1965 (2015)
by Derrick Loo
The 60s was a tumultuous time for Singapore, as it struggled to grasp the social and political paradigm shifts following the withdrawal of the British from the region. A seething undercurrent of racial tension perpetuated the lives of people in Singapore, which eventually culminated in a series of racial riots in 1964 and 1969, claiming numerous lives and many more casualties. Much have been written about this period in Singapore's history; most of which focused on the socioeconomic factors or the political motivations that had played a part in these events. The film '1965' could have gone down this same route, but instead, chose a different, perhaps more personal, perspective to examine this period.
To capture the period look they had in mind, filmmakers Randy Ang (re:solve (2014)) and Daniel Yun (who is also the co-director and executive producer for '1965') decided to enlist the help of Amandi Wong to craft the visuals. And for this project, Amandi picked to shoot on RED DRAGON, paired it with a set of Leica Summilux-C primes lenses, as well as a Cooke zoom for a specific reenactment scene. Footage was recorded in its native R3D and transcoded by DIT Leslie Tan into 1080p ProRes 422 for editorial. Principal photography lasted 33 days, from November 2014 to January 2015.
Below is a interview with Amandi on his work in '1965':
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Derrick Loo (DL): Who first approached you for this film, 1965? And what was your initial thoughts of the idea and the script?
Amandi Wong (AW) : Director Randy Ang was the first to approached me for the project.
Despite
the film being set during a sensitive political period in the history
of Singapore, the focus is more on the relationships between people who
were inadvertently affected by the unrest. Narratively, it is interesting to me.
DL: How long was the prep?
AW: A total of 23 days. 10 of which were in Batam (Indonesia) for location scouting, set discussions and blocking rehearsals on set.
DL: What was the scope of coverage you guys did during prep?
AW: Location
scouting. Shot list discussion. Working with the art team on some
specific camera and lighting set-ups as well as doing blocking with cast
on the actual set.
DL: What camera did you choose to use and why?
AW: RED
Dragon was chosen mainly because of its weight. We also needed a second
camera to serve as a back-up as well as a quick change to Ronin Gimbal.
The other reason being we couldn’t afford having two units of ARRI Alexa
daily although we did a test with it and it won us over with the look it
captures (the skin tones especially) and the way it handles low light.
DL: What lenses (primes/zooms) did you use for the show and why?
AW: Having
decided on RED Dragon (primarily on hand-held mode), I knew immediately
that I needed to go for a better set of lightweight lenses which can
give me that softer edge and faster T-stops. Based on the available
resources we had, I managed to secure a set of Leica Summilux-C primes. We didn’t
use much of a zoom. The only time when it was required was to mimic the
original footage of the late Mr Lee Kuan Yew speaking to the press in a TV studio. And if I remembered correctly, it was an old Cooke 28-200.
DL: Were there any technical tests that you did in prep and what did you hope to find out with these tests?
AW: It
was mainly a visual comparison between Dragon & Alexa. We all know
Alexa is the better camera in terms of handling skin tones, lowlights
and highlights. Thus, the test was to find out the limitations of the
Dragon before the shoot and to figure out various ways to work around
them.
DL: How closely did you work with the other departments like Art/Wardrobe/Makeup etc?
AW: I didn’t
manage to do any hair, make-up or wardrobe tests actually. I was not
totally involved since Randy knew quite well how they would look on
camera. With regards to the art department, I worked very closely with the production designer,
Tommy Chan and his team. We would discuss about the camera angles and
set-ups before they designed and built the sets accordingly. His team
really did an amazing job in facilitating our filming.
DL: Were there any creative challenges that were memorable? (ie. director wants a certain look or certain shot)
AW: Randy
wanted a transition between shots (tilting down from the sky
to reveal a bustling Chinatown and to end specifically on a spinning
wheel in a bicycle shop). To create a more interesting visual, we did a
Steadicam step off from the Giraffe crane following the crowd and ending
it with a close-up shot of the wheel. Weather was really unpredictable
that day and it was constantly drizzling on and off. We were all in a
mad rush trying to work fast. The assistant directors, Sufyan Sam’an (1st) and Julia Lim
(2nd) did an amazing job choreographing and coordinating 80 - 100
extras. The Steadicam operator that day was the talented James Hia. Our
key grip, Malik Basar designed the step off platform.
Another
challenge was the lack of streets to shoot in. We constantly had to
cheat creatively to make it look like a different stretch especially
during the riot scenes.
