Frame & Reference Podcast - 142: Watchmen, 300, Super 8 etc. w/ Larry Fong, ASC

Episode Date: May 16, 2024

Today I'm thrilled to welcome my good friend Larry Fong, ASC to the pod to talk about his incredible body of work but almost more importantly, our shared love of the art of Magic. Not only is Larry in the ASC but he's also a member of the Academy of Magical Arts right across the street from the ASC clubhouse at the Magic Castle, a two-fer that I consider to be the home run of creative memberships. In this episode we talk about many of Larry's films, but an abbreviated list of his phenomenal work includes movies like 300, Watchmen, Super 8, The Tomorrow War, Kong: Skull Island, Batman v Superman, The Predator, and recently the Netflix film "Damsel". Enjoy! Visit ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠www.frameandrefpod.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ for everything F&R You can directly support Frame & Reference by ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Buying Me a Coffee⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Frame & Reference is supported by Filmtools and ProVideo Coalition. Filmtools is the West Coast's leading supplier of film equipment. From cameras and lights to grip and expendables, Filmtools has you covered for all your film gear needs. Check out ⁠⁠Filmtools.com⁠⁠ for more. ProVideo Coalition is a top news and reviews site focusing on all things production and post. Check out ⁠⁠ProVideoCoalition.com⁠⁠ for the latest news coming out of the industry.

Hello, and welcome to this, another episode of Frame and Reference. I'm your host, Kenny McMillan, and you're listening to episode 142 with my good friend, D.P. Larry Fong. Enjoy. these were the card sheets that got you here what oh so this this is an uncut um what are they what was that the tally ho the black and silver tally hose that illusionist made and then this is a a gaff deck that um what was that there was like a specific DVD set that i i feel like um oh I'm blanking on everyone's name now Dan Garcia and

Wayne Houchin made they made like a specific DVD set where this gaff deck was like a big part of the ultra gaff there we go I have one right there I could have looked right there and had everyone's name anyway yeah so those have been there for over a decade now

and they get absolutely obliterated by the sun. Wow. Yeah, Danny Garcia sat right here at this very table doing magic late night magic. How'd you guys meet? It's very funny.

The magic world, I mean, I've always been interested in magic since I was a kid, but it took a jump start about 20 years ago when I happened to become friends with a guy named Homer Lee Wag and he and Chris Kenner

are David Copperfield's right-hand men. So, you know, they're based Vegas. One time when I was out there visiting them early in our friendship, the magic convention was in town. I don't know if you know what those are, but they're like salesmen conventions, but they're more akin to like Star Trek conventions because it's just a bunch of nerdy guys, you know, 90% male walking around talking about magic and buying magic things and just probably smells vaguely better. But orange stinging Comic-Con.

Not interesting, but these days absolutely. Well, at least, there's there's females at comic on this that's true there's more and more magicians though a female magician which is very cool yeah um but anyway since the convention was in town i ended up meeting all of my heroes like the ones you're mentioning and became fast friends because i don't know part league maybe they're fascinated by because i was in filmmaking and that everyone loves films of course and then that just kind of took out took off so i'm friends with most of my friends are probably more magic friends than filmmaking friends right now look yet i've got

I've got, oh, yeah, how's the cat doing? I saw in an interview that you were talking about how the cat had, like, answer or something a while back. Had to get radiology or something? Oh, my gosh. Yeah, that's when he was only a few years old. He had cancer and he survived it and there he is 15 years later. Oh, wow, really.

Yeah. Because I saw the white patch and I wasn't sure if that was like part of it or if that was just. Yeah. Yeah. Had to shave him to do the radiation. And it was just a skin patch. It was so sad. And then about a year later, then the hair started growing back, but white.

It's the white spot on him as like a reminder. It's very cool. And you can see him from far away. And on webcams, if he's ever at a order place, it's identifier. We've got these two, just, we adopted these two, like, brothers. You know, they showed up to the adoption place. But one of them is 25 pounds. at length probably about four feet

long he's just like a dog like he's fucking huge but they they've been in a shelter for so long that they're wary of us so it's just like it's literally just like having exotic animals in the house where they don't really want us to touch

them but they're there and because he's so big he'll just end up on top of stuff so he'll be like putting on a jacket and you'll look up and he's just staring at it like geez let it's a long cat It's a very long. I'll show you a photo

where that later, I'll send it to you. Do they do magic conventions anymore? Oh, yeah. This one I'm talking about Magic Lives every year. It's amazing because you see

the friends that you haven't seen for a year all over, from all over the world. And it's just a big love fest. And the big one's Magic Live that's in Vegas every year, which you should go to. Yeah, dude.

August, September, something. It's like a long weekend, three, four days. And the hotel is, chief stand. A big one is also mad. I'm just blanking out. Magifest, which doesn't hit the Midwest somewhere. And then there's various little ones, but Magic Live is the big one in Vegas. Yeah. Oh, in England, Blackpool is the big one, gigantic, crazy one. I mean, if I had Blackpool money, I'd go. But Vegas was a little more accessible. Yeah. I mean, I'm going to NAB in a couple days. Like,

That's way less fun, in my opinion. That's, do you, have you hit the NAB before? Yeah, it was very fatiguing. I did, actually, I was going to go with Homer, who's also a cinematographer, photographer. But we were stalling, as you do, and we're on the last day, and then we got there about 3 o'clock. We didn't know they closed at 4 or something like that. Oh, on the last day, yeah.

Yeah, and so you're running around for an hour. It's very embarrassing. But yeah, I like those things, but it's a little fatiguing, and then you keep running the people and you just want to, you know, not be distracted. Yeah. I was going to say, do you, like, what kind of things do you even learn from an NAB? Because, like, I feel like they're there. They would rather have you at a booth and just be like, well, you just ask him questions

versus like, oh, this is a new XLR cable we invented. You're right. It is to see some equipment to nerd out, but it's not, that's the sad thing, right? Equipment is important, but it's also a curse. And then you go there and there's a lot of amateur people like, hey, trying that steady cam and running into people that you want to see, but you just don't have the time. So that's why it's a bit fatiguing. But thanks to the internet, you can keep track of quip for that way. But you, yeah, I guess he'd want to touch things, look at them.

But that's the nerdy side of it, right? That's the quip inside. You're not learning about your craft, but it's an important thing to learn your tools, too. But, yeah, I only go occasionally when I'm roped into it. Yeah, this year, I think it's almost aside from the various, like, out of nowhere, I'm not, like, the biggest aperture. Stan, I know that's a big thing online. Like, everyone just, you know, they're affordable and they're good. So, hell yeah. They just came out with a 12 by light mat.

Yeah. Like, that's nuts the other day. Actually, it's eight. It's an eight by, and it's, uh, you can connect four of them to make, uh, 16 by, like overhead. And it's inflatable. So it's insane. I saw it at some event last weekend, speaking of which.

And it was incredible. I'd say, it's like a light mat, but, but, oh my God, the design is, it's, it's very cool. Yeah, I think they've absolutely jumped the line with that, having not even seen it. Just, just seeing the ad, I was like, okay, that's something that everyone's going to end up using. Yeah, it's going to take a little bit, because you have to lay it down and inflate it, and then you put a frame around it and then lift it. So the first time will be, will be hard for grips and electrics, but after that, it's going to, it makes a lot of sense.

The little ones, by the way, the reason I fell low of them, because the little ones, lights they have. The MCs. It shows all day, every day on everything I do. Yeah. Have you used the Astera Hydro panels? No. So, you know, obviously the same company makes the tubes, but the Hydra panels are like that big. So, I don't know, maybe.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, the hydras. Yes, yes. Of course. Yeah, the Bricks. The Astera bricks. They got the Magnin of the Big. Hydros, yes. For whatever reason. A lot of the last couple movies. second. I used those on the last couple movies only because the Gaffer had them. Yeah. I mean, it's funny how easily

everyone thought, yeah, tubes 100%. And then I got the hydrop panels and I was like, I don't know, this isn't tube shaped. I don't know what to do with this. Like, Bill did it in this honeycombs on them, right? And they, yeah, it can be a very, this

weird promo, but I did this movie called Downs on Netflix right now. And we had to suddenly. Thank God. I was like, what do we promo on this? There's a scene that's in a ship and then the Robin Wright, the queen comes down to steal off the young girl and Angela Bassett is there. So it's in this hall of a ship and it's tiny, right?

It's 10 feet wide, but 20 feet wide, low ceiling, a couple lanterns, and where do I put the lights, right? It's night. So up in the behind the beam, just wherever somebody was, we just stuck a hydra with a grit on it. I mean, what else can you do? There's no rhyme or reason. So the girl's over there, standing next to the thing, boom, there's a full spot on her.

But with the right color and the right, not too bright, it looks natural. Angela, as it's here, there's one there. But she gets pushed over here. So now there's another one there. And then the queen's here, so point one. And they're all like, they're that thin. So they were just screwed into the ceiling. Yeah.

That was the whole shop. It was, but six hydras are pointing where they're. needed the point. The thing I love about those versus the MCs, I love the MCs. I got like five, no, world. But is just being able to put X, Y coordinates into them.

I'm a big color meter nerd. The second I got a color meter, I've just like everything, why shouldn't they all match? Right? Like, now that I have the tools, why would I bother eyeballing it, you know, or hoping that a light would get close? So just being able to put that in in the iPad, and have them all like match the incoming window light or whatever it is in a spaceship light

you know it's like yeah so good yeah absolutely yeah that's I did see in an interview first of all I've got to sit like I've always said that like the weirdly like the matrix and Willy Wonka's chocolate factory are like the two movies that got me into filmmaking but the more I was thinking about it I think 300 solidified me wanting to be a DP Wow I had never That

I mean you know Would no one did that That wasn't 300 was unique In when it came out Right Yeah But I saw in an interview

That you had been inventing Or someone Maybe your Gaffer invented Like some tube lights For the grid or something like that Like you had There were like a lot of DIY stuff Things going on

For that lighting setup All those overheads Yeah, that store is not as interesting as it is a nice coincidence, which is we were going to be shooting these big stages. And I thought, well, they're not really stages, their warehouses, as we often do. And I just told the gaffro on the preliminary scale, I mean, this whole thing has to be top lit, or at least have top light, depending how much we're going to use. Now, how are we going to rig this whole thing? Like, there's so many warehouses, so many scenes. Like how, and I need it to be sometimes neutral and then tungsten.

And sometimes they need a blue for the night stuff. How do we can gel all these warehouses? And he said, oh, the last movie we did was a, what's that disaster movie? Something after tomorrow. Yeah, I mean, that's one. The, with the German director. Uh, we're gonna, let's go a day after tomorrow until, uh, no, it's not a day after tomorrow. It's, uh, whatever was, big disaster, maybe the world's coming to an end.

And he said they made these lights that, you know, back then it would be space lights, right? Now it helps other softbox tubes, whatever, sky panels. Back then, it was always, uh, space lights and that was, wouldn't make sense. So they made the, he had these aluminum rods and spaced every so often. was a 2K lamp in them. I see. So, imagine a bar or a tube, a pipe.

Never so often was a 2K. Just bare bulb. Bear bulb. So imagine it's like a flight safe. And then they were just long pipes, aluminum less than speed rail. But you could just put a rope around them and take them up. And they had tons of them.

So they're just lined. You just instantly rigged them and take no time at all. And then they just, just put those everywhere. So they weren't space lights. They weren't anything. They're the one-offs. But he already had them in storage.

So then I said, well, what happens like when we need to go blue? We can't jell those. I know, we had silks made. And then we also have silks that were dyed blue. Incredible. From the last movie. I'm like, that was when he wasn't even hired yet. And he go, you know what?

You're hired. Yeah. Just for those. Yeah. So that made everything so much easier. having having a CTB silk made must be like who does that like there's got to be a company that can make that photo I don't know photochemically I don't you want to call it like accurate that's got to be a job well I don't know if it's accurate they was in Montreal like they just had it died I don't think there was a place that does it for a living at no sure I just take business kind of a niche thing we'll die any fabric to your XY no it was it was not calibrated anything by any means, but I just took it.

Yeah. What would you just thinking about them? Like, do you think... Wait a man. Hold on. Hold on. Sorry, interrupt. No, we did. We used those blues all the time. Oh, it was just permanent. Yeah. Right. You wouldn't switch them out. Because if it was supposed to be daytime, it was kind of sky blue.

Right. And then I wouldn't rate the film, but I mean, I would time it slightly, everything's slightly warmer so that it would be warm down here or neutral and that would be cooler sky and then at night I would time everything is slightly cooler so that that blue would be more blue and be like moonlight that's what I did I remember now and this was this I have a note here that says no di but was there a di on 300 there had to have been yes yes there was a die but it's very minor because 90% of it was done in everything went through the VFX pipeline every single shot. How we got that look, right? Right. You can't do that in the DA.

You can do all you want in vinyl cut. You're never going to get that look because there was this secret, you know, like Kentucky Fried Chicken recipe that's in a vault that nobody knows. Right. So I do have the document stored somewhere, but it's all these steps from VFX, you know, through shake and quake and whatever they did and Photoshop and all these steps to get that. To get that look, which was a lot of testing. We only got that. that halfway through the movie is half the look knowing that we're going to prove it later. So going into it, we only kind of half figured out that look. As we did go into the DIY, which back then was just the tele-sitting, right?

