He is sitting in my seat, he looks so young in a baggy blue woolly jumper, old jeans and scuffed black leather boots and his hair is all over the place. He stares at me through thick black rimmed glasses but says nothing. Nina Angeleri the producer has decided that he should shoot the Amouage Honour commercial and not me. Charlotte Lurot the director is nowhere to be seen although I’m sure she has agreed and doesn’t want to face me. Why he should want to shoot and not direct baffles me, but as its been well over a decade since he shot anything then maybe he is easing himself in gently.
Whilst I’m incredibly angry at being swept aside I grudgingly bow to his immense experience and movie making genius. I ask if we can exchange emails and he gives me a look over his glasses that says who exactly are you anyway? he still pushes a piece of paper towards me along with a pen. I desperately want to get to know him and yet I’m boiling with anger and frustration at being given the boot and after all the months of conference calls, meetings, castings and location visits. Already Walls are being painted and there’s a melee of activity as he acquaints himself with my Canon 1DMK4’s and 5D2’s but more especially he is interested in the huge array of prime lenses giving me the occasional sideways glance and asking the odd technical question. There was no mention of painting Walls in the story or shooting boards and thats my bloody equipment!
Finally I decide enough is enough and get up to leave, I politely shake his hand and then find the producer ‘I hope you’re satisfied, you know he’ll go over budget and the film will be finished sometime in the next century by which time it will finally get some critical acclaim when you’re all dead! Oh and you can keep the equipment! (after all I didn’t want to upset him). I’m met with indifference, nobody seems to care and why should they? He is running the show now and they will all bask in the association with a movie making God and go onto have hugely successful careers whilst I disappear into obscurity.
It’s 5.30am and I open my eyes blinded by the on coming light from the Velux. ‘Bloody hell that was Stanley Kubrick! And I walked off the set, shit! ‘you bloody idiot! You could have assisted him, cleaned his shoes, combed his hair, polished his glasses, made his coffee anything but walk off the set. The dream was so real, I am genuinely angry at myself and want to rush back to sleep and find Stanley and apologise. I lay there for a while replaying the dream and then smile to myself, it wasn’t all bad, at least the project was still mine.
Funny what goes through your head a week before a shoot and how all the months of preparation, niggles and concerns, ideas, thoughts, inspirations and not least my own apprehension and fear of failure both on the project and the wider concerns of a potential career in film making manifest themselves in the subconscious. This miss mash of thoughts which finally formed to make this nocturnal adventure come nightmare were almost certainly triggered by Dmitri Kasterine’s portrait of the great man shot on the set of Clockwork Orange in 1969. But why have such dreams? I suppose there is probably a direct correlation with the scale of the project, amount of time invested and the stakes both personal and professional when it comes to the moving image. The thought ‘You’re only as good as your last job’ often seems to jostle its way to the front of the que of a usually over crowded pre shoot consciousness.
I studied Graphic design through the early to mid Eighties when there was the very definite view that we were all specialists, it was an eighties thing. I for one carried this attitude right through the nineties and quite possibly would have become a photographer much sooner rather than continuing to art direct others because I lacked the confidence to pick up the camera myself. So much of what we do is about having an open mind and being confident and so many successful people say yes first and worry about the how later. Combining this with the ability of not being afraid to make mistakes is at the very heart of my personal approach to film making or indeed anything else these days.
This film, the second perfume commercial for the luxury fragrance house of Amouage is Director Charlotte Lurot and my fourth collaboration. I am very lucky to have Charlotte write the ads with my shooting style in mind and we pour over the storyboards for months prior to shooting. She gives me huge freedom and has the patience of a saint when at times I completely ignore the script seeing something left or right of camera that I must capture, moving the crew and shooting handheld from the hip or guerrilla style as its sometimes referred to (One of the many benefits when shooting with HDDSLR)
Honour is a 3 minute love story loosely based on the opera Madam Butterfly shot on Canon 1D MK4’s and 5D 2’s with just about every lens I could lay my hands on, I think 12 primes in all. Each scene was lovingly crafted to follow the available light around our location, a dilapidated old Manor house on the Tew Estate in Oxford. Two location visits had established the exact time and place of each scene with the invaluable help of Ajnawares Sun Seeker app. If you haven’t already got it then you will almost certainly want this invaluable tool. It enabled us to pin point the position of the sun with total accuracy two months prior to filming.