DL: Who were the department heads in your grip/ lighting department?
AW: The key grip was Malik Basar. We have been
working together for many projects. The gaffer was Wan Arif from
Indonesia. It was my first time collaborating with him and his team from
Jakarta.
DL: Describe your working relationship with the grip/lighting department
AW: I trust Malik and his creative input a lot because of our frequent collaboration on many of my projects. With
Wan, my initial worry was with the language barrier and the fact that
we only managed to get him on board 10 days before the shoot. Everything
turned out to be fine even though we didn’t exactly communicate verbally
much. One thing I like about him - he always listened and hardly
jumped to conclusion even though he is a very experienced gaffer. He was
full of patience, creative and keen to adapt to different styles of
lighting.
DL: Was transcoding needed for offline editorial?
AW: Yes.
Our DIT, Leslie Tan provided the 1080 ProRes 422 for offline editing.
We also had Leslie do the on-set LUT using Resolve and baking them into
the offline dailies. There were however no on-set editorial happening during principal photography.
DL: Who were in your camera department? And how do you think they performed?
Due
to some scheduling issues, my main camera team came in much later. My
camera team for the first 12 days consisted of Aizat Hisham (1st AC),
Daryl Nah (2nd AC) and Endra Jamil (Cam grip). The main team thereafter
included Dean Sam (1st AC), Feng Kexin (2nd AC) and Dickson Chua (Cam
grip). Leslie Tan (DIT) was with us throughout the project. Basically, we can fight a war together.
DL: Was there a particular creative direction you try to keep to, pertaining to the cinematography of the film?
AW: Both
Randy and I wanted a hand-held feel and perspective almost throughout
the film. The camera movement became more stable only after the
narrative settled down towards the end of the film. For most of the riot
shots, Randy wanted them in the form of a POV of either the rioters or
the police. It was as if cameras were thrown into the chaotic
surrounding and ignored by the crowd while taking in the physical energy
of the mess and madness everywhere.
My main approach to lighting is seeing it as a way of creating shadows so that the audience will be able to see
clearer with their imagination. And for indoor scenes, the light should feel like it leaked in through cracks.
Another direction was how I
wanted the exterior night scenes to be lit. I am a great fan of Bela
Tarr’s B&W films and Roger Deakins’ Prisoners. I knew that I wanted
to light it like a B&W film. Hence, the contrast instead of the
typical blueish moonlight. My key light motivation is always from
surrounding practicals.
DL: Did you prefer a certain range of T-stops?
AW: If
possible, I would always prefer T2.8 & 4 and 5.6 & 8 for wider
shots requiring a deeper focus. For big-screen presentation, I feel it
is really not necessary to shoot wide open for a so-called ‘shallow depth of field (DOF)
cinematic 5D (full frame) look’(which is more for TV in my opinion). Filming is all
about collaboration between various disciplines. As a team, we should
also think about the actors. What is the point of a very nice shallow
DOF bokeh when the focus on the actors is soft? I believe in the actor’s
performance and to achieve that, he/she should have one less technical
thing to worry about. There were situations when I had to opt for wide
open though because of low light conditions.
DL: Did you use any filtration on lens?
AW: Only Polariser and Black Pro-Mist.
DL: Where were the locations that the film is primarily shot at?
AW: All locations were in Batam, Indonesia except for the modern day setting which is shot in Singapore.
DL: What is the difference in shooting on stage vs location? And which do you personally prefer?
AW: The
main difference is the amount of control we have and how much we
can manipulate the look that we want. On stage set we built, almost everything
was cater for the camera setups so we can move faster and complete more
setups, not having to be disrupted by factors such the weather, time
of the day and environmental sound etc. That said, when sounding on stage, we had to recreate
all those natural elements such as the ambient lights & sound quality. So it
is equally challenging.
Personally I prefer real locations if we
can have more control. As I always feel that no matter how closely you can
recreate the set, it somehow feels different in terms of the light,
air quality and the surrounding energies. This, I think, is an important consideration,
especially for the actors whose performance is affected by the environment they are put in. Another reason for this preference is that somehow in this part of the world, we
are used to shooting mostly on location, mainly due to budget constraints. So when given the freedom that shooting on stage allowed for, most of us will somehow feel a little lost.