Right. He did some tests and Zach was in there and playing with the thing. He goes, yeah, that's cool. And I go, oh, it looks a little music video-y. I think every one can do that look. I think we need to not just do those tools. Like, don't do the blow out the whites and Grish the blacks and every music video. There's got to be more.

And then we got look development people into it and did more. of secret sauce that kind of if I think no one's done to this day. Really? I think, I mean, you've seen people try on TV shows or commercials or parodies. It's not quite the look, right? Right. I don't know. You tell them maybe.

I mean, I remember in college, you know, I think the best we had was like Magic Bullet, you know, because Resolve was still, you had it by the console. And I think everyone just went, oh, it's Bleach Bypass. but you know there was it was this very kind of pastiche like oh if you if you make a black and white and overlay it and set the mode to uh you know soft light or whatever that bleach bypass you're done that's the 300 look you know really no that's the seven look yeah 100% yeah that that and watchman both what is there's so i think speaking to the children yearning i think the children yearn for that look now uh the just the this i don't know if it's necessarily film because every you know we were talking earlier about like the film looks cinematic and shit but like something about that like hyper realist real like actual reality i think people are looking more and more for because it's clean and legible but still outside of reality we get reality every day right so that that look you guys developed

I think is, is something that people are still, I don't think they realize they're aiming for, but they talk about, you know, around it. That's my opinion. Interesting. Interesting. It's funny because my usually, my approach, if there is an approach, is usually just natural and motivated and kind of invisible in a way. Yeah. Which is funny, because a lot of people tell me that doesn't seem like what I'm seeing, but that's the start, I think. You know, like, if I had a shot, like looking like your shot,

you look like in your webcam now, not webcam, but I'd be happy with that. Yeah. 100% happy. Is, I didn't know that you and just, and now we're just doing this, but I didn't know you and Zach went to school together. Yeah, yeah.

We went to Art Center. We were in the same class, and I just remembered, I think he was super, cool and talented and I wanted to be friends with him basically we became good friends and I shot most of his projects

there and yeah when we're friends to this day so I don't know if that's 30 years ago or what but yeah was he always I kind of I kind of wanted to know just from your perspective like because he's such a visual director

especially talking about like music videos and stuff like whenever I think like Under Armour commercial that's always like did he invent that I don't have the like the under like the classic Under Armour commercial was that him like the slow-mo the the backlit football field the usually it's like there's rain probably like I imagine I don't think I shot that one because a lot of times he shot himself or he used other DPs because I was usually off somewhere right but I do remember him always mentioned Under Armour so I wouldn't be surprised but pretty he did shoot some of those but I don't know which one you're talking about oh no yeah I just meant in general like I feel like you he established the visual language for Under Armour for a decade. He was very visual in school. He'd gone to art school in London before that, and he would paint and draw.

And all his stuff was always visual. Say him, like, the visual is everything. Even in his simple Super 8 projects, he always go the extra mile. And that's why I knew, like, this guy's going to go far. Because you probably know the famous story where he did a short film, which I shot. And he actually dug trenches in his backyard to be like World War I.

Oh, I don't know this now. And he got uniforms and Nazi soldiers and, you know, had his wife hold the hose with the made rain. And that's crazy, crazy. He would do whatever it took. So yeah. Yeah, he is definitely the real deal. But does working for, it's probably hard to find another director that's as visual as

him, but just working for a director who has such an eye for cinematography, make your life easier or harder? I think to say easier because I was a little spoiled because to shoot with him at the beginning when you can work with a friend that you know so well and have a shorthand with and there's no ego in the way or pissing contests

and also you know what he's going for. I was a little spoiled and maybe to my detriment because of the beginning he would grab the finder and find all the shots and he knew them anyway because he would storyboard most of his films so he was finding the shots and choosing the lenses, you know, which directors do a lot. But I'm just kind of watching and looking at him, talking to the operator, and I go, okay,

and then so I'm mainly doing the lighting and protecting him. So I think in the beginning, you know, I started to the finding shots bit and storyboarding and shot listing, started atrophy a bit, you know, working with him. But I got to concentrate on the lining. As you see, I think, like, it was a good working method. But that's something I've had to relearn definitely after working with other directors to the point where I just did a film

where I got to do pretty much all the Shawlisting and the Shawlist which was so fun and here's a funny thing there's a movie I did three, four movies ago called Rescue Rangers, Chippendale Rescue Rangers Cartoon Live Action thing which nobody saw which actually I'm super proud of because Akiva Shafford directed it and it was. Oh, he's funny as hell. Also, serious director. You think, looking at him,

you think he'd be a crazy like Tyco, like Titi or something, but he's actually more like Fincher and he knew exactly what he wanted to and could articulate it all. And actually explain why something was funnier or not. He's fascinating guy. That's originally huge. Yeah, but he would just push me and say like, go further. But this is boring. Normally someone would be insulted, right? And he was like, go crazy because I totally, this would be like, the show. look like a Breckheimer film like you barely doing it like this is not what I hired you for but in a half-joking way right right what you really want to hear strangely for right like that chipmunk maybe but if you see it you will see like every frame I'm proud of and by the way just to my

point since that the pandemic happened on day one of that shoot in prep I ended up not storyboarding but learning in Maya so that I could basically design a lot of the shots and knew, a lot of the previews myself. Oh, geez. I can barely do blender. I'm not dumb, but I'm a little too old to learn Maya, but since there's nothing but time, and I was just dictating over online to people like,

can you pan, pan out? Right, right. Can you pan a little push in this much? They're like, why? And it was so weird that it had to articulate to someone, why I was making those choices, because you don't do that. Right. You just do it.

And then I learn more about why I do things myself. But I would operate even like push-ins and like the handheld or like operating on a CG shot of the chipmunks. Right. But I was doing that in Maya. And the animator were using that information to do the shots. A lot of it anyway. That's actually fascinating. Because the only time I've ever thought about that is when they had like, I don't know, like Deacons do rank.

or something where they gave him like the iPad, you know, like the motion track iPad. You had to do that all in Maya. Well, we did have that iPad thing in the studio. Since the pandemic came, we couldn't do that. But I found it, but I liked doing it anyway. Like a couple of shots were handheld. We did that way before we came in a few days, just a few of us with the team. But I found it really cool.

Because, you know, as an operator when, you know, you're wider, you don't operate much. the tighter you go, you have to do more operating when it's a close-up, you know, someone's moving around, like, do I leave the camera? Do I move, do I go with every movement? Do I anticipate a little bit and do I, am I a little late? All these kind of weird things. But I was doing it in the computer and with coordinates and key frames, it was super weird. But again, most people were just, you know, crying during the pandemic, doing nothing and starving. And I'm just like, at the computer, having blast. Having some glitch. I mean, I learned resolve, which, Oh, that's, to be fair, probably more valuable than Maya for my level of work.

Now I've, I, uh, I've colored plenty of stuff, actually. That's good. It's, you know what it is? It's nice because if someone says, oh, I don't like that. It's like, oh, okay, I'll change it. You know, as a DP, it's like, I don't like that shot. And you're like, well, that's fucking burnt into stone. Like, I don't know what you.

Please, please don't. Please don't hurt me. Well, that's why I want to learn after effects and whatnot. I keep trying to because I figured, I mean, I don't know how it works, if you can actually do that in a feature film. But when I do the thing, I go to VEVX, I'm sorry, that lights in the shot. You're going to have to paint that out. Oh, you don't need, I wish, God, if I did it myself, they would love me.

You can. I can tell this to you right now. All you got to do is either you get just a clean plate, obviously, when you're shooting, or in a, you get a, you get a, you get a, a screenshot and then you go into Photoshop and then you do the generative fill just for that chunk and then just drop that over

the image. I can do Photoshop, obviously, so I know that yeah, the generative fill thing. You can use it for outpainting. Like it all, I've done, I did a dog shit shot in a, in a what do you call? Corporate interview.

It's just bad. So I just cut around the guy and outpainted his entire office with the generative fill and just put him in a different office and you can't tell the client was like where did you go reshoot this

I was like nope that's just being because you do it in log you know so the the Lut still applies correctly and everything it's awesome but in a feature how to get those elements and how I output it and you have it back to them and how I need a still trouble or is it like ethical things like I did the

VFX guy's job although I asked and trying to save them work and save them money I don't know why they wouldn't you know there's all this secret political financial we don't understand luckily I'd be willing to do that was yeah or like in a commercial where I like oops sorry that that C stands in the shot but it has to be there that kind of thing yeah so I don't want to be that guy that makes VFX fix everything you know? Oh, no. Did you see that the VFX reel for, um, uh,

zone of interest? No. Dude, I got to send you this. It's like every scene has six cameras in the frame. Oh, right, because it's like reality show with all the things. Yeah. And they just, they just paint them all out.

And there's like a grid up top where they have microphones mounted so everyone could just, it's all just paint. I'm going to make a note. They were to start doing that for, like, keeping up with the Kardashians, you know? I know. The LED shows. They're going to be cinematic. They're so cinematic.

They can put purple light bulbs behind any couch. Yeah. Later. In post, actually, I always use keeping up with the Kardashians as my example for when I have to explain the laws behind if you can put sticks down places. I'm like, have you ever seen a reality show like the Kardashians where there's someone Hollywooding, an LED, panel on a stick but it's on like it's on like a stand but they're holding i'm like that's the law as long as someone's holding it you can't get in trouble it's not out of the floor you can't get me oh but that's a that's a reference from 2003 um what a what should we talk about

you want to start a podcast um about nothing yeah i have uh here's a question what's What's the closest deck of cards you have to you? Oh, right here. So I got, I got cohorts. Oh, cohorts are good. I got small hands. These are very thin, and yeah, I got to do those. This is the, uh, oh, it's blanking. The, um, Conjuring Arts, Condry Hearts.

Yeah, I have a, I literally have a, do they have their own deck? Or are those I forgot what the Are they the superiors? Are they? Because I have the black superiors. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So the superior.

Those clump up on me. If I use them for longer than like a month, they like get very clumpy. Well, I have to admit that I have these here because I'm lately, I've been, I've repicked them up to do Aussie wins, the Gypsy Queen,

which is amazing. Amazing effect. I've for I for yeah I also got these the old Nuggets I'm trying to get those remade as Larry's nugget

that would be great talk to the uh like I can not say the company because someone keeps promising they'll make the for me but they keep ghosting me

so I'm gonna have to do them myself uh you could use uh there's like a popular company that makes like magic the gathering cards or whatever you know they can make proxies or they'll do any other

game um but they make decks so i don't know the quality so you'd have to get like a demo but um yeah like a thousand deck minimum no no no no minimum oh do you mean maker the making cards playing making playing cards or something like yeah yeah i think that's it big cards playing card decks dot com or something like that yeah um so worst case scenario you can rip those off and then i know that'll work but i want i i got to give this one to you at some point, I'll send it to you, but I interviewed on this podcast. I had to reach out to them, this German team that made the expert at the card table documentary. Oh, right.

I don't know if you saw that. But they made these expert at the card table cards, and they're like golden green and they're just, but they're so smooth and they don't get sticky. Wow. I bought a brick of them. I also got this. the world's smallest expert at the card. Oh, yeah. I have one of those.

Well, Conjuring Arch just did a buy one, get one free. So I was like, well, might as well. Hey, we should start up with a card trick. Yeah, okay. Because you're going to just cut this out because it's at the beginning. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Do you have some cards there? I do.

Okay, randomly. And I'm never going to look at the cards, by the way. They're always going to be below the camera. So, pick out. 10 radam cards Okay 3 6, 7, 8, 9, 10

Yep I learned this from Hoyta I'm just kidding Don't worry, he doesn't listen Make the three Even piles Oh I guess that would be nine Never mind. Nine cards

So three piles I'm going to do this too Just to you can't have to explain Okay, so three piles of three in front of you in a row, yeah? Yep. Okay, so grab one of those piles. Got it. Get it up and look at the bottom card.

Okay. Keep looking at it, burn that in, don't forget it. Otherwise, are we going to waste four minutes of your life? Yeah. So now don't put that pile back where it was. Put it on one of the other two piles. Okay. Okay, so now you have two piles.

And we need one pile, so would you rather, do you feel? lead to put the little one on the big or the big one on the little. I want to put the big one on the little. You go ahead and do that? Now, I'm not going to find your card, but the cards are going to find your card. And it's going to be through a magic spell. And what that means is you're going to spell the card. Got it.

So here, but I'm going to take you through it because it's super weird. So let's say your card is the ace of spades. You're going to spell A, C, E. Don't do it yet, but you go A, C, E, and then put the rest on top. Okay. whether it's ace or two or queen or king, you're going to spell it one letter at a time, face down onto the table. But here's the thing that this is why it's weird.

You can lie. So let's say it's the ace. You could go A-C-E-plop, or you could say four, F-O-U-R, put the rest on top. Okay? Yeah. So in your mind, think of what you're going to spell. But here's the thing, but I'll also do it quietly so I can't listen and like. Right.

And I can't see them. So go ahead and spell whatever you like, what the card is, or a lie, one card at a time per letter under the table, and then drop the remaining ones on top. Done. Okay, pick them up again. Now, obviously, every card of, right, like of spades. So go F onto the table, drop the rest on top. Now the value.