The brief to myself was to try and shoot each scene as if it were an individual photographic ad campaign. Although shooting with HDDSLR relies on a tiny crew (mine was five including me) there is still hair, makeup, models, production, special effects (smoke, dust and haze) runners along with a 30ft Winnabago, large Arri truck complete with generator and technician along with stacks of HMIs, frames, silks, flags, clamps, dolley and track.
As I walked onto the set I couldn’t help wondering when did this all happen and how did I get here? It only seems like yesterday when I first picked up a Canon 5DMK 2 and now all this. I often ask myself the question, would I be shooting films at all if it hadn’t been for the 5DMK2 and I think like many of us the answer would probably be no. It would be easy to get overwhelmed by the film making process and I quite literally blinker my eyes to the activity around me and stay in a bubble surrounded by my crew. Secure in the knowledge that I am in the safest hands possible with mutual understanding earned the hard way from years of working together, everyone sharing a passion to do something extra special. This collective enthusiasm and expertise resulted in the single biggest achievement of the project as we managed to fullful my goal of shooting the entire film in available light. The final result is probably the best example I have so far of the tremendous capabilities of Canon primes in conjunction with HDDSLRS.
Talking with Grant Scott on the Hungry Eye Podcast got me thinking about photographers who have become film makers (Stanley Kubrick being a great example. He once said that to make a film entirely by yourself, as he did in his early career, “you may not have to know very much about anything else, but you must know about photography”.) But why should I be doing this? is it that I some how feel that by seeing others succeed this will make me feel better and does this show a lack of confidence deep down that needs reassurances or is it purely inspiration? maybe its a little of all three but I am a firm believer that photographers can become film makers if we are prepared to take the plunge. Some may want to go back to school and I can understand why and yet I like the freedom to explore this medium with a blank canvas and much of what Ive learned has come the hard way through trial and error. As the commissioned work Increases I am finding myself more and more in the company of Directors, producers, DOP’s, editors, writers, gaffers, grips and all manner of film industry folk and as a consequences every shoot becomes an opportunity to learn something new.
The step change in thinking from photographer to film maker may at first appear simple but as I move deeper and deeper into the world of the moving image so does my thought process. Putting it very simply I have to be careful not to get to bogged in the look of the moment and forget the multitude of possibilities that arrive with movement. I still love shooting stills and my passion for both being in and capturing the moment will never go away. However I believe that making films is the best medium that I have found for creative expression, story telling and most of all its an enabler of taking ones vision and then expressing and sharing that to a wider audience. What other medium can equal film for reaching out and touching people on such a deeply emotional level?*
Whilst I’m incredibly angry at being swept aside I grudgingly bow to his immense experience and movie making genius. I ask if we can exchange emails and he gives me a look over his glasses that says who exactly are you anyway? he still pushes a piece of paper towards me along with a pen. I desperately want to get to know him and yet I’m boiling with anger and frustration at being given the boot and after all the months of conference calls, meetings, castings and location visits. Already Walls are being painted and there’s a melee of activity as he acquaints himself with my Canon 1DMK4’s and 5D2’s but more especially he is interested in the huge array of prime lenses giving me the occasional sideways glance and asking the odd technical question. There was no mention of painting Walls in the story or shooting boards and thats my bloody equipment!
Finally I decide enough is enough and get up to leave, I politely shake his hand and then find the producer ‘I hope you’re satisfied, you know he’ll go over budget and the film will be finished sometime in the next century by which time it will finally get some critical acclaim when you’re all dead! Oh and you can keep the equipment! (after all I didn’t want to upset him). I’m met with indifference, nobody seems to care and why should they? He is running the show now and they will all bask in the association with a movie making God and go onto have hugely successful careers whilst I disappear into obscurity.
It’s 5.30am and I open my eyes blinded by the on coming light from the Velux. ‘Bloody hell that was Stanley Kubrick! And I walked off the set, shit! ‘you bloody idiot! You could have assisted him, cleaned his shoes, combed his hair, polished his glasses, made his coffee anything but walk off the set. The dream was so real, I am genuinely angry at myself and want to rush back to sleep and find Stanley and apologise. I lay there for a while replaying the dream and then smile to myself, it wasn’t all bad, at least the project was still mine.
