Frame & Reference Podcast - 54: "Parks and Recreation" DP Tom Magill

Episode Date: May 5, 2022

On this weeks episode of the podcast, Kenny talks with cinematographer Tom Magill. Tom has shot a number of amazing TV series including "Parks and Recreation", "Angie Tribeca", "Saved by the Bell" & "Atypical." Enjoy the episode! Follow Kenny on Twitter @kwmcmillan Frame & Reference is supported by Filmtools and ProVideo Coalition. Filmtools is the West Coasts 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. Check out ProVideoCoalition.com for more!

Hello, and welcome to this, another episode of Frame and Reference. I'm your host, Kenny McMillan, and today I'm talking with Tom McGill, the DP of some really amazing television. You've got Parks and Rec. Hello. You've got Wilfred, loved that show. You've got Andy. Tribeca, fantastic, the Saved by the Bell reboot, amazing. He just did atypical. So he was a camera operator on the office. Just insane body of work on this man. And it was really awesome to talk to him because I don't tend to be able to,

I shouldn't say be able, I don't tend to talk to too many television DPs. And also, I don't get to talk to people who basically set a visual language for entire genre. So that was just really awesome to talk to him. And also incredibly nice gentleman. He and I hit it off swimmingly and, you know, along with talking about how he lights these kind of shows and, you know, his process therein, we get a little philosophical as we are always want to do on this show and, you know, talk about all kinds of things. So I really think you're going to enjoy this. Like I said, he's an incredible gentleman. I can tell why people like to work with him. So yeah, I'll let you get to it. Also, if you're watching this on YouTube, I'm only anamorphic

right now because I'm too lazy to swap out the PL mount on my camera because I was just shooting something. So these are Atlas Silvers. So if you want to say, there you go. There's a little exciting flare action. Anyway, here, that's for the viewers. But for the listeners and the viewers and everyone else, here is my conversation with Tom McGill. The way that we always get started is just kind of asking how you got into cinematography. Were you always a visual person, like were there films that kind of stood out to you, or did you kind of find it in a different way? Good question. I sort of realized this, probably my 30s, and I can trace it back to when I was

maybe four or five years old. There were definitely a couple movies that changed my life. You know, I'm a child of the 70s. So I'm sure a lot of people my age will have a very similar answer in terms of some of the films that inspired them. But for me, growing up, I had sort of a disjointed, disconnected relationship with my dad. And I always wanted this close relationship. And he just wasn't that kind of person. So I always sort of had this yearning to want to have, you know, that traditional father-son relationship. And there was a day I remember I went through my parents' bookshelf.

and there is this black and white portrait photo book called Children and Their Fathers. And I remember at like four or five. And it was from, you know, children and their fathers from all over the world, just different cultures, different everything. I remember going through this book and looking at these photos and just being able to feel something from it and sort of making up stories of what I thought the relationships were. And, you know, I projected so much onto these beautiful black and white portrait photographers that I would always go back to this book. And I think something in that moment clicked. And I felt like there's something that I feel in photography and I can express myself. And I didn't know anything about it.

And then grew up, got my first camera. It was like a film camera. It was one of these like, I think it was like a key. It was called Keystone something. And it was like the 110 film. And you would go shoot pictures. You'd have to go drop it off at the photo mat and wait an entire week. And then you go get your prints and look at them.

And, you know, it was like, oh, my God, I spent a day shooting Siegel in the school yard. Like it was nothing, but it was just a fun part of this photography process. So I kind of felt like since maybe age seven or eight cameras, something with cameras, I wanted to do photography, they didn't know what it would be. And I grew up in just outside of Philadelphia. So there wasn't a huge industry in Philadelphia. It was you did local news or there was one or two production companies and that was pretty much it or you went to New York or you came to L.A.

And growing up, I never felt like that was an option for me. So probably around when I was seven or eight years old, and I got my first camera, Star Wars came out. Of course, Star Wars, the first Star Wars, right? How many people have said, Star Wars for me? It was Star Wars. It was the first Ghostbusters where I was like, this is a funny movie, but it was a good movie. You know, I was a kid. And then it was also the first Superman.