And this is the final spell, but then I'm going to ask you one more question to see you know. So if it's spades, clubs, hearts, or diamonds. Wait. Yeah. arts clubs basically. You're doing chaste in your head? I was just blanked out like, spade the suit. So let's say

it's a spade, so you would go S-P-A-D-E, yes, but you can lie. So if was spades, you could also spell diamonds, which is a whole different thing, or clubs, and then you're going to put the rest on top. So in your mind, think of what you want to spell, go ahead and spell it, blah, blah, blah, blah. I'm not listening. Spell a suit.

Yep. And then drop the rest on top. Okay. So now you're done spelling, but I have one more question. Don't answer it, but I'm curious if you told the truth, if you were lying, or if you did a little of both. But before you answer, even now you can lie. So what's your answer? I did one of both.

Both. So spell both, B-O-T-H. You drop us on top. Okay, now we're all done. So you see one card right staring at the back one right there, right? Yep. it doesn't work it's on my fault it's the card's fault now you got to admit if you spelled anything differently would have a different outcome i don't know if you really told the truth

or lied or both that could have been a lie so even you don't know where your card is right and only you touch them and i haven't been looking at them right but now what was that card you looked at so long ago it was uh five diamonds is that the top card yeah well so here's the funny thing that makes me laugh it is because they're cohorts they're marked for when I look down. So you didn't know where they were. I didn't even think about it until I looked down. My natural instinct was to look at the marking.

And I just went, oh, yep, there she is. They've tracked it. But that's pretty nuts. That's an excellent one. And I don't know how that works, by the way. And I'm not kidding. There are certain tricks. like there's certainly the thing in the magic community where people like a self-working trick or whatever is look down on. I'm like that's still, that's excellent. Are you kidding me? Something I can't fuck up. That's I love that. Right. Like beginning magicians don't do that. But like my go-toes are pretty much almost self, almost self-working. Yeah, the I, I, what are your go-toes? Because right now I think I'm stuck in a rut of just constantly doing ambitious cards, various versions.

of ambitious cards or just literally leaning on the fact that they're marked and making something up in the spot because I probably have a drink in my hand. I was in a rut too, but this year it all turned around or the end of last year. A friend of mine named Ben Earl, who I've always had a lot of respect for, I joined his online community called The Family. Sounds like a cult. It does. And he puts out videos every week and it completely changed the scenario of how my magic is and also just presentation and technique.

This isn't part of the podcast, is it? Sure. All these days are bad, I was mad at him, but even more so. More than just tricks, just a way of presenting where it's not, the way I'm doing card is completely different. I can't, I'm all going to deal with bring you now. But it's worth every penny if you want to join. in that community. It's a monthly thingy. Or just look up some of his books or go to Vanishing

Ink and download one of his tricks, which are almost self-working and mind-blowing on a Vanishing Ink, Ben Earl. He's just my hero. I'm actually glad you brought that up because that's one of the biggest thing when we were emailing before about like joining the Magic Castle is it's difficult to put it's let's say easy to do a trick. It's hard to present it you know it's it's um how do I phrase this for an audience like it magic isn't about the trick it's about the experience right and it's hard to you need a lot of awareness to create let's say a character or a presentation or whatever so those are things I've always been probably more fascinated in is designing that experience versus the

the mechanics of the trick itself because a diagonal palm shift is more fascinating just off rip but it's not cool if you don't have a whole thing around it you know then it's just what's the the jerry seinfeld bit like is this your card you're a jerk you know like but that's why the top chain is more satisfying than a diagonal palm ship because because it's like I got away with that yeah and I always started doing it recently because I thought that that's either going to get caught or just do double lift, but then you realize that when you double lift, the audience subconsciously knows. Everyone holds it funny. Right. If you can tell, then the audience definitely knows. Like, when people have been trying to weed the double lift out of all my stuff. What's that?

I was just saying, I hate when people do that, you know, and I'm like, no one, no one does that. That's not a natural movement. Even the good ones are suspicious. Even you do a double push off with a thumb. That's like, that's cool, but who does that? So a lot of work, like you spent probably 90% of your effort and decades into that, and then it still looks suspicious. Yeah. And now I know why, Chris Kenner told me 15 years ago, the best double lift is a top change. And I never knew what he meant until 15 years later, less year. And now you're just replacing.

That's actually, I'm taking a note of that too. And it's complete attitude. It's not technique. Right. And what's funny about what you're saying as you're saying. what you were just saying about putting it together in the effect, I realized that's what filmmaking is, right? Anyone can look on YouTube and see what cinematic or what piece of, what slider to use, or what light, or what let, or what camera. But that doesn't make you a filmmaker

or a director or a DP. Right. How it's done, or how movies made, for that matter. It's funny, everyone knows how movies are made. Everyone knows they're not real. And that's just like what magic is um yeah it's how you apply those things to get a response or an emotion when i was in college i remember uh something i mentioned this before but like uh my directing teacher was like filmmaking is literally just making people feel the emotion you want them to feel when you want them to feel it yeah that's good and everything else is in service of that um and actually you play bass right So I played drums. I did some research.

But I was last night, I was in my cups because my friend was leaving town, so I was having a good time. And when I get a little drinky, I will just start watching music stuff. And so I was just ripping through music. And it occurred to me that the rhythm section in general, because I was watching some like metal stuff and metal drumming. What do you play? Sorry, drums, you said? Drums. Okay.

And it occurred to me that the rhythm section, this is all going to make sense, maybe. I just came up with this last night. Like, when people talk, oh, what kind of drums do you play? I'm like, I just play drums. I don't, like, there's no, oh, what do you do? Like, metal, jazz. I'm like, it's all the same.

And then it occurred to me, there is no such thing as metal drums. Metal is in the guitars. Right? Like, you can play, the guy I was listening. to was basically doing gospel licks in a metal song. And that's just how you describe it, but it's not

it's not built, you know, a funk groove isn't only for funk. And it occurred to me that like, oh, in a DP it's like, oh, I make horror films. It's like, but that, that, whatever, that lighting setup doesn't have to

be for horror. It can be for comedy if it's in the right thing. There's no, there's no assignment for the rhythm section or cinematographers. You know, so to your point about bringing it all back around, you can look up

all the, the mechanics of it, but until you have experience, you don't know, I can teach a parodils, but until you've played it a billion times, you don't know where to chuck them in. Right. Or when to leave one out or add some, you know. Yeah, exactly right. Because you can use, if you're paying attention, if you're a musician,

you can say, oh my God, that, they're using that, And in that song, that's genius. When you hear musicians talk about that, I was listening to Deadwax podcast yesterday, Rye Lerner, and who's the guy that started Patreon? You know that guy, Jack? They started Patreon? Yeah, he's a musician.

Oh, no. He has cool channels. But when you hear really good musicians talking about analyzing a song and things they point out that you never would have seen, because, you know, we like music, but they can go deep. It's fascinating. And like you say, like, you can put a technique or something and apply it where someone doesn't expect it.

And then it's amazing. Right. In film, right? You can have, I'll just use this example. I don't know if it's true, but let's say Dune, which is the future and crazy, but then look at a shot and it will look exactly like the film noir shot that you saw that was filmed 40 years ago. But the exact same composition and contrast and lighting and the background and everything. It's the same principles, but they're updated. and they still work and it's all choices yeah it is that does i think i was just talking to

someone about this the other day where there's so many i think this is where youtube falls apart as an education platform what you need to do is just stock david mullin and just whatever he posts online just take that but um he's a national treasure i i was just talking to uh j holbin a couple days ago. And I was like, him and David are probably like the two foremost educators in the space, it seems. Yeah. An official godfathers have just here's knowledge. Yeah. But I don't know. Like David, Jay's joke was like, I think he has assistance. There's no way you're on all those forums all at once. And working and then finding time to just like taking pictures strolling back from work or whatever, right? And also showing the tests that he did. And also here's examples of how

we did that shot of this movie and that TV show. Yeah. God, Maisel looks great. Anyway, the, where is I going with that? Oh, you, so there's infinite beginners. Right? So it's easy to teach, here's how to expose.

There are very few experts. And when you're at an expert level, as a musician, as a magician, as a filmmaker, now you're basically asked to teach intuition and feeling and that's i think incredibly difficult to even attempt to try to tell other people to believe in themselves you know like just just trust you know the mechanics just trust your instinct yeah 18 like find your find your path and what your vision is and your voice yeah where do you think you uh what kind of filmmakers were you at when you because I saw this right before we got on you shot the losing my religion video

I did that's sick it's 1990 or so what where did you go what brought you to that video and then what made you go from there to like kind of designing your own boy I assume Zach was kind of a part of it because I feel like you guys have kind of built a look together but maybe not yes I mean you only can do so much in film school right because here's the thing Like, when you, any amateur, you can always put a light on a stand, but then it takes a next level when you can do overhead light, finally. Right. We've got spreaders.

Yeah. They'll already get bouncing in the ceiling. But here's the thing, like, the new, the new Vogue, like, those filmmakers are just bouncing lights in the ceilings and stuff. They're anti-ollywood. There's bouncing lights everywhere, and, like, it's hard to beat that. Right. I mean, Deacons does that or a form of that.

I mean, we all, he didn't invent that, but of course, he comes a documentary background. So a lot of time, you go, well, I just bounce off there and be done with it. But what happened was Tarsem directed that video. And I was also, he was in the same class as me and Zach in film school. So I did some of his projects, too. And then when we discovered space lights, like this thing, you can haul up on a rope and, like, we have top light now. Right. So we started doing some of that look for some of our weird, surreal projects.

And Tarsem's projects in school were very surreal and weird. So he did a few, right upon graduating, he started working on commercials and videos right away, even quicker than Zach, I think, because he was so savvy and he's so smart and talented. And he did several music videos. They're really good. And then I was doing music videos too at that time, very bad. And he got this R&M video, which not a lot of people knew, but I knew because, you know, art school guys. So I believe that the DP he wanted to use couldn't do it. And then so I came in and Tar Sam and a lot of people at that time, his contemporaries like Mark Romantic and Fincher, they would always go to Arcana bookstore and get all art books and let's do stuff like this.

I wouldn't say they're ripping it off because, you know, looking at great photographer's references, great, especially in that time of MTV where. let's do something artsy fartsy rather than crazy xenon backlights and smoke and whatever let's do some let's do art and there's a small group that i mentioned um and more spike yeah they're all doing that technique so tar sam even back in the art school was always either art books and photo books and like let's get this vibe so i probably don't have to mention the artist but there's two or three that you could probably tell the influence of on losing my religion, we had those books, and we're like, how do we get this look? So that was the springboard for all of that. The crazy, wacky camera operating was stuff I was doing on my bad BRAB videos on 16 mil. And for some reason, Tarcea wanted to use

some of that. Now, the funny thing was we shot that in 35, which was probably my first video on 35. And there's a big difference between using SR and that thing was the Canon, the Nangeneu Zoom that was everyone used. Anyway, you could whip that thing like crazy because you can just snap it with your hand, the zoom and cradle the camera. And, you know, it's almost like the can't touch this video. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Which I think Roger Tonri shot that. And I watched him work and I go, he's so good at that. Um, but then imagine going to Erie 3 with a thousand foot mag and a cook 18 to 100 and trying to do these snap zooms and land on things and without moving eyebrow on and everything so you're like instead of snap it's kind of like jing boring boring

and you can see that in the video and my hands or fingers are bleeding because i'm trying to do the snap zooms and on the on the on the on the yeah the neural yeah yeah i was trying to do that and it was pretty obnoxious but um so we incorporated that into the just very not photo graphic, not cinematic. I don't know what all this. Mixed with these lock-ops, mixed with these crazy, the crazy grading or Intellicini

and the colors and the crazy production design. Now, did you ever see that the Song Exploder episode about making of that video? I love song. Yeah, we should see it. They'd tell much better than I,

but the idea of that video was that Tarcane wanted to be like Bollywood. which he's a very familiar when I say being Indian. And so he had the different band members and Michael Stipe doing this kind of very Bollywood type poses and things and it was not working.

So at lunchtime, Tarsan realized it was not working. He went to the bathroom. I think he vomited. He goes, working. And he came out and he goes, this isn't working. And Michael Stipe

said, this is not working. Have the days done, right? Day one was the artsy stuff. Day two was just Artie stuff, no band. So Michael said, why don't I just do what I would do? I'll just sing and I'll just won't do much. I'll do a little weird trans dance thing.

I don't know. Let's see what happens. I threw all that footage away of all this cool stuff. And with him doing the cool stuff that you see, I'm just improvising. That's what that was. I have to say, there's one shot, and you as a DP probably notices this,

notice that this there's a shot where Michael's in a chair and then he gets he starts to get up you know how actors can fake you out with the stand-up yeah and he fakes me out and I tilt up and go past him like kind of cheekily cum beddle so and I go I screw that one up and it's in the video do you know the shot I'm talking about yeah yeah yeah totally just starts him goes oh that's hilarious let's leave that in amazing I was mortified but yeah every DP goes like that was a mistake they left in right yeah I I, so as someone, I don't know why I let David Fincher have this hold on me, but now I'm absolutely like the overshoot guy who like, if it, you know, where you, you'll get an extraction just so you can, uh, art direct the camera move. Yeah, you know, if they, if the actor fakes you out or whatever, I'm like, nope, I'm fucking tracking their head.