I
remember many years ago when I attended the Budapest Cinematography
Masterclass with participants from all over the world and we were tasked to light and set up a shot in a well equipped and spacious studio. My team mates were from Hong Kong. At the end of the shoot, we realized how different we Asians approached the lighting vs those from the Wests. They
were fully utilizing the stage- from one end to the other. In contrast, our setup was mostly
cramped into a corner!
DL: What are some of the challenges you faces while shooting in Batam?
AW: We have one main location that required a total of 4 hours traveling to and back. So waking up at 4am and trying to sleep on a bumpy ride was a challenge. Also that particular location are not very ‘clean’….
Since
in Batam there are no filming rental facilities there. We had to
plan everything in detail during preproduction so that the right equipment can be packed and shipped in a single trip. The production team also had problems
finding proper generators, scaffolds, cherry picker and trucks for
equipment. And because of that we had to push back the shoot dates
slightly.
DL: Let's talk about lights and lighting...
AW: My
main lighting package consists of a 18K HMI, 3 x 6K Par, 2 x 4K
Par and a couple of smaller daylight lamps. For tungsten we have 2 x 5K,
some 2K, 2 x 2K 30” Jem ball and many units of smaller lamps. Kino Flos
are the usual 4 feet and 2 feet 4 and 2 banks.
The final list
was decided after my final location tech scout with Wan and his team.
I always prefer to light from outside of the set as much as possible mainly
for two reasons. First, the quality of light feels more natural,
secondly I can free up more space for the actors to move around
without restricting their performance. I am a big-believer of giving as
much freedom to the director and actors as possible. In narrative films, between good performance and fancy set ups, I'd choose the former. That also explains why my
lamp heads are often of a bigger intensity for the further throw
factor, since I have to put it further away from the set.
DL: There were a good mixture of handheld/ Steadicam shots, as well as on sticks and dolly. Were there a general
rule as to which you sort of operation you choose?
AW: We have a rule
that the camera should be hand held as much as possible before the scene of Mr Lee Kuan Yew making his
TV broadcast in the studio. The exception to this is when the camera is on a crane. I always prefer the camera to be more
stable when its meant to be a dolly or crane moves.
The only Steadicam shot was that Giraffe crane step off shot that I had mentioned
earlier. The rest of the sequences the looked similar to Steadicam moves were either achieved
by using a mixed of dolly, Ronin gimbal, electrical golf cart and a
passenger van.
DL: As a period film, what's your lighting philosophy?
AW: Right
from the beginning, we knew we did not want it to be too stylized and
pretty. Our lighting approach was to re-create and enhance the look
naturally. ‘Poetic Realism’- quoting Vilmos Zsigmond.
DL: Was there any particular actor/actress that required specific lighting?
AW: Yes
and no. Those specific lighting were mostly tweaks after the final
blocking. I would craft the light or shadow further as an additional
layer to their performances. We didn’t want to go for an overly
glamorous sort of lighting for them. The idea was to feel and look as
natural and real as possible.
DL: How was the fire scenes (in the warehouse) shot?
AW: We
had a really talented SFX director, Adam Howarth to design and build
those sequences. The indoor set was built with an open roof for smoke
and heat to escape safely. The whole sequence was shot at night for day
to match the exterior shots of the burning warehouse.
DL: Describe your working relationship with the directors.
AW: There
are two directors on set. Daniel Yun, being the co director as well as
the EP, oversaw the performances while Randy focused more on the
overall direction. I work mostly with Randy and it was my first
collaboration with him. We had known each other for a while but just didn’t
have a chance to work together till the project. We had numerous
meetings talking about shots and setups, as well as going through some of
his references. Usually after reading through the script a few times, I
will listen to hear the director's interpretation and the initial
direction of what he/she hopes to achieve. After which I will do my own research and proposed what I think it will be good for the
film, keeping the director's vision in mind. After the tone and camera vocabulary are set, we will go deeper into
each shot and scene to work on the details. Randy is more of a visual
director and he is very particular about the texture and detail of
everything. When we are on set after the rehearsal blocking, he will tell me how he feels the scene should be but also gives me the
freedom to suggest the coverage, shooting sequences and framing etc.
The only challenge was sometimes we will have to pause for a while the directors conferred on creative details.
DL: And what about the art department...?
AW: We
are very fortunate to have such a strong art team on '1965'. The Production
designer, Tommy Chan, and Art director, Keng Boon, are such a talented duo
that they can never fail to impress us. As there were many sets in '1965'
and with a tight deadline, we had to meet regularly and update each
other on our progress and changes. Other than the overall look and feel of
each set, we also discuss in detail about the types of practical light, removal
walls, specific set dressing as well as some special props.