Something about all those films, I just was looking at these movies. Like, what is this? I didn't know I wanted to do something with it. but it just stayed with me. So I eventually, through high school, I'll try not to make this a 10-hour story, but I kind of like went through high school and they had a media program

and I signed up for it. And I would, you know, they had like a local access school channel and I would shoot everything I could for it and edit everything I could for it and be as involved as I could. Did that all through high school. And then I graduated high school

and I had no money. And I didn't know anything about like art school. Like I could go to art school or anything. And in Philadelphia, Temple University was kind of the route. Everyone went, and they had like a pretty decent film and TV program, and that's where most people went. And then you would do your four years at Temple University and then hope to get an internship

somewhere and then start your career. And you would either move out of Philadelphia or you would work somewhere in Philadelphia based on whatever the industry would present, right? So I didn't, I couldn't even afford Temple University. So I just was like, I'll graduate high school, I'll do a year of community college, bang some credits together, kind of get through it. They had a film program, went through that, did my first year, terrible, hated everything. The courses weren't good.

I was not into it. And I finished the first year with an awful GPA. And I was like, oh, my God, what am I going to do? Like, I can't go another year at the school. So I decided, I'm going to take a year off. I'm going to clean my palate. I'm going to wipe the slate clean. I'm going to work full time.

I'm going to save enough money. I'm going to go to Temple University. And I'm going to really push myself to go the route that I know it was successful. for so many other people. And that first year that I took off, I got my first job editing news in Philadelphia. So I started as an editor, which I kind of look back and I was 20 years old.

So at 20 years old, having a job almost right out of high school for the most part in a fourth largest market I think it was at the time was really fun and exciting. So I was like, well, I'm not going to go back to school because this is ideally where I would want to be after school anyway, and I had no debt that I was worried about. So I'm like, I'm just going to roll with this. So I edited news for a couple years, and then that led me to a documentary company. The New York Times wanted to own, and, you know, like programming. So they started this little documentary company

in Philadelphia because it was cheaper than having space in Manhattan, but it was still close enough where they could work back and forth. So I started editing for this company, and they were doing like these video journalist type of things where they would have these little hi-eight cameras and they were trained really top-notch journalists all over the world. And they would send them these cameras and they would teach them how to shoot.

And then all the, they would go out and they would do all these stories from all over the world. They would mail all the footage and the scripts back to Philadelphia. And we would cut these stories together and then compile them into an episode of something and send it out to Japan or wherever, you know, these hour-long pieces.

So it was editing a lot of stuff that was poorly shot. Some of it was really good. Some of it wasn't. So as an editor, you're really learning like what makes visually a good story and what are the pieces you need? So I'll fast forward. They sell this pilot idea to the learning channel, back when the learning channel did, you know, more doctoral.

Actual educational programming. It wasn't like, yeah, just the crap. Oh, not crap. I don't want to say crap. But it's not what, you know, they took a shift. It's the fast food version of... It's the fast... Yes, it's the Big Mac of TV, of TV programming.

So they did this one-hour pilot where they were going to live in the University of Pennsylvania in the trauma center, and they were going to follow trauma doctor. It was going to be this super amazing documentary. And they had these digital cameras, these Panasonic, I want to say that they were like easy one or was the number. It had like this viewfinder. it looked like a really girthy toilet paper roll and the whole thing just sat in the palm of your hand

and it was a one man band thing and it was the next step up from like the hiate video so it was like mini dv almost but at the time which was mid mid mid 90s you know it was like a big deal and we got these cameras super eight right it was the next level up from from so there was also like a highate right which was that was the first one I had no I had VHSC and then hiate Okay. VHSC was even, I think, a better than high aid at the time. So we get these cameras. I don't know how the company got them, but they were like brand new from Japan. They weren't even released anywhere. And all the menus were in Japanese. So you're white balance, all your settings, you're like going to this camera. I think this is what you were just sort of figuring out. So they had like three of the video journalists, which were all one man ban. They'd done a month at this hospital. And they were burnout because they were doing 12-hour days. They didn't have a day off. They were working like weeks and weeks and weeks.

