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Another scene in the embassy office was lit with three 18Ks pumping light through the windows. With three actors and three cameras on hand, it was inevitable the 18Ks would come into view. “Ridley never said, ‘I see the light! Take it out!’” recalls Witt. “He knows what piece he’s going to use.” The biggest build and trickiest lighting situation was the CIA headquarters in Langley, Va. The practical location was a National Geographic office in Gaithersburg, Md. “The building was set in the woodlands, just like Langley, and it was designed by Edward Durell Stone, who designed a lot of embassies overseas during the time Langley headquarters was built,” notes Max. “It was eerily similar in terms of the architectural style, which is one of the reasons we went there. We were given several empty floors.” One of the key sets there was the Predator Control Room, where agents monitor real-time images from cameras aboard unmanned aircraft flying over Iraq and other areas of interest. When building this set, says Max, “we were advised by a retired U.S. Army technician responsible for those types of operations. The hardware was based on the latest technology; those machines and monitors are all available, so we could get all that information. We built our own based on those references.” The aerial footage was shot by John Marzano with gear provided by Flying Pictures Ltd.: a gyrostabilized Wescam 35, which was mounted on the nose of a helicopter, and Cineflex’s new high-definition V14 surveillance system, which hung from the helicopter’s side. “The V14 has a 1-40 zoom, so you can go very high and zoom into things like license plates,” says Witt. “Predators can hear people talking on the ground from a thousand feet overhead! We wanted to fly very high and zoom in on an outdoor market where Ferris is walking.” Although the Predator Control Room contained a variety of small lighting instruments, including 1Ks and Inkies tucked behind objects and into corners, the keylight is provided by a bank of 60" flat-screen surveillance monitors showing the footage of Ferris. This created a problem: that footage was scheduled to be shot at the end of production. “When we shot in the control room, we really didn’t know what to expect from the screen,” says Witt. Using stand-in footage wasn’t possible because the monitors were actually pieces of white plastic lit from behind by small fluorescents. “It was difficult for the actors, because we didn’t know where the action was happening — they might be looking at one side of the screen and the action might on the other,” says Witt. “It was difficult for me, too, because I knew the Predator would travel through different environments that would influence the color on the actors’ faces. I think we shot everything at T2.8 or T2.8 1⁄2, but without the footage, we didn’t know when there’d be a light or color change.” Rather than guess wrong, “we decided to use one color and do the alterations in the DI.” “Ridley wanted the Predator video screens to look a lot different from normal media, which are a warmish color,” says colorist Nakamura. “We graded all those background plates very cold, and Ridley came in for a session where we just painted all the background images. From there, I could take the foreground images of the guys in the control room and put a little color-correction in areas where the light would be bouncing off faces and control panels. We sent that material to Sony Pictures Imageworks, and they put it together.” The white light from the faux monitors created one problem: “It caused a little wraparound light that looks like a halo around the actors’ heads,” says Nakamura. “It didn’t lend itself to being an easy key, so they had to do a little more work there.” Back on location, the biggest ongoing challenge for Witt and his crew was keeping pace with Scott, who was always open to last-minute inspiration. “We might have something pre-rigged, even pre-lit, and Ridley would come in and say, ‘We’re going to change our direction completely and shoot over here,’” recalls Cronn. “So on the spot, we’d break down our unit and move as quickly as we could to whatever the new shot entailed.” Witt knows the drill well. “It happens in every shot,” he says with a laugh. “I think it’s difficult for many cinematographers. You have to put up lights for a three-camera scene and understand there’s a 95-percent chance Ridley will add a fourth camera that looks in that direction. This means you have to hang more lights than you normally would, and that takes time, but I enjoy the challenge.”
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TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS
2.40:1 Super 35mm
Arricam Lite, Studio; Arri 435, 235
Zeiss and Angenieux lenses
Kodak Vision2 500T 5218, 250D 5205, 50D 5201
Digital Intermediate
Printed on Kodak Vision 2383
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