DL: Regarding the reenactment of the historical scene where Mr Lee Kuan Yew announces
our separation from Malaysia, what was the creative approach adopted by the
filmmakers?
AW: The key direction was to be as real as possible. As
the original footage were in B&W, the art team did extensive research to find the exact color of all the
props, including the walls at that time. They even built the studio
camera from scratch, which is able to be wheeled around and appeared in the foreground!
There were camera moves, including the zooming and focusing, that I had to mimic to stay true to the original recording.
*All stills are courtesy of Stardust Pictures Pte Ltd and Amandi Wong.
Bring Back The Dead 《招魂》 (2015)
By Derrick Loo
Asian horror films have always been a staple for local movie goers who relish surrendering themselves to eerie moods and hair raising soundtracks which so frequently come coupled with the ever effective jump scares. Not that 'Bring Back The Dead' 《招魂》 lacks any of these, in fact the film has its fair share of well crafted moods and jump scares to satisfy any horror fans, the strength of the film is that it seeks to deliver a lot more than just a plain horror piece. The emotional crux that anchors the film brings to it a layer of poignancy and human drama - a quality that will continue to grip the audience even when we all know the ordeal is over.
Helmed by veteran director, Lee Thean-Jeen (TJ), this film is the culmination of 7 years of efforts, and is based on a short story, Bringing Back the Dead, by Wong Swee Hoon. The film is about a loving couple who lost their son, Xiao Le (Shawn Tan), in an unexpected accident. Unable to bear the loss, the distraught mother, Jia En (Jesseca Liu), employs the help of her nanny (Liu Ling Ling) to seek a medium to bring back the boy's spirit - all behind her husband's (Jacko Chiang) back. After a successful attempt to reclaim the spirit, Jia En is tasked to strictly follow a set of instructions from the medium. Unintentional lapses on her part, however, prove disastrous and incur the wrath of the spirit which is bent on harming Jia En and the people (and animal) around her. This drives Jia En to investigate if the spirit that was reclaimed is indeed her son's and that very endeavor unexpectedly reveals a harrowing truth.
To help him with the visuals, TJ recruited Joel San Juan, who had worked extensively with the director on various projects ranging from TV dramas to the former's earlier feature films. The actual prep of the film begins 6 weeks before principal photography which started in June 2014 but even before that, Joel and TJ had begun their work together since Joel received the script back in February. The film was shot over a span of 19 days, using ARRI Alexa Plus with Cooke S4 T2 lenses (18mm, 32mm, 75mm, 100mm), recording ProRes 4:4:4:4 directly into SxS cards.
Joel has graciously agreed to do an email interview with Cinemacraft.sg and share his experience and approach in the making of this film.
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Derrick Loo (DL): Who
was the first person to approach you with the project? And what were your reactions/ personal thoughts when it's revealed that it's going
to be a horror film?
Joel San Juan (JSJ): TJ
(Lee Thean-jeen) mentioned this project quite a number of times to me
in the past few years that we have been working together. If you have
read the press kit, he mentioned that the project has been more or
less 7 years in the making and was inspired from a short story that
he had read then. What hooked me to the script was mainly the
approach TJ wanted to take with it. From the very beginning of the
it, he wanted to work the script more from a perspective of a family
drama that has supernatural elements rather than a horror film. I
think those who watch the movie will agree that it lingers more on
the emotional journey of our protagonist Jia En rather than an all
out horror scare fest.
DL: This
is the third time you are working with TJ on feature films and
there's apparently a strong synergy between the both of you. Care to
comment how those past collaborations helped in this aspect?
JSJ: This
is officially our second feature film together that he wrote. The one
other was more of an existing script that he was hired to direct.
That aside, our working relationship has had a longer span than that.
We first met working on a French television series in 2008 and have
since done a good body of work together including local episodic
television series such as 'The Pupil'. We joke about it constantly but
it's scary how much we think alike! I think there is a certain synergy
working with TJ because he trusts the people around him alot and he
lets them excel in what they do. And one most important element is
our working mantra: always try out something new on every project that we
do.
In the
7 years that I've known him, I don't think I have ever seen him shout and scream at any
actor or crew just to get something done. His approach is very unassuming
and subtle and many will just end up with sheer admiration of how he
runs a set quietly and with extreme efficiently (we shot this movie
in 19 days!). We do plan quite a number of specific shots together
but we also keep a lot of things open (needless to say, we are not any assistant director’s best friends). It is always weird to me that the media always
states TJ as a comedy director because to me, he has directed more
narrative dramas than comedies.