And they had this big company meeting. And they said, does anyone want to shoot this Saturday night? We're given, you know, so-and-so the night off because they're just burnt out. Does anyone want to just take a shift and shoot? And I had spent a year or two in the edit bay watching footage from all over the world going, I want to be in all this craziness. I don't want, like I'm stuck in a room. I liked editing, but I didn't like the kind of editing I was doing at the time.

I'm stuck in this room. It's dark. I'm getting fat. I'm eating like Sparrow pizza every day. You know, like it was just like not where I wanted to be. Like I want to be on the field. I want to be where all this craziness is of all this footage I see. So I raise my hand.

I go, I'll shoot tonight or Saturday, whatever it was. They go great. So they give me the lowdown on the camera and blah, blah, blah. And I take a shift and I'd probably go to work at like three in the afternoon. And there was trauma doctor that they'd been following. So the camera was you have the camera.

We had a little boom mic. that was mounted on top of the camera. And then you had, that was channel one and channel two was like the wire. You would wire the doctor. That was it. You had a little porta brace pouch with releases.

You do your releases. And they were like, just hang with the doctor. Whatever the doctor does, whatever happens, just go shoot that. I'm like, okay, great. So just by dumb luck, all these crazy cases came in this one night. I'm probably 21, 22.

And I'm just like blown away with being in this level on trauma center and just how gnarly it is and the stuff I'm seeing gunshot wounds car accidents just blood every like it was eye opening and I'm shooting my my heart out and it just so happened that the cases that happened to come in that night were interesting enough that they made the documentary documentary gets released it's good enough for series and tlc says we want a whole series of this series the series we're called trauma life of death and the ER. So the pilot was done at University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. And then they were

branching out and they were going to just do top trauma, level one trauma centers all over the country. And it was going to be the show that, you know, maybe it was a flagship show for TLC at the time. Who knows? Right. So they come to me and they're like, we need shooter. Do you want to go shoot on a series? And I was like, yeah, please, I would love to go shoot on a series. So from news to documentary to then shooting, I, that's kind of where I started. So I basically started. So I basically my documentary career as a photojournalist or however you would want to video journals classify it in this world and I lived in like trauma centers for a couple years all over the country and then that spun off into the same series with paramedics and just crazy shit I saw in

a couple years in trauma centers and that was gnarly it was pretty intense I was going to say that must have been pretty uh that that'll change a person that'll change your your perspective on life yeah and the thing you know you watch some of these shows and it was a very graphic show not for the sake of being gory but educational reasons it was amazing medically at the time and this is the 90s so who knows medically where technology is now with what they can do but it was fascinating you sort of get as you know you sort of get a little disconnected when you're looking through a view finder doesn't quite seem as real as when you the camera's down and you're just experienced you're looking through the camera and you're figuring out the shots I need and luckily

I had all those years as an editor because I was always thinking what pieces do I need? How am I going to tell the story and blah, blah, blah. They go perfectly. They blend perfectly hand in hand. So started as a shooting documentaries, you know, really sort of low budget, I guess, documentary stuff. And I was in Las Vegas at UMC trauma center doing the same show and I was sort of burned out a little bit. And I met a DP from San Francisco. And he deped, I think it was, I don't know what season it was. It was maybe season two or three, the San Francisco real world, when the real world

was sort of new and they hadn't had 30 seasons. And it was like this really big deal. And I was talking to him. And I'm like, by this point, I had moved to L.A. and I knew no one. I had sort of moved to L.A. to edit TV commercials. And that blew up in my face. And I was shooting. again. It was this whole weird thing. So he says to me, you know, you would be perfect for this company that does all this reality stuff. And this was back in the day when you could not find reality TV on your channel. Like you really had a search for it. It was the show Cops, which was maybe one of the first reality shows. And it was real world. And then they had this sister show Road Rules, which was sort of real world in an RV. And they were just travel and do cookie stuff.

