Be Natural: Interview with documentary filmmakers Pamela Green and Jarik van Sluijs

Filmmakers Pamela Green and Jarik van Sluijs have worked on documentaries in various roles including as co-producer of the Emmy-nominated documentary Bhutto. Their company, PIC Agency, has produced titles for movies including 42 and The Kingdom, and they have also produced content for award shows, commercials and other productions. “People come to us to add to the story when you can’t turn the camera back on,” says Green. They have specialized in creating new content by combining graphics, stock footage, new footage and editorial. These techniques should be especially useful for their first documentary, Be Natural, about the first female…  Read more

A D.P. Chooses the ARRI ALEXA

It’s been said that choosing between digital video cameras is a bit like choosing between film stocks; they provide different images that suit different uses and aesthetics. I’m not sure that the analogy is entirely accurate, but it’s certainly worth considering. For this reason, I’m always interested in hearing about d.p.’s experiences when working with a camera other than the one they usually shoot with. When Boston cinematographer Chris Loughran recently tweeted that he was going to be shooting with an ARRI ALEXA, I was curious to ask him about his experience with the camera. I first met Loughran a…  Read more

The Cinematography of A Field in England

English director Ben Wheatley’s [Kill List, Sightseers] latest project, A Field in England was shot in black and white and follows a group of deserters in the English Civil War. But this isn’t your standard historical period piece, being variously described by reviewers as a  “monochrome-psychedelic breakdown” and a “17th-century head trip.” Shot in 12 days on a micro-budget, it was also, rather unusually, released on the same day to cinemas, on DVD and Blu-ray, and it also aired on Film4 (a free digital television channel). For those interested in the movie’s production, the filmmakers have created a very informative…  Read more

Canon Announces a New DSLR, the EOS 70D. Should We Care?

This week Canon announced a new mid-level DSLR, the EOS 70D. The latest in their series of black, semi-pro DSLRs, the 70D has a 20.2 megapixel sensor, a DIGIC 5+ image processor and built-in wi-fi support. Expected to ship in September with an estimated retail price of $1,199, you’d be forgiven if you assumed this latest DSLR will have little impact on the video production field. You might be wrong. Canon remade the video industry with the 5D Mark II, but for the last two or three years their DSLR updates have offered virtually no improvement in video capability or…  Read more

Which Camera for Which Genre? Five Questions for D.P. Timur Civan

As an undergrad at NYU, Timur Civan studied sculpture before moving into video. “I became really interested in video because I was able to bring time into my sculptural work,” he says. Civan has produced a wide variety of work, from short films, music videos, and corporate videos, to commercials and documentaries. He recently DP’d Vincent Laforet’s intro for the M?VI digital 3-axis gyro-stabilized camera gimbal. He has an affinity for experimenting with unusual gear, and finding new in-camera effects. Civan spoke to us briefly at a recent presentation he gave at Rule Boston Camera: Filmmaker: How did you first get…  Read more

The Scent: Interview with D.P. Stefan Müller

What do you do when you get a new camera? Some people run out and shoot test footage, while others just gamble and use the camera on the next shoot they have lined up. When Stefan Müller, an Austrian freelance film director, d.p. and editor acquired a Canon C100, he went out and shot The Scent, a 12-minute short. One of the stars of this short is a black Labrador called Sky. Despite W.C. Fields’ admonition, “Never work with children or animals,” Müller captured a great performance from the dog, yet when asked if anything interesting or unusual happened during…  Read more

Shooting in Snow and Ice with the Canon C100: Interview with Ben Pender-Cudlip

Ben Pender-Cudlip is a Boston-based documentary filmmaker who recently switched from shooting with a DSLR to the Canon C100. His first project shot on the C100 was a short that included a segment on ice climbing. In this second part of our interview with him about switching to the C100, Pender-Cudlip talks about the project and what it was like to use the camera in these conditions. Filmmaker: How did this project come about? Pender-Cudlip: It’s a film for a woman named Lauren Schaad. She approached me about shooting a TV pilot. She was looking to get into reality TV…  Read more

Switching from a DSLR to the Canon C100: Interview with Ben Pender-Cudlip

Ben Pender-Cudlip is a Boston based filmmaker who specializes in nonfiction work. His short film Sanjiban, which chronicles the passing of filmmaker Sanjiban Sellew, premiered at Hot Docs last year. Ben recently switched from shooting on a DSLR to the Canon C100. In part one of this interview he talks about his experience switching to the C100, and in part two he talks about the first major project shot with the camera: documenting an ice-climbing expedition. Filmmaker: What were you using prior to getting the C100? Pender-Cudlip: Before the C100 I was using a Canon 60D, which is sort of…  Read more

Shooting with a RED EPIC in Indonesia: Interview with David Kruta

Cinematographer David Kruta spent a week in Indonesia this February shooting footage for the SurfAid charity to use in their promotional and educational campaigns. He took with him a RED EPIC, and says that the goal was to “bring a cinematic approach” to something that would be more often shot in a documentary style. Filmmaker: How did the project come about? Kruta: The director, Michael Lawrence, is a good friend of mine and I’ve done five or six projects with him. He said he had a shoot in Indonesia, and that he was going there to revisit the places he photographed after…  Read more

Using a Stair Climber for a Crane Shot

Sometimes a piece of everyday equipment can be used for an unusual purpose. While shooting a recent music video for the band Run 8 Rider, director Sean Meehan noticed a stair climber at the location and wondered if it couldn’t be used to create some kind of crane shot. An additional twist is that the shot would consist of three sequences shot at different times in the shooting day and be spliced together. Sean explains how the shot was made: We walked in, I saw this stair climber and my first thought was “That’d be really cool to use for…  Read more