DL: Share
with us how you were involved in the pre-production planning stage.
JSJ: Every
job I have worked on with TJ has been an education journey in itself. The
people that make the main difference in my opinion are your
production design and art department gang. They are the ones who make
your movie look credible. Kenneth Kee, the film's Art Director, and I talked so much in
detail about the look and feel of the story and most importantly, the
color palette. He was very respectful of TJ and my ideas but at the
same time also added on things that we never thought about that benefited the movie on a deeper level. We also worked with the make-up and wardrobe team to make sure they got the palette close to where
we wanted it due to the desaturation that we’ll be doing in post
color grade later on. So we took photos of what they proposed and did
some desaturation in Adobe Photoshop at different levels to ensure that the
colors were right.
DL: How
did you arrive at the choice of using the Alexa Plus coupled with
Cookes lenses?
JSJ: We
used an ARRI Alexa Plus 4:3 cropped for 2.35:1 with Cooke S4 spherical
lenses. I went into this project knowing that we will definitely be
using an ARRI Alexa as the color science of it is unmatched by any
other camera in its league. I care more about the color nuances and
separation rather then resolution. (plus cropping for 2.35:1 in the
full 4:3 sensor gives you a little more resolution than in 16:9 mode) Having shot in Europe and in Asia, I’ve come
to quickly realize how much more difficult it is to get the Asian
skin tone right and especially more with the harsh tropical light
conditions in Singapore. After a round of tests, the Cooke S4 and
Alexa combination brought out what I wanted in Jesseca’s look for
the movie.
DL: I
understand you shot most, if not all, of the film with white balance
set to 3200K. Why is that?
JSJ: I
attended a workshop by Paul Cameron, ASC during the Camerimage
festival in Poland a couple of years back where I had a short film
that I shot in the competition. He was teaching the Alexa workshop
and he talked about how he noticed that the Alexa picked up more skin
detail when it was white balance 3200K. He did a few demonstrations to
further reiterate his point and I was sold. I talked to him more in
depth after the class and he shared more about how to achieve a great
skin tone at 3200K even in full daylight. I myself have since tried
that technique on other digital cinema cameras but the Alexa still
shows better results in that aspect. In 'Bring Back The Dead', Jesseca is in almost
more than 80% of the film and we spend a lot of time seeing
her up close. So skin tone and details were of utmost priority in
this film.
DL: Was
there any optical filters that you used during principal photography?
JSJ: I
got Bert Tan (Bert Lighting House), who was one of our producers as
well as our production equipment rental house, to get a set of Tiffen’s
new Black Satin filters and a T1 filter as well. I have seen tests
for the Black Satins and they definitely played a huge difference in
getting the skin texture right for this movie. They are so different
from the Pro Mist and Soft Contrast filters in giving a soft glow in
the highlights while giving a warmer grainier feel. I took into
consideration that most of the scenes will be in low key lighting
with hard contrast so I ordered the Black Satins to help soften out
the skin tones in the highlights and give a creamy silkier look.
After the first test shot, TJ was sold on the Black Satins already.
As
for the T1, it was the very much-needed filter to assist the Alexa in
getting more subtle hues in the reds while blocking out Far Red
contamination (especially on dark materials). While the Alexa already
has its own IR (infrared) cut filter, it still does not sufficiently cut out the Far Red. Having an additional IR filter will more
or less defeat the purpose. So the T1 was the best choice for the
movie.
DL: Who
were the crew and key collaborators that worked with you on the film?
JSJ: My
key technical crew included gaffer
Ben Ong and key grip Abdul Malik. I always hire my own key technical
crew and let them hire their own team. I don’t get involved in the
process of who they select because I trust my key to make their own
decisions.
It was my first time working with Ben and from the very get-go, there was
already a very good energy to our working relationship. He and his
team (especially his best boy Eric Tan) were so well organized that it
put me at complete ease on set and that helped me concentrate so
much better on the frame. I appreciate a very silent and efficient
crew and his is definitely top notch in that aspect. Many of the
production crew commented that they almost never see us talking but
yet equipment moves on set as if a silent hand was constantly at work
controlling the traffic.