So he says, you'd be perfect for this company and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I'm like, I'm dying in L.A. I'm dying a slow death. No one will return my calls. I can't get work, blah, blah, blah. I'll take whatever you got. Like, I just literally had like $200 to my life. I'm like, I need to work. Like, I need to do something. So I call this company, the company was Buna Murray Productions who did real world. Just so happens. They had a one of the road rule seasons gearing up and they needed a camera person. So I went in and I interviewed and I had like it's somewhat of a real. It was all this like gnarly hospital stuff. But they. We're like, great, you're hired. So they hired me to do, to be one of the camera people on that. And they're like, here's the deal. It's a flat rate. It's a six-day week. And it's a flat, you know, per diem, $1,500 flat for the week.

And I was like. In the 90s, too. I was like, I'm in. Yeah. That was the most money I'd ever. I'm in. You know, now I look back and I'm like, yeah, I was like, I was like a, it's a P.A. It's terrible. And we were working like 14, 15, 16 hours. And the cameras we had, you know, I went from this little DV camera. These were like these giant Ikegami, you know, beta cam things. And we would put these cameras on our shoulders. And we would film everything. It was like three operators, three sound people, you know, three big, you know, crews, more or less three crews. And we would never put the camera down. So.

You would, we would be working 14, 15 hours straight with a half hour break. This camera never came down. Tape would come out, another tape would go in. A battery comes off, another battery goes on. You never had a break. So I remember distinctly we were in Seattle starting the show, and I was just overwhelmed. And I got back to my room after my first day of shooting. I think we were shooting on the, they were the HLV 55s.

These cameras were like, I'm not even exaggerating, like 25 pounds. all loaded up and 14, 15 hours with this thing on your shoulder. I got back to the hotel room and I couldn't lift my right arm up. And I was like, this is like a six-week show. How am I going to do this every day? Like I was almost in tears. I was like, I'm never going to do this. You work the muscle out.

You force through it. You build up a tolerance. So I sort of went down this reality road, not planning on it just because it was a job and I needed to pay my bills. And I was like, well, I'm kind of traveling. and I'm meeting like really fun people and I went down this reality road for 10 years traveling the world and just doing crazy shows

and the quality of the shows maybe weren't the best in terms of content but the experience, the life experience in terms of handheld work and documentary work like we would shoot everything like documentary when it's edited it would all get condensed and it feels really kind of hokey and reality-like But the way it's shot is very true documentary style.

So you have a camera on your shoulder for 10 years doing handheld work. You know, you really get dialed into just the camera sort of becomes a part of you. And you can just sort of work. And, you know, you develop these skills of listening and reading people and kind of figuring out in these real life moments. Like, where do I want to be? I'm sensing there's a fight or I'm sensing something crazy going to happen. Whatever it is, you're in a crazy city and something's. happening in the city and you're in the middle of it. It's like, where do I want to be

to capture everything? Where's the right spot? And you just sort of have this sort of develop like this sixth sense almost of how to move and where to be and how to read people. And when you connect into like that flow, it's magic. It's incredible. I mean, no matter where you point the camera, someone crosses and you carry that cross to something else. And you're completely telling a story. You know, there are a couple times that's happened, especially in the trauma center, it's like organized chaos. Like someone will come in with a gunshot wound or part of their head blown off. And it's, it could not be more serious, life and death, serious.

And you have to figure out where you're going to be in that mix of seven or eight trauma doctors and nurses and surgeons. So you're not in the way of things, but you can also tell the story. And you just sort of like there's this rhythm that happened. So there's, I gained so much out of that documentary. reality world. So cut to 2007, 2008, I sort of run the course in the reality world. I was tired of living out of a bag. I wanted to be home more in L.A. and trying to figure out what I was going to do. And never did it occur to me. I was going to be a DP, maybe work and scripted. I sort of thought I wanted to try to make that jump. I didn't know how I was going to do it. And it's really hard to go

from that world into another world, you know, because they're different salesets. So I had friends of mine that had worked in the reality of world for a while. There was a guy named Randall Einhorn and another guy named Matt Sohn. And they had gone on and they worked on this show for NBC. It was called The Office. And it was documentary style reality. A little show.