We're not, we're not missing it. I'm not doing this. Fincher's great. Yeah. He is great. The, but what, so that's the thing, I've asked a lot of DPs about this, where it's like that, that era of music videos, that 90s, early 2000s kind of was so experimental and so fun. And I, do you see a modern analog to that, uh, or, or are we kind of still in this era where it's like, I hesitate to say like studio mandated, but like, it feels like things are kind of rigid at the moment. I don't, I am ignorant so I can say, but I'm, I feel like I'm seeing less experimentation and a lot more rigid. It's funny because we don't all watch MTV all day, but we do have YouTube and whatnot, and I do see, I use some videos that are very impressive and cool. So I, and sometimes, you know, I meet young filmmakers that say they want to work with me and I go, like, don't you know you don't. Find the young, cool, innovative guys. Like, that's your job.

you need to find something new. Right. So I'm all the way, by the way, like Fincher, who is a little of both. Remember, he was doing music videos and using like Jordan Kronoweth to shoot the videos stuff like that, you know. Yeah. Perfect circle. Yeah. I can't say enough good things about him.

But I will give you this insight. When we started the music videos, no one knew what to do with the art form, if you want to call it that, or MTV. TV. I remember the labels just not knowing what to do. They knew nothing about film. So they go, you just do what you do, which is why people in those days could do those crazy things. And I was witness to this. Pretty soon, they were starting to get savvy, the music labels, and then the bad members, the drummer's girlfriend will make a suggestion, and they'll come on a set. And then pretty soon, everything was falling apart, and everyone had an opinion. And then that's when everything started getting diluted. And that's when it was no fun.

and that's when I got out of it. Yeah. But so there's a perfect analogy to, yes, you're just talking like the equivalent of studio interference was everyone had an opinion, whereas before it was just carte blanche. I mean, that's up to a point because there's one, I remember Tars have this idea for a band that he wanted to shoot the whole thing out of focus. Okay, yeah. Cool, right? I can see that note coming through. Right. That was where we went too far and they're going to go to that, but you're going to shoot. some parts in focus, right? And this is the thing about Darsame. And you go, nope, you didn't listen to me? Nope, I'm out of here, goodbye.

And he's always been like that. And, um, but he had crazy ideas like that. And, um, yeah. I could see that working if you do, because like the classic, none of the spines are facing me. There's a, is it Saul lighter who has all those photos of like the, the like condensate. on Windows.

Oh, you have it, yeah. I thought that was the word. Red Hurd song. But yes, yes, I do now. Oh, I have the Hurd song, look. It's right there. It's in the shot, look. Yeah.

Yeah, mine's all these. What the hell is that? But you see, it just gave. a thumbs up bubble just popped up on your screen not doing anything okay that's zoom as being that was weird

but yeah I can see you doing that whole music video if it was like that where like there was something very sharp in focus and then the action was out of focus and you had to like lean into that would be kind of cool right and people have done single shots you know in movies and in the video whatever with a little bit of that

I mean that's kind of zone of interest but not visually. Like, emotionally, that's what they're doing. Yeah, that's a fun thought. But so what post-music video, like, what were the kind of the DPs that you were looking up to? Or, like, people you were stealing from, basically.

Right then? Yeah. Or I guess becoming more modern, because obviously we had already talked about Zach and stuff, but, like, when you're left, or even on damsel, Like, do you, were you able to kind of get yourself to that project?

Back then, there was Derek Walski and Mark Plummer and people like that. Derogki is still one of my heroes. Like, even back then, you know, he was doing a movie and he's, we had lunch. And I said, please, can I do second unit on your movie? He said, no. A lot of people ask me, they can be second unit on my movies. And it's kind of, you don't want to do that. It's true.

It's not necessarily foot in the door. Who I look up to now? There's all the usual guys, but the guys that I really admire, I try not to duplicate them. The only thing I can do to try to do what I do is not do. I don't want to mention specific techniques or people, because it's not that it would be insulting, but it's more an opinion because sometimes I'll lie to scene and I go, okay, I know how to make this real pretty and we'll do the whole thing. and then I'll tell the gaffer like, this looks too pretty. My favorite term is this looks too good

and I just like to see their expression on their face. Right. Oh, you want me to be bad at my job? Thanks, dude. But you know what I'm saying, right? Yeah, yeah, of course. And one of the, I try to push the envelope and here's, I guess here's an example. When I did Batman versus Superman, we're doing the camera tests

and had Affleck in the bat suit. and I remember what we did before and I saw what Wally did who's a neighbor on the Batman stuff he's done with Nolan and I started with soft light like you do in a camera test

big and soft and you know you don't want to do too crazy just want to show the outfit for informational purposes for the studio wardrobe director and I realized that the soft light on Batman just made it look rubbery

and then I thought well why can't we do harder light because you know when you come to do he discovered soft light, right? And he was like, hey, it's where they need you that for 20 years. Right. Answer the magic thing.

So how do you take that, but then also embrace hard light and we'll go, what's the spectrum everywhere in between? So I go, let's, I told the guy, let's just, this point a hard light at him. Like sometimes, by the way, there's, there's no hard light on the set anymore. Right? Yeah. They have, okay, take those all LEDs and do you have any harder? No, you should ask for something.

Yeah. So you just got a big one K2. We can go find a YouTuber with a 600C. Right. Or that. Yeah. There's one down the street. We can go steal it from him.

That's why I have a trunk full of aperture lights. Yeah. So he did a hard light on him. And then everyone's like, wow, the costume guy and Zach, like, that looks much better. Yeah, it does. Because guess what? Ben Affleck, whatever age he has, has nothing to do with him. Once you're in a suit, it's black rubber, two eyes and, like, a mouth.

Yeah. Anyone's going to say, oh, my God, like, there's wrinkles in the lips, like who, and it's going to be nighttime. It's going to be under exposed anyway. We should go as hard as possible on Batman. And this may not seem like such an amazing revelation, but kind of what we did. My point is that you don't always have to default to what the prettiest thing is. Yeah. And that makes sense, by the way, because then you can do hard film noir nighty stuff.

I mean, obviously there's exceptions, not every shot, but, um, yeah, I forgot what point of that was. Well, I did, it didn't occur to me that, uh, because we kind of back and forth and talk about people starting, but, uh, in your opinion for the, the, uh, comic book films you've done, like, if you were to distill down for a student, like, what makes those films? looks so like Hard Light being one of them, you know, without thinking too hard, like what makes those comic book films look like that? Like, why does Watchman and Batman look like that versus, you know, Batman Begins or Dark Night? Besides, obviously, the different artists. I don't know. Well, in the back of my head, it's that huge BFX pipeline. Yeah, I didn't use as much highlight on Washman, but then again, um, I don't know. Throughout my career, a lot of people are saying, how do you get those amazing black, you know, those tones in the shadows?

Like, I don't know. I want to do anything special. I turn on the light and I'm not doing any special to make those black shadows. I guess maybe I'm just not using it as well. I don't know. I honestly don't know. I think it's not that hard to get those rich blacks.

You have rich blacks right now when you're fine. I'm not trying to be an ass. I just honestly don't know I don't think you are like I think there is a lot of kind of the example all use is like when people ask what what's this shot called and then you're like it's up over the shoulder I don't know and they're like no no no like what's it called when you do that you're like there isn't a name for it you just do it there's not this isn't a not everything has a name you know in the same way it's like not not everything has an explanation You know, it's like, I just, that's what it looks like.

Yeah, maybe it's, maybe it's because the set was dark. Yeah. I don't know. Or the colorist. Who was the colorist? Have you used the same colorist for like, if you were to like 300 and Watchmen or Bambion? Like, all of Zach's movies are Stefan, who are at Company 3. That makes total sense.

And a couple other movies without Zach as well. But, um, but lately I haven't had, with all those overseas work, sometimes there's stipulations you have to use this or someone from this country or in the case of 824 i'd use someone in new york for some reason um but but you always seem to be able to get what you want hopefully a few of my movies have been done by david cole at david cole at photocum he did skull island he did um rescue rangers and uh tomorrow war he's amazing I think he also did these movies you may have heard, such as Dune or The Bad Man. He's done those too and has a lot to do with the film out process.

Right. We couldn't do that because, you know, like, you have to be very powerful to do the film out process. But he does his best to get the film a glick on Skull Island and on Tomorrow War, if you look at them. They're pretty filmy, considering they're not film. I vaguely, I definitely saw Tomorrow War, but that was one of those movies that I was watching late at night, I was just, like, stoked to be watching an action film. But I just remember, I do remember watching Skull Island and being like, this looks sick.

Like, I didn't know you had shot it at the time. I was just watching it. But that film really looks great. Yeah, we spent hundreds of hours in that, D.I. We pushed that very hard. All kinds of tricks. All kinds of tricks. Really?

Well, we see the shooting as well, but not justice, not like, oh, fix and post. But also from, from the choices of lens, the custom lenses we had, that Sasaki made for us at Panavision. That's the other secret sauce, right? Is having Danzasaki on your team? Those lines that were so original and amazing. Like, no one knows where they are. I've never been able to use them since even.

But they took them apart. Part cook, part size is the craziest combo. And no knows where they are. That's a bummer. Well, they can't, you know, again, I think they probably just took them apart and put them in a different, I feel like unless there's like a huge

ground swell of support which would be really weird for like a specific lens set I bet they just rip them you know ditch the housing rip them apart and put them in a new set at the time but if I was a big giant DP then they'd be on the shelf or somewhere my house that I'd have been shelf somewhere

like my set of lenses you know like they used to those rehoused uh doone lenses what the Russian ones they the super cool that that that like burnished bronze thing sick we're sick I have to say I was I can't remember I think I was talking to it might have been one of your like second unit DPs this would have been a long time ago for Skull Island and in they were saying if I'm remembering correctly maybe I just watched an interview but I feel like I talked to this person that they were saying that like what was that?

that conversation. Oh, I think the pickup shoots they were doing where you just had to put like a bunch of fake grass in a, in a room and then just top lighted and like match stuff. Is that correct? I don't remember that. Oh, maybe it was like second unit or something, but. Oh, man. Yeah. Wouldn't be surprised. Yeah. Do I have any know? I feel like I literally just called you to chat, but I feel like I should have another thing. Good. Do you start wanting to talk about like artsy farty stuff and painters that I wouldn't be able to. Oh. there's an interesting one the difference so I I didn't watch Lost when it came out I still haven't seen it okay so I'm one of

four people in the world who never saw it but you put in war trust me but boy was that a big show but

I was interested what was the transition like for you going from multi-cam to single cam Did it make your life easier, harder? Did... Multi-cam to single-cam?

Like, coming off of a JJ Abrams show where he's got, you know, or even like Super 8, you know, where... Oh, you mean you go from single cam to multicam, though, but... Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, sorry, sorry, sorry. Because, nah, because Zach always used one camera, barely use B camera. Again, spoiled, because, like, the best place for cameras here. He also never did, like, two sizes at the same time, you know, unless it was stinty or some reason. Yeah, very spoiled So actually started before that

Wait, was Super 8 before? Oh yeah, Lost first, yes. Lost wasn't crazy multi-cam because I did the pilot, right? It was barely two cams. As the season went on, of course, there was more cams. It was actually harder to do Super 8, which was three cams.

Yes, but that is super hard and I've been slowly trying to learn that to do multi-camera and I'm still not good at it. I don't like to do it but at least you can kind of plan ahead if you know the director's going to want to do that and only slightly

compromiser lighting but yeah that's no fun. I'd much rather use you know one but I think most of the time when people use two cameras it's kind of they're the same angle that's what I was going to say like just the feature stack you know. Yeah But it was so often, you know, we're in a hurry and you've got to do this thing.

And then your 90 degrees, which compromise are like almost 180. And why are we doing this? So I don't like to do it. Although some people, they seem to be able to do it very well. And I'm jealous. I don't know. That's something they don't teach you anywhere. Well, I'm going to go and look at YouTube after this is over and see any tips for cinematic, cinematic shooting coverage in a circle.

Well, that's You got the other camera That's what I was going to say You got to learn your paintouts at that point Well, it's on the director, right? Because it's like do you Are we going to do the best shot? Are we going to compromise or

Or maybe not the director Maybe it's also the work of the day Sadly, it becomes things like that Can we make our day? Yeah. Priory, it looks good enough So I've learned how to compromise If I know it's coming, you can use more top light

rather than a shot where it's two over there and they want to cross shoot in, one person's total front line, one other person's in total bad client. But sometimes you just, you embrace that, right? And like you meant to do it. I was talking to Mezershmet, and he, one thing that kind of stuck with me was he was like, I guess the way he operates is kind of like, no one ever watches a movie and goes, well, I, I'm glad they made their day. Yeah. And I was like, dude, that is awesome. But damn, you got to be able to pull weight to be able to be like, shut the fuck up.

I'm shooting this. I don't care if we make schedule. God, oh, I did hear that actually. I listened to that last week. Yeah. Oh, did you? That was funny slash painful. Yeah.

You got to be up. And she like the remainder days. Or at least he's had two examples, right? and they're just both heartbreaking. But it's true. That's true. Yeah. I'm wondering, no, that's a, that's a question for,

or a thought for a different day. That was just going to get. Any who's, we talked about film. Would you have shot those, is film, if you had the option to shoot digital, would you have shot those superhero hero films on digital would that made your life easier? Or as part of that look,

the film, because it goes through that heavy BFX process, like you were saying. So, like, the image gets touched up so much. Would it have mattered? That's a difficult question, because I remember we shot, you know, Zach and Jay, you were both super film people. And right when I predicted Zach would turn, I remember one day I just said to a DIT who knew Zach, I go right around now because I was shooting digitally, my second digital feature, I think.