Abdul
Malik and I have done lots of work together since the time I was a
camera grip many years back. He enjoys my wacky ideas for camera
movement and I enjoy the fact that he can get any idea of mine done
without much hassle. If you watch the movie, there were a good
handful of shots that were subtle but extremely difficult to achieve.
He made it all happen and again when you have crew you can trust, you
can give so much more to the story and the frame.
Another key collaborator is, of course, the art director Kenneth Kee. When
you have a wonderful art director who sees your vision and share the same
enthusiasm for your project, a good 80% of the look is already
settled. Kenneth and his amazing team were attentive to the details
and that made the shots worked. We had a lot of tricky angles with
the unusual layout of the house and it was only with their help that
I managed to sneak in difficult camera and lighting angles with much
ease.
DL: On-set grading has over the years gain popularity. Did you have such a
workflow?
JSJ: I
still go old school in the sense and I know somewhere down the road,
I would have to change that mindset. From the first day I learn
about exposure during the film days it was always with a light and
spot meter. I trust what I see on set with my eyes and I refer to my
contrast glass whenever I am in doubt about the contrast ratio.
Working with the ARRI Alexa also gives you that added ease because
you know what you see through the viewfinder is what you are going to
get. I haven’t got around to using a waveform or a monitor to judge
exposure yet. We (TJ and I) collectively decided that we will be
recording ProRes 4:4:4:4 directly to the SxS cards. This was for the
ease of workflow and also we were going to do a very
character driven narrative with very minimal special effects. On set, we just
viewed everything on REC709.
The
beautiful color depth that the Alexa gave us was ample for what we
needed. We had a few bad experiences in the past dealing with the RAW
format workflow with the available local post-production facilities
and I guess although things might have improved recently, it's more of a
"once-bitten-twice-shy" syndrome. After off-loading the ProRes 4:4:4:4, the footage was transcoded to
ProRes 4:2:2 (Proxy) at Infinite Frameworks for the ease of the offline and we
later relinked the ProRes 4:4:4:4 files for the colorgrade at Finish
Postproduction in Boston.
DL: In the film, the house is perpetually bathed in nuanced shadows. And
even with the other high-key scenes, there's always this sense of
dread pervading the entire picture. Share with us your methods and
your choice of color palette.
JSJ: TJ
wanted the entire movie to have a slight desaturated look and
somewhat high contrast at the same time. We discussed a variety of
color palettes and eventually settled on one with earthy tones and a
separate one for the theme of Red (we were inspired from M.Night
Shyamalan’s use of color and fog from breaths to depict the presence
of a supernatural entity). A lot of the credit also goes to the
production design, make up and wardrobe team. They understood the
importance of getting the tones just right to achieve the sense of
dread. There’s only so much lighting and camera work you can do. I
think the local film industry heavily under utilizes the capabilities
of the production design, make up and wardrobe teams to help tell the
story. We forget that they are artists as well. I can honestly tell
you that we did very little with the lighting compared with most
other movies out there. Ben and I would just decide the direction of
the key light and maintain a 3:1 contrast ratio throughout the entire
film except for the day exterior where we will go 2:1. The rest is
the work of the art, make up and wardrobe department. Generally I
just feel we lack the proper appreciation for their importance in the
local film industry.
DL: What
was your lighting package like?
JSJ: For
budgetary reasons, I had to split my lighting package to 3 parts. The
house, day exteriors (cemetery) and night exteriors (cemetery). The
house package consisted of a 4K HMI Par, three 2.5K HMI Fresnels, six
2K Tungsten Fresnels, two 1K Tungsten Lanterns and about five 650w
Tungstens. We had 20x20 and 12x12 Ultra Bounce and a 20x20 Silk. We
had a 6K HMI Par for the day exteriors with reflectors, bounce and
silks. The night exterior we had two Maxi Brutes and two 5K Tungsten
Fresnels.
All
camera, lighting and grip equipment was from Bert Lighting House. The Cooke lenses were from Asia Film Equipment Sdn Bhd.
DL: Was
there any special lighting set up that was memorable for you? And why
so?