Just some small little show. I think it was very small at the time. A lot of those shows don't really blow up and have a life until, you know, years later. But probably season two or three, that show, I think, really took off and became a big deal. So it was probably season six. They were starting season six of the office. And Randall calls me one summer right before they're about to shoot. And he says, Randall was making the jump from DP.

He sort of set the look of the office. And there was a whole philosophy on the way the camera moved and when it would zoom. and where you would find stuff. And he was sort of making his jump to directing. So he was going to be gone a couple episodes, directing a couple things. And then Matt, who is the B operator, was going to bump up to D.P. And they needed a B operator. So they reached out to me and they said, we would love to give you this shot.

If you can get into the union, we can guarantee you work on the show, like here and there, whenever we need people. And I'm like, my God, that's incredible. That show's amazing. and this is my foot in the door that I didn't know how I was going to do. So I had enough non-union hours to prove to join the union. I joined the union. And then they brought me in on the office.

And I would be there observing and watching and just I've never, never really worked on set. Like I would do some EPK stuff or behind the scenes of music video stuff here and there, but not really working on a set or coming up on a set. You know, there's sort of a learning curve on how things work because it's a whole different animal. compared to some of the other stuff I did. So just being on set and watching them work and learning how hair and makeup people work

and props, you know, it was like fascinating to me. So I'm just absorbing all this. And then they gave me my shot. And I tried to fit in as best I could and match the style as best I could. And it was so much fun. And I was like, oh, my God, this is the next chapter. I don't want to give this up. Like, I want to continue this.

So I think I operated. No one's fucking dying or fighting each other. Yeah. It's not blood being thrown all over the play. I'm not like walking through puddles of blood. So I do like six episodes here and there. You know, it's a couple of episodes that year. And then randomly I get a call from this other show that's starting up.

I guess there was a show called Parks and Rec that was going to start up. And they're kind of the same family, the same, some of the cross, some people crossed over. So they reached out to the office people and they say, you know, we're doing a show. It's the same style. who do you guys have, who using that is like your relief operators that can come in and sort of hit the ground running with that philosophy of shooting. And they passed my name along. I went in and I interviewed and I wound up on season one as the A operator and rode parks and rec out until season five until I got a chance to bump up, which I wasn't thinking that was the plan. I was just so happy to not be

living out of a suitcase being in like third world countries just fighting for for meals or do whatever it is and I'm like this is such a better life and I love the content I love the people and it's a different my skill sets carried over but it was challenging in a different way and on those shows you're as an operator you have so much freedom you know it's not like okay we'll this take hold the two we'll do a couple takes so we like it we'll punch you for the close up and you know the way more traditional stuff is done Right. Your camera, zoom lens, you're pulling your own focus.

You're reading your sides. You're learning the scene. You have to know, on this line, I need to be here. On this line, I got to be over here for this. You're whipping around. And they give you the freedom on the office in Parks and Rec. If you see something, you know, if you're over here and someone throws you a reaction, whoever, go grab it.

Like, you had freedom to find anything. So you were really sort of empowered as an operator on a scripted show to really just be involved in the story, almost like a character in the sense. The camera somewhat is a character on those shows based on how it moves. So you're the audience. You're the audience. You're seeing for the first time what the audience is,

and you're choosing what they're going to see and how they're going to react. And those little zooms just sort of add on those shows. I think they did, I think I heard on the office when they were, maybe it was the pilot or before the pilot, they were trying to figure out what that visual style was going to be. I think I heard they shot scenes handheld traditionally without any zooms or whip pans or any of that stuff. And then they looked at the scene and then they shot the same scene with the zooms and they cut it together.

And the stuff with the zooms and those little accents of movement felt funnier. And it made the show funnier. So this is what we're going to do. This is now the language and they sort of worked from that. So sort of having a, you know, learning a sense of timing and still you have to be in the right spot. It was amazing. So, season five comes along, Parks, sir. I remember season three I was operating, and there was a DP who was in there.