I go right around now I bet Zach would be open to digital and sure enough that weekend called me and say hey Larry can you set me up at Panavision and do some tests you know and he hasn't looked back and neither have I by the way like I've been on projects where of course the director wanted to shoot film

and of course the studio said no way so you know unless it's a heavy hitter that really wants to shoot film and we know who they are I don't know if I'll be doing another film thing so I've been I decided to just embrace the digital thing you know it's kind of the enemy at the beginning

Right. But I didn't really see it as an enemy. I saw it as a challenge, and there's a lot of things I love about it, you know? I mean, a lot of things. But I can think of one instance, and this is just going to show my ignorance. On Watchman, there's a scene where the SWAT guys break into Rochecks apartment, I come up the stairs. And at the time, I had my digital Nikon, and I would kind of just do shots within,

just kind of to get the idea of a shot was working out, not really, to make important decisions. But, you know, I had my meter and my spot meter and I determined what the shot was looking down with these guys coming up the stairs. And there was a dark stairwell because I metered it and I, you know, I figured that would be the exposure. So I took a picture with my Nikon.

I look at it and it's completely black. I'm thinking, why is that? Again, this is going to be a mirror saying, but the stairway was black, the SWAT efforts were black, the helmets they were black, the guns were black. everything was black something glad I took this picture

hey can we just open up a stop yeah they're like yeah no problem seems obvious right but it's little things like in the heat of the battle where um you know if that was digital

I mean now there's never I just love that what you see is what you get digitally um and that I can look at it and go okay this is 95% of what I think it's going to look like later. Roll, right? I feel like that's been the thing that everyone says is like,

oh, I, you know, a famous, uh, uh, deacons quote of like, now I can sleep at night. You know, whereas before it was waiting for dailies and just going like, oh, did I fucking, yeah, yeah, it's true. It is true. But I, I do feel like, and this isn't something you've done, but a lot of deep. seem to have fallen into the trap of digital cameras and LED lighting come or I shouldn't even say LED available easy to implement soft lighting has resulted in in very low contrast images and I think speaking of the children yearning once again I think they yearn for contrast hard light deeper stops not everything has to be 1.4 you know yeah no that that that is true I um But also you don't have to be, I mean, you can use no fill and see how contrast it is and go, okay, we don't need fill. Let's roll. This looks good. But what happened with actually not so much of the digital age, well, kind of. More the LED age. When I did Skull Island, where most of the units were becoming the LEDs. In the past, you know, that backlight's too bright and you'd make these calls like you put a double in the backlight. And you know that's going to be exactly one stop less. right right you like the singling and it's still in between can you back at the light of

foot and you're looking at it right but now it's digital you're not guessing but also you're not throwing singles and doubles it's not increments of half a stop or one stop on the Skyl Island I'd say we need to make that maybe half stop darker that for example and then I hear the guy for go and he saw you do the guy on the board op right uh what's your light at what what percentage okay come down 15 how's that larry uh little more is like okay five point okay that's good okay let's roll so like i don't even know the percentages i don't know how to say what is the number like come down how many points so now i'm this is what i do i don't know what other people do i go dark, but that's way bright, bring that down

a lot. Or bring that down just a little bit. Bring that down. At least my fingers, like this. They go, a little more. A little more. A little more. Okay, good. So I don't, it's weird, right? I, you know what, it's, I had not thought of that. But why the fuck don't like manufacturers

have a stop, stop option? Well, Neil now, back then they had to because you had only can make two different kinds of screens on the scrims, right? that that was arbitrary so also numbers are arbitrary but a hundred come down five points is not the same as if you're 20 come down five points I can't figure that out I'm sure

the kids can but now I just but what's good about is like it gives the gaffer and the board op they get to play more of a part instead of being robots yeah I like that I like that for to involve crew people so a little bit more and they're looking at it too they're next to me watching the screen right which is again a product

they can do this because it's digital because they're in the tent with me. I go, see, that's kind of bright, right? Say it's blowing out. And then he'll go, and then I like that, that people can be more involved, right? And then pretty soon, because they're doing that, they know my taste. And then the next scene, they're adjusting it without me maybe saying it. So that's a product of both the digital and the LED age of how you adjust lighting.

Also, by the way, because what you see is what you get, remember how before you have to stop. You have to run in and guys get a ladder and put the double in and they're mad. I'm always adjusting not only between takes, but while the shot's going on, that's just something I've never heard anyone talk about. We're looking at it and they want to roll. So I'm going, okay, yeah, can you just roll. And while they're going, okay, everyone's side of all like final touches. I'm still adjusting the lighting because I can see it, right?

Right. Even if we do it and they turn that way, oh, it's too bright. Slowly come down on that slowly come down. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And when they're resetting and they'll do it, you know, that's a whole different way of filmmaking. that doesn't exist 50 or 20 years ago. Well, just to why you're rolling.

Yeah, on the like iPad or what, you know, you got your luminary or whatever it is. You can just, although I will say, it only works now to your point. Because I think if you and I know who I'm talking about,

but we don't need to name him. Yeah. But the DP who was adjusting a light. Who was already thinking of that when I was saying that. Yeah, yeah. Because they had, I think,

I don't remember the specific. I do know the gaffer for that shoot. I believe he was putting a scrim in or he was moving it. And yeah, now you can just do it. And I'm sure the like motorized heads exist now too. Like people are using those, those movers a lot more than I would expect these days. Yeah, I've started doing that too.

Are they like photometrically accurate enough? Does it matter? They're not good, but they still have saved my ass more than once. on two movies we had the cavernous sets like for example on dams all these giant sets where there's no way to know

where the action was going to be in giant cave sets I mean gigantic so the Gavro could like these movers everywhere you know big ones small ones and then so

there's a guy standing there in a white shot oh man like thank God there's a mover there like that one or that one for the backlight that's two dead back that one

okay five okay brer can it you know the guy's on his iPad zoom in. Okay, it looks a little green. I got really good at this. It looks like two points green. Okay, there it is.

Okay, flet it out, soften the edge, put a little pattern in it. Brighter, darker. Okay. You can put patterns in them now? Yeah. And then that was like, you know, pick 30 seconds. That's so good for the distance. And sometimes a key light, like guys run like, well, we'll soften it when it's a big closer.

But for there, you know, like, that's a big closer, but for there, you know, like, that's That mover might work. Right. That's crazy. That's right on a stand over here, but then we do the close up, we'll bring a light in, right? But in a giant place like that,

how else can you do that? You know? Giant stage. That's fascinating, because I would have assumed that the, no, I don't even have an assumption for that. That's just really fucking cool. I didn't know you could put like goboes in them

or whatever, like cookies. Yeah. watery and even kind of branch-like so if it looks too much like a spotlight and you're in a naturey place or something like in the caves I was talking about you could put a very light texture in it so it didn't look so much like you know someone else follow a spot on them and by the way even when it's front light when they're walking through it then you see these kind of interesting kind of patterns and it's just instant right well and I guess nature isn't always you know the sun you know if it's bound to

around it's going to get polluted by something so yeah you're an underground cave it doesn't make sense anyway if there's any so it's another story well that that actually i think what was your uh gabron jim gurch jim gurch i don't know where i got the rest of that uh jim gurch the the the quote i don't know if i got this quote from you years ago or if someone else said it and jim stole it or what the deal was but the uh where's the light coming from the same place music's coming from I've used that for that that is that sentence alone has guided most of my filmmaking ideas is like I don't need to explain this it's just good yeah it's the soul it's not the brain you know yes and that he was amazing that way he's he's not with us anymore but I do believe I've heard that from other sources as well so I'm not I can't ask him but I don't know if he really made that up but we'll say it did that yes that sums it all up yeah well i didn't i didn't know he had passed so i'm sorry to uh bring that up on you but um what else do we have i have some this is

just random notes in here about nothing i saw that that book in the title sequence of from seven oh right uh uh oh like here's a weird i just have the doctor man Manhattan tank looks rad. I don't even know what that means. Not that all-CG shot? Yeah. I didn't think that was the greatest, but fine. No, well, so I think roll right under it.

It says the Iron Man tank looks better. Oh, did they do something like that? I can't remember. I think he's, if I have to remember, again, I was a little in my cups last night. I think when he like blows up, Iron Man like does that cool guy, doesn't look at explosions thing and he blows it up. And I, and I think, oh, okay, I need to continue reading, uh, 2008, that era of the kind of watchman era, the slash Ironman being like the happy medium between where film and VFX seem to have coalesced in a way that the audiences seem to like. Yeah. Whereas now if you even whisper VFX, people get all mad.

Yeah, they do. But they, but they love the work that like you guys did. And I'm just fascinated by that. That's not even a question. It's just something I've thought about a lot. It's like, why do you like it from back then, but not now? That is true. I've been noticing that a lot of, hey, every movie review, by the way,

whether it's just armchair, YouTuber, kid, or New York Times, they always mention the VFX. Yeah. C.G.I, they say. They were like, yeah, the CGI wasn't good. The CGI looked like it was in her. Like, it's part of the review, as much as acting or anything now. Yeah.

Just fine. Yeah, it always becomes a thing where, like, can you do it or why are you doing? Yeah, and there's always budgetary things. There's deadlines. I've experienced that. We're like, this is the doing the DIY. Like, this is the finished effect thing. Dude, like, they locked picture yesterday and we just finished this now.

But, you know, we're not out of time and money. What can I say? We're sorry. And then that's on forever. on the, I was going to say on the DVD, but it's, this forever somewhere. But by the way, that's an interesting thing. When your work, when DVDs and Blu-rays and all that came out, well, I guess almost any movie you can see.

But in the old days, when it wasn't that kind of thing, if you had a mistake or camera shadow or reflection, like you kind of lived with it, now is there forever, right? And only if you're a certain director, can you go back and paint that out before you release the, whatever? So you can see mistakes. you know um but people prefer them everyone gets mad well luc as being the obvious but like people want it see i i keep saying people i'm so i'm such a dork but like i'm i'm i have felt this kind of ground swell of people wanting granted the the push towards shooting on film or having a film

a literal photochemical film look um but i people seem to i think because we're so inundated with perfection all the time, whether it be a filter on Instagram or whatever. But just in life, everything seems to feel so perfection oriented or sterile that people prefer when there's mistakes that they can see or they prefer whatever film or they, you know, and it's interesting how the the executives have not taken note. We want more artists doing art stuff, the AI push, You know, and there's, before our conversation, there's a couple episodes that are coming out where I'm talking to Jay Holbin and Michael Keone

from Stratton talking about AI and stuff. And it's interesting to hear the various opinions on taking the artist out of the art, in my opinion. That's me editorializing. Yeah. It's interesting. It's not even a question, but I've been thinking about a lot. But it's funny because when I was doing,

Even back to Watchmen, I was thinking, which is only my, I guess, second studio movie. Which is wild, by the way. I cannot compliment you enough on 300 Watchmen back to bat. I probably have to give him Zach credit for that. No, you take it. I've never met that man. Okay. I mean, we're doing crazy.

Remember, like, there's front of the balcony zooming all the way down to the sidewalk and do a close-up of that pin? Yeah. I would say, like, you know, like, you should, like, miss the focus. You should I have a, you should have, like, a bump in the crane down because it's all CG, right? Right. Or when the thing is falling, I kept suggesting this, they were, yeah, maybe. But in the end, you know, I think no one was brave enough to do that.

Right. But I still ask for those kind of things, you know, I, um, little bumps, I even operate. Like, you always know it's a CG landscape because you see that flare in the corner, okay because they're like right that they'll confuse the people they won't be able to notice it and actually is just like bing cg not real and everyone does that i mean half my work's full of those i mean i didn't make the decision but you know that that that was the reason right right and then um you know the spaceship flying by you in outer space and it's always operated so perfectly it's right the second unit space aerial space unit their operators are the best because they fail it

There's a space, there's no rehearsal. The spaceship's coming by light speed, but they just nail that operating, right? Yeah. There should be a lag. And I've seen, I think JJ has done, other people have done it where it kind of is not perfect. That firefly. Yeah. And this perfect.

Or like the snap zoom. The only, no one told the second unit, space unit, stop with the snap zooms, right? Yeah. That's also. Nowhere in the movie. Yeah. Nowhere in the movie. Space snaps was down here.

But it's smart. And back in the day, because it made you think, oh, okay. It's not just a lockoff camera as well. So I get it. And it was actually, it's very clever. But it is kind of funny, nice mentioning that we've all seen that. But that's the funny thing, right? Because like everyone loves Fincher films, but he removes the humanity out of the operating entirely.

Yeah. But becomes evisible because you don't think, because you don't realize it. Only you and I know that. And the audience doesn't know that. audience has, you know, you just see a movie like social network and then you look at the VFX is like three minutes long, a VFX artist. You know, what was that? Where?

I have to say this is kind of funny story. A bunch of us were going to see a social network. And as we're walking in there, I go like, I wonder how many VFX are going to be in this. It seems to be just talking people. Right. And I go, and we're sitting down and go, Fitzger will find a way to do elaborate and visual effects. Just watch this. And then we sit down and like one of the.

