX pictures. I think, in some part, it's also a rise in a generation of directors brought up on late-60's - early 80's movies Or maybe that's just me.

I think anyone who doubts that CG photography and cinematography have a huge amount in common should watch this http://vimeo.com/7809605 The skillsets required to frame, light and move the shots require exactly the same decision making skills as any DP will use on set...If anything what's different is the GAFFERS job, but then only because he has the equivalent of every lamp ever invented on the truck ( and a few that haven't). Another thing to remember is that, with live action cinematography, you get a lot of things for free...Try bashing a 12k through a big silk ( or bouncing it off the ceiling) in Maya or XSI. Well, that's a little inaccurate, global illumination is getting there, albeit slowly....But in general, the lighting requirements in CG are even more exacting than they are on set. The creative process involves exactly the same set of decisions, they're just accomplished with slightly different tools....You're still basically putting a 4K here, a Kino there. Gelling it, flagging it, picking a lens length, deciding whether to go sticks, or dolly, or crane. You can't really say that because the technology is different its not cinematography, that's like the old days of "Ahh, well you see, its video, so they can't really be cinematographers."

Absolutely love the work....Some of the more commercial stuff on your site also puts me in mind of Claudio Miranda's spot & music vid work. J

true, it wasn't...about 4 minutes of the 166 minute run time was shot on film...Those four minutes really made the difference to you , yes?

A particularly embarrassing example of not counting to ten before posting....my apologies to all and sundry, particularly Richard, who didn't deserve such an ad hominem attack.

Not necessarily more entitled, but certainly entitled...There was no Monday morning quarterbacking going on here. He's demonstrated he has an eye, and imagination.... The guys responsible for the celluloid hemorrhage in question have neither, as has been amply demonstrated by their previous works. Anyone can criticize any work they see fit...but the criticism becomes more valid if it is delivered by a person of talent in that particular arena. Or are we getting into that touchy-feely, everyone's-opinion-is-worth-equal-weight, no-matter-how-ignorant-uninformed-or-just-plain-dumb-they-are, garbage?

and your problem with that is? These guys have been churning out the same unfunny poop for the past few years, the fact that their movies continue to make money is not any reflection on their quality...it is unfortunately, a reflection on the continued demise of taste and intelligence in a depressingly large segment of the theatergoing population. I think Ruari's quite entitled to call out a project like this as a festering pile of cinematic manure. He's earned it...You have seen his stuff, right?

Do yourself a favor, wait another 2 months, the Final Cut is being released on Blu-Ray, HD-DVD & DVD on 12/18. The current DVD release was encoded back in '97 and isn't even anamorphic. Not the best way to enjoy the movie.

Love the barrel distortion on the shot of the hearing. What lens was that? As far as the dvd release goes, it was just a pity that they settled for DVD-5 rather than DVD-9. Whilst it looks good on anything up to about a 42" , the compression begins to break it up when projected...do you know if there's any plans for a HD-DVD or Blu-Ray release?

and the award for 'most apt typo of the year' goes to......

I'm glad you qualified that this time. I got no trouble with people expressing their opinions on anything, but when the argument gets laden with absolutes, it bugs the ever-lovin poop outta me. ( There, that's my opinion) I know Bay's not popular, and as you are a self-professed 'Lefty Brit" I don't think there's ever gonna be anything he does that you'll like. I happen to like a bit of Blue-Sky, Flag-Waving, modern americana....and I dont think there's anyone out there that can nail that sort of stuff in a single composition better than Bay. I know this is gonna provoke groans all round but I see his stuff as 21st century Norman Rockwell painting. The man knows an iconic shot when he sees it. oh and BTW, Pearl Harbor made $449 million worldwide...I'd LOVE a flop like that.