Funny what goes through your head a week before a shoot and how all the months of preparation, niggles and concerns, ideas, thoughts, inspirations and not least my own apprehension and fear of failure both on the project and the wider concerns of a potential career in film making manifest themselves in the subconscious. This miss mash of thoughts which finally formed to make this nocturnal adventure come nightmare were almost certainly triggered by Dmitri Kasterine’s portrait of the great man shot on the set of Clockwork Orange in 1969. But why have such dreams? I suppose there is probably a direct correlation with the scale of the project, amount of time invested and the stakes both personal and professional when it comes to the moving image. The thought ‘You’re only as good as your last job’ often seems to jostle its way to the front of the que of a usually over crowded pre shoot consciousness.
I studied Graphic design through the early to mid Eighties when there was the very definite view that we were all specialists, it was an eighties thing. I for one carried this attitude right through the nineties and quite possibly would have become a photographer much sooner rather than continuing to art direct others because I lacked the confidence to pick up the camera myself. So much of what we do is about having an open mind and being confident and so many successful people say yes first and worry about the how later. Combining this with the ability of not being afraid to make mistakes is at the very heart of my personal approach to film making or indeed anything else these days.
This film, the second perfume commercial for the luxury fragrance house of Amouage is Director Charlotte Lurot and my fourth collaboration. I am very lucky to have Charlotte write the ads with my shooting style in mind and we pour over the storyboards for months prior to shooting. She gives me huge freedom and has the patience of a saint when at times I completely ignore the script seeing something left or right of camera that I must capture, moving the crew and shooting handheld from the hip or guerrilla style as its sometimes referred to (One of the many benefits when shooting with HDDSLR)
Honour is a 3 minute love story loosely based on the opera Madam Butterfly shot on Canon 1D MK4’s and 5D 2’s with just about every lens I could lay my hands on, I think 12 primes in all. Each scene was lovingly crafted to follow the available light around our location, a dilapidated old Manor house on the Tew Estate in Oxford. Two location visits had established the exact time and place of each scene with the invaluable help of Ajnawares Sun Seeker app. If you haven’t already got it then you will almost certainly want this invaluable tool. It enabled us to pin point the position of the sun with total accuracy two months prior to filming.
The brief to myself was to try and shoot each scene as if it were an individual photographic ad campaign. Although shooting with HDDSLR relies on a tiny crew (mine was five including me) there is still hair, makeup, models, production, special effects (smoke, dust and haze) runners along with a 30ft Winnabago, large Arri truck complete with generator and technician along with stacks of HMIs, frames, silks, flags, clamps, dolley and track.
As I walked onto the set I couldn’t help wondering when did this all happen and how did I get here? It only seems like yesterday when I first picked up a Canon 5DMK 2 and now all this. I often ask myself the question, would I be shooting films at all if it hadn’t been for the 5DMK2 and I think like many of us the answer would probably be no. It would be easy to get overwhelmed by the film making process and I quite literally blinker my eyes to the activity around me and stay in a bubble surrounded by my crew. Secure in the knowledge that I am in the safest hands possible with mutual understanding earned the hard way from years of working together, everyone sharing a passion to do something extra special. This collective enthusiasm and expertise resulted in the single biggest achievement of the project as we managed to fullful my goal of shooting the entire film in available light. The final result is probably the best example I have so far of the tremendous capabilities of Canon primes in conjunction with HDDSLRS.
Talking with Grant Scott on the Hungry Eye Podcast got me thinking about photographers who have become film makers (Stanley Kubrick being a great example. He once said that to make a film entirely by yourself, as he did in his early career, “you may not have to know very much about anything else, but you must know about photography”.) But why should I be doing this? is it that I some how feel that by seeing others succeed this will make me feel better and does this show a lack of confidence deep down that needs reassurances or is it purely inspiration? maybe its a little of all three but I am a firm believer that photographers can become film makers if we are prepared to take the plunge. Some may want to go back to school and I can understand why and yet I like the freedom to explore this medium with a blank canvas and much of what Ive learned has come the hard way through trial and error. As the commissioned work Increases I am finding myself more and more in the company of Directors, producers, DOP’s, editors, writers, gaffers, grips and all manner of film industry folk and as a consequences every shoot becomes an opportunity to learn something new.
The step change in thinking from photographer to film maker may at first appear simple but as I move deeper and deeper into the world of the moving image so does my thought process. Putting it very simply I have to be careful not to get to bogged in the look of the moment and forget the multitude of possibilities that arrive with movement. I still love shooting stills and my passion for both being in and capturing the moment will never go away. However I believe that making films is the best medium that I have found for creative expression, story telling and most of all its an enabler of taking ones vision and then expressing and sharing that to a wider audience. What other medium can equal film for reaching out and touching people on such a deeply emotional level?*