Then three seconds in, like it tilts down from the starry sky down to university. And then we all just start laughing, like seven of us, right? And we're the jerks in the theater. Like, what are they laughing at? What's so funny? Right. It was funny to us because no one realized that. You're talking about the stitch up, like the six camera rig where they track him through the quad?

No, this is just a simple establishing shot. If I remember correctly, just the sky. And I think you just tilted down and then he's down there. Gotcha. Unless that's what you're talking about. I don't know. I think if I might I have it's been a while since I've seen the film but I just you know what I'm talking about right like the that rig they set up basically they weren't allowed to shoot at Harvard so they just went to across the street and put like six red ones in a grid and and instead of doing that move I think we're talking about the same thing instead of doing the whole move they just shot one giant plate essentially oh animated the the move in post oh see even more complicated than I thought yeah but just Just the stabby shot of just coming down with sky

where no one would even think twice, except we know that you can't shoot the star sky. But, yeah, but then, of course, there was like the breaths. Yeah, I found that one on a Blu-ray. Oh, you can tell? No. I didn't even think about it. That's good filmmaker, though.

I didn't even stop to think, like, you would go so, granted, I was like 18 at the time when that came out, but like 18, 20, but like to go that far, never occurred to me right but that's the genius of fidger right little things like that yeah but i get yeah i guess that all speaks to like that the right tool for the right film is the thing sometimes it does need to be handheld 16 mil you know verite versus absolutely and there isn't a i spent all this time saying like this is what people want it's like people don't know what they want i don't know what people won no one knows what they want but as long as there's

In my opinion, this is a great save. I think the most important thing is just having the artist, whoever it may be, director, cinematographer, their voice. As long as people can tell, this is the AI thing I was thinking of, as long as they can tell a person is talking, visually, whatever, that's it. Yes. Yeah. I agree. It's going to be interesting to see, like, in the future with the AI or, um, but, but then again, we've seen films and worked on films or it's almost AI could have done it because. Sure. It was like a committee, you know, decided the whole thing. Um, do you see it being, being, uh, at the level you are, are you seeing the kind, are you seeing studios kind of bow? Are you, like studios now? They're like tech companies. Are they kind of backing off and let people? I know, I've heard that. I've heard that. like Apple's pretty good at it. Or does it seem, are you saying that there's still as like

hands-on as ever? I've seen both. I've seen lately where, you know, had to shoot two or three endings. I've been on a movie, scarred of the whole third of the movie, the ending, or the middle. But then I also worked on, you know, I worked on this 824 thing last summer where the director absolutely did his homework, knew exactly what he wanted. worked so closely with me it was an amazing experience and the studio came by and they were hanging out for a day

and they go hey nice to meet you could see you and I go well you're not coming back tomorrow they go no no it looks like you got everything in control but other things we have to do other ones okay they're like wait hold on are we not

in the forecast I'm like really I guess that's a good thing wow you know I can't say enough good things about 824 or whether like that you know that was quite something to see because that has a director's hand all over

and my hand, and I can't, it's coming out the end of this year. It's called Death of a Unicorn, and it's going to be a weird one. It's 824, although no, like, male frontal nudity, and I don't think any decapitations. So I don't know if it's going to, it's off base for them. I'm going to see tomorrow and on. I'm going to see a Civil War. I can't wait. I'm interested in that as well.

I didn't, I had only seen, like, Instagram posts. And then I finally saw a trailer. I was like, ooh, this could be a fun one. Yeah, seem to be pretty commercial for them, but that doesn't matter. Alex Garland's great. And so it was Rob Hardy. Yeah. So, Oscar.

Isn't that his, I just saw a thing. He's saying that's his last movie. Who? Garland, he's over it. What? Yeah, apparently. I don't know if he's going to keep writing, but I think he said he's done directing. Wow.

And I was like, dude, you literally batting a thousand. I don't think you've made a bad film. what happened wow by the way you just see that weird movie where

the the the woman's trapped in that cottage uh ex machin no no just uh

it's one or two films ago basically all about some one woman and all those weird things happened to her oh my god you got to see that

that screwed me out one of his films a few days I was just wandering around a day is yeah it was the craziest film

wow that please the name. Yeah, we'll look that up later. The other one that I mentioned, like, obviously Shamelon is always

making something funny, but that whatever that, where they just have a bunch of people in a box in a forest, have you seen that trailer? So, that's coming? Yeah, I think it's coming out soon. I mean, I saw the trailer,

so it's got to be the next, but like, it's a bunch of people in a living room that's in a concrete box with a window on one side. And it's a one, way mirror so they can't see out but people can see in and like

monsters come to look at them or something I listen it sounds cool it sounds so cool like I I can't with that man like you make signs once and then everything else is weird and I can't stop watching oh my gosh

yeah that'll be worth saying that'll be a fun one probably should let you go have we started the podcast yet yeah are we going to record something. I did, I suppose to finish it. I did want to know like what actually got you into magic because for me it was magic came well before film. Yeah. And it and it took me being

I found an old journal last night that I was reading and it's really interesting to see how little I've changed and how much I've changed, but how insecure I was and becoming an adult, just every page in that thing. It's a five year journal and almost every other page is me talking about how sad I am and insecure and talking about it's a very strange it's a weird artifact but how old were you when you wrote that so this would have been 20 uh I would have been 15 to 21 and it's I took some screenshot like some photos of it because some of them are really funny but like everyone's talking about how kids are um depressed these days. And I'm reading that journal like, no, we've always, this has been, this is constant.

I now, I have a weirdly enough, a deeper understanding of the way kids feel based on my writings as a teenager. I mean, you know, I would have written something similar if I thought of writing it, but I'm kind of glad I didn't because it helped me forget those times. Yeah, I don't like you're right. You're right. The impression is like very fashionable right now. Sorry. but that is all to say this is by far the most interesting podcast because I didn't I was so magic was something I kept inside

because I thought I was going to get made fun of as a kid it was cool and then I don't know when someone started to make fun of me but I clearly just decided like oh this shouldn't be a part of my personality and then as I've become an adult in my 30s everyone thinks it's rad And I think Penn and Teller have something to do with that

Because Chris Angel did not help us No, for split second, per certain Yeah, he made it popular, but You can say again? Penn and Teller for sure. Yeah. Yeah, I got the old, uh, where is it, the three clubs tattoo. Oh, really?

Did you know that, do you know that three of clubs is hidden in a watchman and also Skull Island and also several movies. I have three of clubs card hidden in the shot. I love that. I don't know if I have that anywhere on the, I might have mentioned it like on Twitter here and there, but there's no actual record of it.

Yeah. That's so funny. Yeah. You'll have to, you got to send me like the timestamps for those or something. I got to find. Well, do you have stills I've taken off the monitor like from the send you. Oh, yeah.

Please do. I, uh, real quick. And watchmen, you know, when they, when they raid Rochak's house and he's scrably trying to find something. He's looking through the drawers, he's trying to find the hairspray. If you look through the drawer, you see linking rings in there and you see a three clubs there. Oh, he has like, I thought you meant like a book, but the literal linking rings trick. Yeah, because Moloch, right?

He's in Mollock's apartment. Right. But also they go to the flashback of Moloch doing a stage show when the gangsters get exploded. You'll see he's up on stage and there's a three club. floating a big card. That's great. Things like this. Anyway,

that's really, Matt, it's funny you say that because magic for me helped me because it helped me like when I was about to get probably beat up. I would just do a crazy magic trick

and then I would freeze everyone, at least in my memory, may not be true. Right. That'll shut people up when you suddenly, like pull your thaw off. Right.

Even today, it shuts people up when you pull your thaw. But for me, I was a nerd, so I was in the library all the time and then I was not only like at arts and sciences and whatever, but the magic, you know,

you see magic, but you're like, what? What? That, this is how you can look like you're putting, put a handkerchief over your thumb and then put needles into your thumb and people will freak out. And oh, you use a piece of carrot? That's pretty smart.

That's cool. I got to try that. There's all these little weird things like that. And I got a magic set for Christmas and it was always just not very serious, but I think college I had a burst of, always doing some kind of little magic trick and then I've always had magic books

and bought magic things but like I said when I met those magicians 15 or 20 years ago that sealed the deal because now I had access to all the coolest stuff and the coolest magicians and then yeah I mean that's my that's my second passion behind film for sure but it informed

I knew it mattered when my count and said, you know, all that magic stuff you use can be a tax write-off because it's obvious, even online and even like the podcast that you use your magic as part of what you do in your career and you're as a cinematographer. So it's definitely the tax write-off. Right. And it doesn't inform what I do and how I do have the time because I go, look, guys, you can just do this simply if we just do so-and-so, trust me. And, you know, half the time, they believe me half the time they don't. And then, you know, ta-da, Is there an example you can think of where like specifically like some kind of like tentative magic worked?

Obviously misdirection is a pretty good one. But like anything specific, not you don't have to. You're not from Texas switches to just. Oh, sure. Oh, here's. God, this is weird that this popped to mind. When we're doing 300, there's a low angle of a warrior kind of he's full of, I think arrows. and then he

breaks them all off. And I think it's in the trailer. Yeah. It's on the shield, I think, right? Yeah, yeah, that was it. That was it. So, obviously, you had to look straight up, but then you look right into our lights.

Right. That old thing, every movie we do this. So I'm like, hmm, now I go, why don't we just, you know those things that you put your trash cans on and take them to the curb, those things with the wheels? Those little truck, hand trucks, hand trolley.

Oh, sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah. remember when you're a kid like you put your friend on it and you wheel him around yeah so i go why just put the guy on that lean him back 45 degrees we're looking into the green screen that's already there and he hits the pieces they're all going to fly at us anyway it'll seem like we're looking straight up we won't really be looking straight up perfect and then they bring it over okay ready shoot it like okay next yeah the bfx would have made us do a whole green thing like this and do blah blah blah um and i used that actually in my life

Like two months ago, the same trick. Because we had to look straight up and it was leaking into lights. Just angle a person. Did you have the green screen in that most reason shot? Or did you just? Yeah, that was a green screen. Yeah. But we're all like this and all of a sudden, you know,

no one told me that on the storyboard you couldn't tell. That was a licking straight up shot. You couldn't tell from it was someone who was underwater. What is that? What was that? What was that? I'm telling you. I'm not touching anything.

What the fuck was that? There's no one in my house. I'm not even touching the computer. Speaking of magic, is no one listening to it on us? So hopefully. I'm on my screen. But I don't know because like,

all right, hold on, do a thumbs up. See if it does that thing again. Oh, you know what? I bet you it's because I'm using this the webcam app and it does have weird things in it. There might be some kind of hand gesture.

Oh, maybe. I don't know where they got the idea of balloons, though. That seems. look down here like stickers backgrounds effects

yeah because you know how you do hand signals like the DJI like the drone if you do a thing

or like do a oh yeah yeah do a selfie or whatever maybe I did something

or I said some we got to we got to watch the tape back there is I haven't webcom before so

it looks good is it what is it what is it opal this one was late night Instagram

purchases Opel C1 yep I don't know why I have it because I already have a webcam. It's like right above the built-in MacBook. It has an app that you can adjust the image. I always bought this. Do you have, all right, do you do this where the later it gets,

the more likely you are to purchase shit on Amazon? Oh, yeah, Amazon, Instagram, drunk, all those things. Oh, my goodness. You go up in the mail. It's like Christmas. You don't remember ordering it. Sometimes you order two of the same things. Yeah.

You got something you go, this is cool. Then you put it on a shelf and then you go, oh. You put it right next to the one you already have. I've done that with Blue Rain before. I'll tell you what, I've got 48 decks of these like B casino Bs that like, I guess this Chinese casino went out of business. So Conjuring Arts was selling them by the brick. Yep. That was a, that was one of those.

I don't use B. I can't, I can't do the, the, um, second deal. Yeah, no, I mean, just any of it. It's so, if you have a card upside. down. It's, it's immediately apparent in those things. So I just, yeah, but you're going to stop doing the double lift, so it doesn't matter. True. That is true. I have it circled right here. I'll help your second deal. There's a version, I mean, your top chain, there's a version of the top change, the mineral has where it's actually you put it on top of the deck and you pause

and then do the thing and that's where the beat will actually help. Oh, really, maybe, maybe I'll finally have a use because I love the way they feel. Right. But the, and they're also, like I said, thought like I will say about the nuggets do you have the oh you were going to make they they're a little too stiff this but why even play with them because those are worth so much money and you're going to wear it out yeah how many do you got uh I've got a lot of about a brick of them so I've got weird uh conjuring arts at one point oh um I got a green one I got a I got a gold leaf red one I came out with those But

I have two One was from Chris Kenner I'm name dropping And one one was from Michael Weber Oh fuck I haven't thought of Michael Weber in a minute Michael Weber Oh people should know Michael Weber was Ricky Jay's partner

In doing like effects for movies Including you know like Going All Way Forest Gump Et cetera Using magic principles to do effects That's how they made Sarge Corporal Dan

Corporal Dan Captain Dan Lieutenant Dan Lieutenant Dan You know Have the made the wheelchair With the make it look like you have no legs That actually

You just reminded me The when Wow This is such a weird thing To have suddenly remembered But I remember thinking Oh shit magic and movies At the same time

And it was the special of features Forst Gump When they were like To sell the idea That he had no leg They CGIed in Something that he had to whip past With his real

leg. Nice. He had, so he had the blue screen sleeve on his leg, and then I think it was like a table. And it was a CGI table so that he could physically go under it, but then they CGI the table and to sell the idea he had no leg.