I had this memory. We were in Ron Swanson's office, Nick Offerman's character, and we were, I think, an hour behind, and we were trying to set up some special shot. And I don't know why we were behind. I don't remember that, but I remember how miserable the DP was and how they were just, like turning the screws on him like we got to go we got to go we got to go he was just miserable and he was sort of like barking in his guys like we got to hurry up sent me a topper here do this whatever and i remember just sitting there having my shot that they're lighting to thinking i never

want to do this i never want to be a dp this looks miserable like the pressure and the stress like i'll come in i'll shoot i'll have a blast as an operator i go home i don't take anything home with me and that's what it's going to be and i'm totally happy with that and i'll just try to work on really fun shows. And then season five, they were looking for DP and they were like, I've been here since season one and I know the show and they gave me the chance and it changed my life. And now I look back and I'm like, I'm now that guy getting peeled in the office trying to set topers at the last minute. You know, like that's me now. I'm that guy. Right. So that's sort of how I started as an editor doing news, had this weird whole middle part doing crazy stuff. And then I wound up

here I am 10 years later, shooting some movies, some, you know, mostly comedies. The intent wasn't when I was a kid to go, I'm going to grow up and I want to DP half hour comedies. Like, what a great life that would be. It's so specific. Like, it just sort of led me here. Yeah, the, you know, I've said, you know, when I was in college, obviously I was editing way more than I was shooting.

They were having us do kind of everything, obviously. And I've said, especially now later in life editing other people. stuff. Learning to be an efficient editor or a quote-unquote good editor has made me a better camera person probably more than studying cinematography. 100%. Especially editing your own stuff. Yeah. Well, and it just makes you so much faster, too, because you can sit there and go, I mean, it's hard sometimes if the client or the director doesn't believe you, but it's a lot easier to sit there and go, trust me, we're not going to use this. We don't need to set this up. They're like, no, no, it'll look cool. Trust me.

We don't. We're not, it's not going in the edit, especially if I'm the edit. That's been a sort of blessing on my lower end budget stuff is like, I'm usually shooting and editing. So it's like, I can just be like, trust me, we're not. Believe me on those one. That still happens to this day. And sometimes we shoot that stuff anyway. We're in some weird shot. We're like, we're never going to use us. Yeah. Whatever. It's part of the process. Yeah. Earlier when you had mentioned, the sort of like Star Wars Ghostbusters kind of era of filming. I've noticed that whenever we think, I mean, film is a relatively young medium, but it seems like at least popularly, we always talk about sort of that late 70s, early 80s, in the late 90s, early 2000s as being like these two eras of filmmaking that were really formative for most people. And I'm wondering, my theory has always been,

And that's when the studios were actually, you know, trusting directors to just make whatever they wanted. But I'm wondering if you have kind of a theory on why those two specific time periods were so good, let's say, for film. That's a great question. I don't think I have an answer for that. I would have to put a little more thought into that. There's nothing that just comes to me off the top of my head. Yeah. Yeah, because my thought was always like, go ahead.

No, it's interesting to be able to pinpoint it to those two eras. Yeah, in my head it was, you know, in the seven, and I could be making all this up, but from what I remember of film history, it was just like in that sort of 70s era, they were both spurred on by new technology, but also the ability for a director to take like a script and go, all right, I'm just going to make this in the studio and all right, because, you know, you had the Paramount case and all that stuff where they had to really distance them. themselves from all the various sections of the film, you know, distribution and creation and all that.

And then on top of that, bump into the 90s, 2000s, it was the advent of, you know, better editing techniques and, and, you know, visual effects and stuff. And I think that period where you couldn't rely on visual effects, but you could put in just a little something to make it extra in a background extension or whatever, um, an indie film Of course, indie film in the 90s. Yeah. Was there a movie for you in either of those times that stuck with you? Same thing.

No, I mean, it was Star Wars and Indiana Jones and Ghostbusters and all that stuff. And then in the 90s, it was, you know, the Matrix and all of David Finchers films. And. Yeah. Remember the first time the Matrix came out? What's that? The first time the Matrix came. The first one, it was like when the iPhone came out.