JSJ: The
day interior scene where Mdm Seetoh finds Jia En at the corner of the
piano room after the funeral of Xiao Le. TJ and I are big fans of
Bernardo Bertolucci and we have been talking about doing a Bertolucci
tribute shot in one of our movies together. So we finally found the
chance to do it in this scene. Jia En is completely trapped in the
darkness of the room and she is cornered by her own depression,
refusing to come out into the light. We referred to the famous
‘Plato’s Cave’ office scene in 'Il Conformista' (Bertolucci,
Mars Film 1970)
where the intensity of the scene is further emphasized by a hot shaft
of daylight, directing the audience around the mindset of the
characters. So we set a 4k Par with a spot glass a distance away to
create a very long sharp throw. Art department came in to help
reinforce the translucent curtains with a black backing to cut all
light coming in. We hazed up the entire room and set little slot in
the curtains to emphasize some furniture edges and a white porcelain
mug on the floor to make the room feel much darker than it is (small
white dot on a black background theory - simultaneous contrast). In the end, the shot worked
because it fulfilled the Plato’s Cave ideology and it also
emphasized the character’s suffering in terms of the light
direction and the frame.
DL: Could you share with us how you shot your favorite scenes?
JSJ: I
feel that the ‘one shot’ breakfast scene where Jia En discovers
the wall full of crayon drawings after her husband De Wei points it
out to her easily stands out as one of my favorite scenes. For the
shot, we initially wanted to try out doing it without any cuts.
However, flying in the art department to quickly repaint the wall in
the middle of the take proved too difficult for the lighting (moving
shadows) and especially for the sound department. So we decided to do
a cut in between since using a body wipe toward the end of the shot will
be a predictable and obviously giveaway. I can’t tell you where we
did the cut anyway! Also, since it was a handheld ‘one shot’ that
went around the dining room with HMIs throwing in from the windows,
avoiding shadows was also one of the really big challenges. I think
that’s where my experience from years as a Steadicam operator came
in really handy in terms of knowing where to set a lighting angle for
a complete 360 degree movement and knowing how to avoid shadows.
DL: Was
there any particularly challenging scenes?
JSJ: The
stunt scenes were the most challenging especially the one that
require the maid, Anna, to fall down a flight of stairs in the house.
We had a very tight and dark area to work in and we had wires
everywhere. It was also suppose to be the end part of a 360 degree camera
'roundy-round'. So trying to get the timing right to make everything
work took much longer than expected, not to mention the danger
elements for the actor and stunt coordinator involved. The short
evening turned into a very very long night.
DL: Share with us how you worked with TJ on set.
JSJ: We
would start by giving the heads of departments a run down of the
scene and ideally how many shots we were going to do per set up. A
makeshift shot list is only invented as we go. Unless there’s a
specific shot that had to be in there, we usually keep it open until
we have seen the end of the blocking of the actors. After the block,
we will re-discuss with the actors’ input as well what works best
for the shot. Then we break up into our own departments and start
building up the shot. I find that a lot more gets done per hour on
set when everything is discussed systematically during the blocking.
Sometimes during the take itself, we discover something else that
works! Then we throw in that extra shot in there. But most times we
keep it simple. His approach was to try to make it feel like there’s
an uninterrupted feel to the shots.
Not
many people can understand this workflow of not using a shotlist or a
storyboard. This has definitely pissed off a lot of assistant
directors and productions but somehow this has worked for both TJ and
I for so many years.
DL: Where was the grading done? How was the process like and working with
the colorist?
JSJ: I
approached Rob Bessette at Finish Post in Boston to help me out with the
color grade. I’ve seen his work before and was very impressed with
his eye for detail and most importantly his working philosophy of
grading for the story rather than showing off techniques. His passion
to get this story told right was the key to this successful
collaboration. He would first work generally on the global look of
the movie based on my guidelines of how much cyan I wanted in the
blacks and how much red I wanted in the highlights etc. Then we
would meet to view the primary grade, critique it and then work more
on a scene level. After all that is done, we will then nitpick on the
smaller more crucial details and work on it until it is right. I have
to applaud Rob and his team at Finish Post for their amazing work
ethics and their dedication to getting it right. I have never been
happier with a color grade like his. Its just beautiful!
DL: What system was it graded on? How it was monitored?
JSJ: 'Bring Back The Dead'
was graded on a DaVinci Resolve system and monitored on P3 enabled
monitors corrected for REC709 as a base. This workflow worked very
well after a few test workflows between Finish Post, MochaChai Lab (who handled the DCP) and Infinite Frameworks. It was a virtual
collaboration that I have to say impressed me quite a bit. I felt
that we discovered a great cross continent workflow that will
definitely benefit many others who decide to go that route later on.
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*All stills are courtesy of Weiyu Films & MM2 Entertainment Pte Ltd.