Seamus. Jeez. By the way, I was on the set of Zemex's last film, last year. They're probably not allowed to say what it was. But I saw him doing Oh, it's not out yet. But do you know anything about it?

I interviewed his DP the other day, but I'd maybe not. Well, you had anything about it, Don Burgess? You didn't tell them? Oh, it wasn't Don. So, no, I don't, uh. Oh, I don't know how much of his public, so I don't know if I can say. But it's going to be, if I just told you the concept, your mind would explode. Really?

Yeah. You got a good one coming from him. God, what kind of hint can I drop without getting sued? The camera Never moves Ooh For the entire movie Interesting

And the entire movie is not real time Like one or two hours It's much more I hope I don't get sued Well we can Well I knew that before I visited So it hasn't been Common Knowledge

I don't think that's enough to Because we're you don't know the story or anything you know that's just a yeah but again magic like zameca's magician you know all the way so many things all the way even contact right the famous i love contact famous darrow go right up the stairs into the medicine cabinet shot yeah so good that what now now i'm just wondering is there a uh a film that has met oh christ almighty I forgot you did Now You See Me

Yeah, let's not talk about that Okay I was going to say As a bit I was going to say So it's not Now you don't What the hell?

What the hell, Larry? Couldn't call someone about that? But see, like Forrest Gump is more magical than that. Yeah. And

Is there a film that includes magic in it that you off the top of your head because there's like shade or like what's the other one? Prestige.

Well, that's an obvious one but blah blah blah. I guess they're all obvious aren't they? Prestige was okay. Sting. Yeah, that's good. It's hard because the screenwriters and people, they're not

really magician so it's always super cliche right? Right. Even now you see. me like even the performances and things they say and the things they do are so not how a good magician talks or speaks because it's a secret world so unless you're in that world you don't know what's possible and what it's really like um well it was to to your point earlier about like getting into magic as an as an as you got older and and it was it took meeting those people. I feel like the same thing

with set of photography, like you can learn all these skills, but until you meet people, I guess this is music too. Until you meet people doing it who have more experience than you or are maybe more intently focused on it, you don't know where the ceiling it. My reference is always no one knew skateboarding

could be cool until Tony Hawk did the 900. And then people started trying. That was impossible. So he did something impossible and everyone went, oh fuck, I guess We got to, now there's 13-year-olds doing 1,600s, you know, whatever. The street scene in skateboarding is nuts now. Just so many talent athletes.

But, yeah, it's like until you're around in possibility, you don't try. Mm-hmm. So it is cool to, like, be able to meet those. Hanging out at the castle in general is one of the most artistically fulfilling things. I think someone can do yeah yeah yeah I'm going Thursday night

it's been a while are you really yeah I should see if I can pop through the I don't I just don't think that like because the magic is vaudeville there's like nowhere in the world really or especially not in L.A. We're like

people are willing to buy into that or just hang out and talk about like film certainly is that everyone wants to talk about CGI. You know, it's like people going to a place to willingly suspend their disbelief and

dress up way nicer than they ever have. Right. Is rare. Yeah, well, it's very vaudevillians and dying art. Surprise is still around, right? When you think about, like, you don't see ventriloquists every day or people spinning hula hoops or spinning plates, you know, all that kind of

unless you go to Brookledge. I don't know if you know, Brookledge is. No. Rickledge is owned by the people that started the Magic Castle. It's the residence in Hancock Park, I think. And they have a theater in the back, and it was used a lot in the 20s and 30s. And so often they have a special invitation-only show there, which is almost like going back to the Bond Bill days. The performance is very rare that the public doesn't see goes there in music, magic, dance, blah, blah, blah. I don't know why I brought that up,

sorry. But the cool thing about magic is that it's become relevant, right? Because when David Blaine did what he did, you like broke a mold of the one stereotype of the magician being the dapper guy in tucks and the top hat. It's a street kid, watering the street in New York City. And he was doing stuff. And it was funny because he was doing a lot of tricks he was doing where, you know, tricks you can do, and I'm sure you did, or he can buy the store. But the thing that was genius about it was it looked like just a normal kid manifesting these strange things and people thought he was the devil thought that was real right only because the the paradigm was broken yeah still the cart tricks or making coins disappear but for some reason that was real he was the

devil that's how powerful what he did i remember the church is freaking out about the street magic uh like legitimately like the 90s were wild But now, like, you know, it's funny because people that came out and they said, Larry, that's the kind of magic you do. I go, it is? Yeah, you just kind of water around. You don't say much. You just do a thing and then you leave. Like, I wouldn't compare myself to David Blaine, but you're right.

My thing is organic. And I can't go in front of an audience and say, ladies and gentlemen, blah, blah, blah, this whole spiel and the rehearsed thing. It does feel organic because that's all I can do because I'm not a performer and I have stage, right? So it has to be organic or seem organic, which is the one common. and thread with that kind of speed magic, we'll call it, is. Although, if I pull out the cards and like, it's not like, it just came out of nowhere. I just happen to have those deck of cards in my pocket. But that kind of stuff is the most fun.

We had mentioned it in the email, and you don't have to talk about it if you don't want. But I think it would be interesting just to know, like, what your process was joining the Magic Castle because you had said you don't like being in front of people you know like you know performing for a single person is fine but like you know a crowd I think most people are are not stoked on but the whole point of joining the Academy of Magical Arts and Sciences is that you're gonna be in front of a bunch of people at some point yeah I think it was facing my fears you know I did know some additions that I would always have to ask them when they're going so I could go up there and they're saying like you should just audition I can't audition yeah you can

So thank God, you know, they pushed me because it's a thing of pride, I guess, or a dream come true. It's part of facing your fears. And nothing is scarier than having to go in front of a board of people than prove yourself as an adult. Right. As in my 30s or whatever when I did it. But that's weird. It's not something you would willingly put yourself through. Like a job interview, but worse.

It was actually more difficult than even the ASC audition, so to speak. That was the comparison I was going to make was like it's, I feel, I'm with you. I feel like that's way worse. Way worse. Because at least I could show my work and the show that I'm not a complete idiot, but where I couldn't really do that and the magic thing. Yeah, but those two dreams, two dreams that came true was being a member of the Magic Castle and a member of ASC.

So nothing left. I don't know. What else I can do? Well, the nice thing. is shared parking almost, you know? You can push. Just go to one or the other, depending on what kind of day it is. That is true.

That is true. I've thought about it, honestly, because I know I can, like, kind of sneak cheap parking at the Magic Castle. So, like, every time the ASC does a thing, and I'm like, I don't want to, the mall, you're going to charge me $70. Maybe I just park up at the Magic Castle that run away. Well, like, after the awards. But then, oh, the awards, you are dressed up.

Because if it's not an award thing, then you, they go, you can't be going to the castle because you have street clubs. Right. So, uh, yeah. It is funny to tell people like, hey, uh, you know, if you invite folks and you're like, hey,

dress like wear a suit and they're like, oh yeah. And I'm like, no, no, no, you're not listening. Drep like the nicest thing you have. Right. That was a huge thing. When I was an early member and I would tell people that and then people would show up in their hip club clothes. Like I told you.

They go, no, I can get in anywhere because they're talking about getting in some cool club right right the sunset strip or something and then like oh couldn't get in okay so much for that and i we're all going to go to denny's now that happens so much right or you say you make sure you eat first because they don't have food which they do now but yeah now they have thank god barb food and stuff but if you went without dinner um yeah so whenever i give someone invite i have to say three times you know and and forward them the page that says what you have to wear and i'll say it's very strict. You just have to say it over and over again. People just don't

believe you. Very famous cinematographer who's been nominated for Oscars. Wanted to go there. And he didn't listen to the dress code. And so he didn't go. Might fall apart. So yeah, still happens. I think

going back to the idea of like I think forcing everyone to dress up like that is gets people in the mood for like that's the first step into getting people to suspend disbelief yeah is there they're now probably out of their element but then everyone else is dressed nice so it feels like an event so you're already primed for something outside of your daily experience yeah you've made an investment yeah big one for a guy to for someone who lives in l.A. to put

on a suit on a summer night huge committee yeah they don't allow Oh, Lyndon, really. Dude, I remember one time I was in there. I got to let you go. This has been very long. But I remember I was in there. And there was, it's the first time I've ever seen them shut it down early. They closed it at like 11 because there was this.

No, there was plenty of people there. But there was this group of like, I want to say like 15 people that were all dressed to like flappers or something. And they got so drunk, one girl fell all the way down the main staircase, top to bottom. like popped up in the middle right under the owl bar and then continued to fall and uh i was like wow that's crazy and then i went and saw someone in the like close-up room and then when i came back out they were like getting everyone out they're like no more we're done here wow just because of one group yeah i think they they fucked it up for everyone because i was

like there's no other reason it was like a saturday well that does happen i was there one night where things went insane yeah yeah happens every so often. But it's their fault because they keep wanting you to drink because that's part of their income and then they become unruly audience members. So that's horrible. But then, yeah, then they have to shut the place down. Some of those late night shows are, I feel so bad.

Like, because I've been in there to film, like, a lot of magicians and usually in the close-up room. And it's like, it's funny to watch the arc. Opening shows, very quiet, right? Middle shows, awesome. anything after 11 p.m. or like 10 p.m. Yeah.

It gets bad. It gets pretty bad. All right. Well, we'll probably just have to do this again so we can actually record something. Yeah. 10 seconds talking about film.

Yeah. That's what I think this is either is going to be everyone's favorite episode or no one's going to listen to it. And I don't care either way. People. They're going to tear off halfway.

I better go back to Deakin's the deacons pot first of all shout out to James Deacons because she's clearly the driving force of that podcast but I will say they don't interview a lot of DPs I've interviewed 150 DPs they've interviewed like 12

yeah ancillary characters which is good oh it's rad but I'm just saying like you know if you're going to listen to a cinematography podcast this is the oh right because how many of you I've done I think your episode might be 150. Wow. But also the competition. Like, I would never want to be interviewed by Roger Deacons. Well, you don't have to. It's James.

We'll be in the same room, quote, it's too intimidating anyway. Thank God. They don't know I'm alive. I'm sure. But, yeah, they're all in the same club. It sucks. They don't give you a magic castle three-letter. You know, you can't be Larry Tongue, A-S-C-M-G-K or whatever. AMA. It is on my Instagram. Oh, is it?

AMA. Is that what it is? Am-P-A-S and AMA. A Academy of Magical Arts. Oh, okay. And seven clubs, by the way, because now I'm seven clubs, not three of... Oh, you got... Oh, nice.

Why the seven? Because obviously I stole mine from Ben and Teller. I was three clubs but then I was invited to a magic organization called the 52 and then you have to choose one of the cards there's only 52 members obviously

and three clubs was taken so there's only a few left and that was the closest one so starting from the Predator now seven of clubs and tomorrow war is in the movie

didn't make it in the chipm oh it could have made it in the chipmog movie we didn't film it didn't make the cut and of course damsel they didn't have any playing cards yeah um all right well uh we'll let you go thanks for hanging out with me uh i'm gonna you can if you have to delete this from your feed and like we'll start over talking about film i'm happy to here's the thing i didn't really prepare okay everyone out there it's his fault

yeah it is 100% my fault i literally just uh i was just so excited to chat with you i was like you know what especially because I forgot you had shot damsel so in my head I was like what normally it's like oh we got to spend about a half hour talking about whatever film they're here to promote but since you're not here to promote anything I was like you know what I'm just gonna fat with him because that that is the one thing I will say like I know we're talking about but basically what I do is I listen to other podcasts and then don't do that oh good so and I've been told by mostly guests because weirdly enough I only get feedback from guests I don't know the metric say people are listening. I don't. I've never heard from them. There's no feedback. Yeah, there's

apparently about 3,000 subscribers. I don't know if that's a lot or a little, but I've never heard from any of them. But all the guests have said that the more conversational aspect is more fun, because it's not, you know, you can get a PR, you know, what's it called press tour interview anywhere. It's like more interesting. My thing was always like, it's more interesting to talk to DPs about the people they are less than like Oh, do you use a 12 by here? Yes, I did, you know?

Yes. And if I was younger, I would probably listen. A couple of the other ones and then they get bored and then this. Because when you meet people in person, they're actually more interested in your personal journey or this and that or who you are. Right. How do you, who are you rather than talking about the latest lens or whatever? So yeah, I've listened to many of your, uh, I have listened to some

of the other ones and I don't often finish them, but yours, I, you know, I tend to listen to the end. I appreciate that, man. Whatever, but I'm not that. That's just going to be the pull quote. I'm, so I'm trying to, this is one thing I need AI to do for me. I want to transcribe all of them and then just create a Jay Holbin style book of like lessons learned and the type of people, but I, that fucking dude, it's like 400 hours of interviews.

Wow. Oh, that reminds me of cinematography books. People are always asking what to get. And I have all those. I've read all the technical ones. But there's a few that are about the person themselves that are the more interesting reads. What are they? Because normally I tell people get Shotcraft now. Yeah, things like that. They're just not technical. You do need the technical, obviously. But then after a while, you're like, well, how does you want to learn? Making movies by Sidney LeMay was the first film book I remember reading that I was. It was like, oh, the people make this. Yep. Yeah, that comes up all the time. It came up when I had Aussie Wind, I had lunch with him the other day. That came up. He talked about that book.