What is this thing? It's incredible. Yeah. it was there was a lot of plus I was what I was like starting to get into any film like Kevin Smith I know I'm not supposed to say this out loud but Kevin Smith's films really did get me into filmmaking because it felt accessible you know yeah I did have I remember telling a higher up at Viacom he was like a VP and I have it and he's like so what got you into filmmaking and I was like oh you know I really liked Kevin Smith stuff and he goes don't tell that to anyone no offense to I think Kevin would know one lie um but uh yeah it was like those those i really got into like those sci-fi fantasy films you know like chronicles eridic was a big one i really like that you know just like teen boy uh you know all that stuff it was built for me so i think i was it was sort of weaponized against i wonder what that is going to be what those movies are going to be for the generation coming up

now like in 20 years there's going to be some incredible filmmakers and they're going to go back to well, you know, in the early 2000s, this movie really affected me somehow. Like, I'm curious what that'll be. Well, I mean, the obvious answer is the Marvel films, but those are so polished and so micromanaged and everything that I'm wondering if that that accessibility doesn't feel like it's there, but it's also such a community-based, like watching, even watching the Matrix, like it was such a experience, but then also, uh, go. going and like finding behind the scene stuff or like it wasn't everyone's favorite film it it blew up and it was huge but after a year like it wasn't like everyone was going like i you know that's the best movie ever and i'm sitting there online like finding forums and and you know deep diving becoming part of the story basically but um yeah that right now film feels very uh it just doesn't feel as niche as as it once was in my head

Some TV feels that way for me. Like once Netflix got rid of, you know, like once you weren't mailing DVDs back and they had like the streaming service and then other streamers sort of caught on and followed and now all the networks pretty much have their own channels as well. For me, like TV really took a jump.

Yeah. With streaming, like just the level of quality, it could explode it because, you know, generally network TV, you have to have sort of a show that appeals to the broadest audience possible and now with all these different channels you can be very specific in niche with stuff you know what i think actually and this is probably a good thing and a bad thing but i would assume that the next generation coming up is probably more likely to point to shows

yeah i think so much because they're not going to they're not going to find an indie film or whatever you know they're not going to seek it out it's going to be what's presented to them and those are often going to be shows instead of films because the films are all like you know Disney products and these shows you know are hour long 13 episodes so they're it's like a 13 hour hour film almost some of them yeah so yeah the Lord of the Rings probably would have been a show if it came out to yes that would probably have been on HBO yeah it's fascinating to think it's something that I'm constantly thinking about because I'm like I always feel like I'm unstuck in time where I'm just like to quote what Slaughterhouse

I guess, where it's, I'm always, I'm not, I, I have a habit of not thinking about right now and thinking about what now means for tomorrow. And I, and I can't, I can't imagine that. That's like the opposite of meditation. That's anxiety, actually. That's what that is. Stress. Which leads to stress eating.

Yeah. Oh, man. We love a pizza. You know, I, I kind of want to, because you've done so much work in like the office and and your parks and rec and all these kind of things and just comedy in general i was wondering if you could give people sort of tips on high key lighting because it seems to the untrained eye that that's pretty easy you just throw a bunch of light in there and it looks good but it won't look good it's going to look cheap yeah and it looks flat yeah depending on where you are see there's and

here's something that i find that i'm really excited about the way comedy has sort of moved um i feel like the needle has shifted a little bit in terms of the look of comedies, even on network TV. When I was coming up, everything was very flat-lit, super bright, super colorful. And I think it was thought, you know, there is a theory that still exists that, you know, brighter, really poppy colors is funny. And that's what comedies have to be. And I feel like because of a lot of the streaming services and because of the different stories that you can now tell that don't have to be very broad and, you know, generic, you're able to give different looks to stuff. So for like the office in Parks and Rec, I'll speak morely on Parks and Rec because that's

where I spent most of my time and DP there, but it was definitely modeled after the style of the office. You know, they don't want it to feel lit. It's supposed to be a documentary. So a documentary crew isn't going to come in to a city hall and light up everything. You're just going to play off of overheads and pretty much maybe an interview, you'll set like a key light or something. So we were, when I connected with my gaffer, once I started DP, I met this guy through a friend. His name is Willie Dawkins. And he's, we call him Willie

Dawkins Gaffer to the stars. He's like phenomenal. He has done everything. And I was interviewing him and we were really connecting. I was telling about the show. And I was like, what's going to be really hard for you, Willie, is you're not going to really be able to do it you want to do. You're going to come in. We're going to light a little bit. But we're going to, but we don't want to light. They don't want to light anything. It's not supposed to feel lit. So here I had this incredibly experienced gaffer that I would love to light with, to learn from. And I'm like, just don't do what you would want to do. Like, we'll figure it out, you know. So he was like, okay, you know, I think that was sort of maybe interesting and something different for Willie.