Really? So that book always comes up. When I young filmmakers, I always give them that book. That book just keeps on coming back. Astros of Light. It's a good one. I'm a little sort of that. But there's that big one on Starrara.

There's a big one. The biography of James Wong-Hau there, that's like an inch and a half thick, just finding out about people themselves. After a while, like, that's what it comes down to, right?

And about, um, biographies. Uh, you literally just, I had written down, I saw you bring it up in a different interview, the James Wong-Hau book and I,

and I put it, that was almost a fucking drunk purchase last night with, is it really expensive now? Is it out of that? Oh, yeah. Yeah. But,

uh, that was, yeah, I don't see, where did it? Oh. I might cut this part. I'm not going to cut literally anything else,

but I might cut this part out because it's a little. But you've said you watch YouTube. Yeah. You know Wolf Crow? Yeah. So there's an episode on you. Right? I assume you've seen it.

I'm going to say that I'm going to say something. Go. Okay. I appreciate the amount of research that man does, but his presentations piss me off because he, he'll read because I know because I've read the same things

right he'll open up whatever American cinematographer I don't know he's getting his read but like in your episode he goes Larry

always uses a 27 millimeter and I was like no he fucking does it but not this man yet and I know he doesn't like it's that weird that thing where he like and I've seen other creators do this

but that was just the one I ran into last night but like yeah it's hilarious they're very pretty like the three quarter key with a backlight. Yeah, and it's like,

no, I do that once. Okay, so I can tell you my story. It was a young cinematographer, I know, and he always wants to learn a thing, and he's too caught up in the house and technique and everything. But he keeps sending me, like, well, this was maybe five years ago, sending me those videos. He's always sending me YouTube, but he's like, I don't want

to see all these videos. And he kept sending me those. And I go, like, I'm looking at me, trying to watch them. I saw, like, Chivas and deacon stuff like it's like it's like what he's saying it's kind of like bullshit it's like we're not bullshit but it's just like not saying anything of value and he was kind of hurt like yeah like I mean imagine they did one of me that would probably the same thing it wouldn't really make sense then then it comes out right yeah of me and sure enough it doesn't really make any sense what he's saying there's one or two two things all the rest was speculation I don't know where

he got it and then I had to you know I show that to my friend and he he still doesn't get it by the way so so it was funny when he came full circling did it on me yes and it was not all accurate yeah so I I get it and he comes from a good place and it's hard but it's just yeah it's I think the main thing is like artists don't tend to and of any type don't tend to be prescriptive like that I'm going to use a 27 mil this is my lens you know it's it's paints for various easels or whatever. And I think the non-technical people are constantly looking for the, quote, unquote, the correct answer, all caps, trademark, you know.

Right. And I do get asked that, by the way, but occasionally, like, what is your favorite lines? So, like, if you were interested in Da Vinci, he read his biography, right? But you're not going to ask, like, where's the book that talks about what brushes and pants he used? Right. Who made the canvases back then? and whose did he use. No one cares about that.

But that's the weird part, right? People do. But they're none of them, but it's. Well, maybe we're as an asides, but you're not going to. But the people make, what I'm saying is like the people making the shit don't care. People who are. Oh, yeah, yeah. Ancillary.

The audience is, is interested. I have a TikTok because I'm trying to keep up with the youths. And I made one video about slates, half a million views. on and I'm like it's literally just me going like well you put you write it in here and when you go clap that's where the audio sings and it's like 700 comments of people going I had no idea this is incredible

like right they don't know that's so funny but that's a little easier to make a video about than trying to like detail someone's creative life down to an eight minute video but here's the thing why is that guy got set that's the biggest issue I think is that guys like that, but again, does this, clearly does his research, but the, but the presentation's weird. Get like a billion subscribers or whatever. And it's like, but now you're just spreading misinformation to the point that that because, and I'm not talking about him specifically,

but there's plenty of people who because of their following will spread some form of misinformation that then becomes the truth. Right. Yeah. And I'm all, I'm always fascinated by that where, like, there's no, there's at this point no point in correcting because you'll get a hundred voices telling you you're wrong. Yeah. That happens on Reddit to me all the goddamn time. I'll be like, no, that's not true. And they're like, where'd you get that?

I'm like, I fucking talk to the guy. Here's the link. But it's just like all those magic expose channels are the right. People just want to know what the secret was, what's the one secret why Dune is what it is, you know? What's the secret? There's no secret, you know? yeah trying to find out the magic secrets there's no one secret the cinematography or filmmaking there is no secret that's the thing was the masked magician a part of your life in any capacity

kind of in the sense that when it came out i go that's kind of interesting huh i want to watch it but it's kind of not cool so then i would bring it up to uh layman regular people out there And they're going, oh, that's so horrible. Like, I couldn't watch that. People live in, so many people said, I couldn't watch that show. It was just so disrespectful. That's incredible. Right.

And I like, I watched it. But the sad thing about that was, like, he got found out very quickly of who he was. Right. In the magic world, he has that thing. Oh, that's the thing that so-and-so makes. I must have rented it from him. I'm like, can't keep that secret. There's only one of the whatever crazy windmill girl comes through, you know, so many in existence.

And so they just have to make some phone calls. The sad thing about that was not exposing the magic to me. The sad thing was that guy was selling out his brothers for money. Right. And then using the excuse, well, if I, a lot of magicians have done this, if I expose it, that forces magicians to come up with better ways of doing magic. But anyway, he ended up, I was in Vegas with a friend and went, you know, now you have to cut this out because we're in a strip club.

and then I saw him watering drunk around in this strip club drunk and just wandering by himself in circles and it was so sad because all his friends disowned him and he just became an alcoholic

because he sold out his brothers for money and I think he got cancer I don't know if he was liber or not but yeah but it was so sad because he was so bad right didn't you see like

a lot of his exposés of close up magic he's shaking and he was a bad take and he didn't even do his second take you know, a lot of times he kind of running around. It was very sad. That's the sad part to me. Well, yeah, not only that, but like, for what?

Like, you and I remember him, but you're, Chris Angel, most people know. Yeah, you're right. He's been forgotten into the ether. Right? So you did all that. And it's, and it totally actually makes sense that people didn't like the layman didn't like it. Because we're going to watch because it's like, oh, what's this I doing? You know, you got to check in.

But like, yeah, I just, I never saw. That was one thing. That's actually one thing that I, that I am on the fence with Ben and Teller about is because they kind of have a similar thing like, oh, we'll just show people because it's old. And I'm like, yeah, but it's new to somebody. Yeah. Now they can elevate it, you know, like doing the transparent box or like cups and balls, like in a different way.

But they're making the audience respect it more. They're stooping down and, you know, they're insulting their intelligence. Exactly. Because you appreciate that trick more now. You don't go to your friendly go, oh, I know how they did in the cups, had an extra ball, and then they hide it when you're not looking. Or when, when Teller does that thing with a cigarette and different steps of magic, you know, makes you appreciate the art.

Yeah. Oh, their goal, right? Well, and especially if it's, if it's something that involves just like technical skills, like you can show people and it's they're not going to go home and go I can do that right and here's the thing about Penn and Teller

you know their show right uh Fooless yeah you know that's the reason of that is not to have a magic competition it's to get their openers is it oh no okay it's so they can get have the world see more magicians

had to get magicians that are known that well to get exposure so I always have my friends like who are your favorite magicians like oh well you don't know them you'll never see them right but how you can see them because now they've had an audience international audience and that's because pentatelloar love magic so much they're doing that for the magicians that's the real secret why they do that that's good you know who just got on there who I've been a fan of for a couple years now is Markobi French dude he was a champion of magic

like whatever that compromism like two or three years ago oh is the guy with the cards or with the cards real sloppy yeah yeah yeah yeah that was incredible that guy

that dude I think is probably one of the most in like because when we were emailing and I was talking about like oh I don't have like my patter down I don't have any of that I was like fuck that guy nailed it yeah I want to steal that now

but now I can't because he's doing it also the thing I love is handing out the there's such an inside baseball thing he did but handing out the kit cat because with the tight jeans you know and everyone sees the the box in his pocket and it's a fucking kit cat

I'm like you what's the joke oh so it looks he looks like he set himself up for a what's that go ahead sorry it looks like he set himself up for a packet for like a deck swap. Oh, is that what it was?

So he's wearing it. He's totally, I didn't get that at all. Oh, yeah. At least that's the way I took it. It's like, and you can see that, obviously, when he comes out on stage? He comes out, the shirt's too tight, the pants are too tight, and you see this brick in his pocket. So everyone's thinking, oh, there's going to be a deck swap. And then halfway through the trick, he pulls it out and just hands out.

It's Kit Kat, just hands that. I'm wondering about that why I ever laugh so hard. Yeah, because that was the way I took it. Also the false palm. That, okay, that, this is incredibly inside baseball now. But, but if you, I rewatch that thing a hundred times and he absolutely does that to the false poem. Like, and, but it's not, he doesn't do this, right? It's like really so subtle.

And it's just such a masterful little misdirect. It's genius. Now, I feel like I've talked more in this podcast. And normally I try to shut the fuck up. good now everyone will get to know you better yeah maybe we'll see we'll see um all right well i will actually let you go because at some point i do have i have a photo shoot i got to get to it yeah i got a couple hours but um all right man it's great chat you i'll stay in touch absolutely yeah yeah i'll see if i might have something on thursday but i'll see if i can't pop by the castle you end up going

okay yeah but there's no dialogue between you and listers like you can't say like the comment here if you wanted to hear us to get together again and actually talk about film. No. I, like YouTube in the comments below, there's no. That's the thing is all the... Apple, there's not comments or reviews on the Apple podcast, nothing.

Those mechanisms exist. No one seems to use them. You're too good for them. It's something I've thought about, like... You're super niche, which is cool if you ask me. Oh, it's incredible. Oh, it's super. I mean, how many...

There's like four cinematography podcasts. And Ilya Friedman from Hot Rod has literally... the cinematography podcast so I'm assuming his SEO is nuts yeah I was on that like seven years ago yeah it yeah yeah that's one of those there's so many cinematogers now there's so many new ones like yeah whatever that's definitely one that I listen to and go all right don't do that that's that's fine but yeah I guess that's that's what we'll have to if anyone makes it all the way to the end of this let us know. Let us know what you want.

They don't know where to let you know, but... Yeah. My email is so available. You know, no does email. Comments have to be like anonymous and lost in the blur, like an Instagram or... Wait, are you on Instagram? I am. Yeah, yeah. It's all got, yep, got one of those. Any announcement of when you put a new thing on? Any comments there? Nope. Every once in a while, other DPs, other DPs who've been on the podcast, every once in a

I get like a little flame emoji or like oh I worked with them okay yeah the newbies they're not you're right the newbies

they're not going to care about any of this oh well yeah I don't here's the thing I don't care this has been my favorite interview

but yeah me too honestly oh all right well yeah we'll keep in touch

I'll let you go I'm probably should it's about lunchtime anyway should get something to eat oh man

oh dude are you I'll cut this part out are you ever on the west side Yeah, occasionally not a ton But yeah, fine I live on Sautel

Oh, it's all the best food in the world So I was going to say next time I love it I've been going there my whole life So yeah, for sure Nogia Nogia is my jam I go there all

Nogia is a little strip mall Oh, it's a little market, right I blanked for a second But you know what's funny I When I moved So I was in college I went to film school

But I started working at Red Bull so I can, like, abandon film for a minute. But then when I graduated, I didn't have a reel. So when I moved back to L.A., this is like 2015. This is well after college. I stayed there for a while working at Rebel. So 2015, I moved back to L.A. And I needed to shoot something.

So I go to the Sujita, the annex. And I just go, can I film you talking about it to the manager there? This dude named Dikey. I was like, can I just film you making ramen and then you talk about it? And he goes, yeah, sure. to this day one of the like most viewed things I've ever made and I'm still pretty proud of it but like four years later

Sujita the person follows me on Instagram and I was like well he saw that like oh there's no there's no way you just go randomly find the man lives in Japan he doesn't live here like that's funny one day he was on YouTube and just went like oh cool and followed me and I was like

That's the best follow I've got on Instagram. Wow. This guy who makes the best around him. Yeah. But yeah, moral of the story, next time you're in here, let me know. We'll just go grab lunch or something. Yeah, for sure. I try to grab something to eat there like every so often.

So, yeah, for sure. All right. This is like, no, you hang up. All right. I'm going to go. All right. Great talk to brother. Look you soon.

Bye. Bye. Frame and reference is an Alabod production. It's produced and edited by me, Canny McMillan, and distributed by Pro Video Coalition. If you'd like to support the podcast directly, you can do so by going to frame and refpod.com and clicking the button to buy me a coffee. It's always appreciated. Thank you for listening and especially listening to this one because it was very long because me and Larry clearly are cut from the same cloth.

And I enjoy his company very much. I also wanted to give a shout out to Ed Moore for arranging this. Our first meeting, we have since hung out since then. So it's weird, it's weird listening to the first conversation you have with some of that you've then had many conversations later. But once again, thanks for listening. And do, you know, give us a shout if you have any comments because it's fun to start a dialogue.

Anyway, that's that for this podcast. You will hear or see us next week. Take care. Thank you.