So thank God, Willie's been my gaffer for 10 years, and he's phenomenal. But basically on those shows you have your overhead flows that you have that are giving your ambient that are cool whites or whatever you want them to be color temp wise and that's sort of your base ambient and then you're really just setting little highlights is what it comes down to I mean you're not really allowed to light because a camera could go 360 and you know we're shooting two cameras and a lot of it's cross-covered. So I can't put a four-by-four on the ground, you know, a booklight because I'm going to whip through it and see it.

It's going to break the illusion. So we had to hang everything. And a lot of the comedy world generally feels like that up until recently. So we would do a lot. We sort of got a system down and, you know, we were still trying to take care of the actors because the producers of shows or show creators would be like, we're not going to light. they're going to be in an office

and the camera's going to whip around and we're on a cross cover and it's going to be great and we're going to shoot like nine pages a day and it's going to be incredible and it's all great theory that we're going to head towards

how fast we're going to do everything it's going to be so fast and we're not going to light and then if you talk to the actors the actors are going to be like whoa whoa wait a minute we're not going to light especially some of our female actors

especially if they happen to be older actors they're not going to light so you have to light you have to take care of people but you're trying to do it in a way that feels natural, that fits into the tone of the show. And we tried to take care of people a little more than maybe we should have. We still weren't like blasting 20Ks through windows and setting like 250 toppers on people. It was still highlights and everything was from above,

but we sort of figured out our own language for the last three seasons that show that I'm pretty proud of and pretty excited about. And forever grateful I had the opportunity to bump up to. to D.P. something on that level. So talking about the comedies, it's a completely different world now. We were shooting Zoom lenses. Every comedy I had ever worked on at that point, it was a Zoom lens. Even if the Zoom wasn't in the language of the show, it was Zoom out.

We'll do the wide zoom in for the tight. It just saves times. You're not changing lenses. And a couple years ago, I pitched, let's shoot primes. Let's do probably make it look different. And they went for it. And I was like, oh, my God, like, I hope this works. Like, I hope I don't, you know, kill myself with changing lenses and getting in the way of the flow.

Because here's the thing about the comedy. And this is why comedies look the way they do. And I sometimes feel like I'm a adventure drama DP caught in comedy situations. There's, there's like a timing that has to happen in comedy. It's almost like music. Like there's a beat and you've got to get to the point. Like, the script is the music. on the page and the actors are just trying to get into the tempo to perfectly hit what's on the

page and that's just a tempo and you sort of need to let's go again let's go again let's try again like if you were in a band practicing it's like let's do it again play the song again play it again and you're just working out those little kinks and by hopefully the six or seventh time everyone is in unison and you have this great scene that's very funny but it's all based on tempo so to come into a comedy show and be like, we're going to have a 32-foot hydroscope. I'm going to start up here. We're going to boom down. We're going to catch this.

You know, like you can be really creative. But in the edit, it's going to be like high and wide, three seconds over, over 50-50, over 50-50. Like they had this formula that is proven in the comedy world where it's hard to break out of that visually and do things interesting because so much of the comedy is the timing and the tempo. A lot of that is helped out in the editing. they can control the pace of that and they can make jokes funnier, they can make things funnier.

So shooting comedy is challenging because you want to be a great cinematographer and bring something different to it, but it's all based on the comedy. And if the show's not funny, it doesn't matter anyway. People are tuning into a comedy show to be entertained and to laugh and to follow characters they like, they're not tuning in to be like, hey, we got to turn cheers on. Like, this is the best looking show I've ever seen. Like, you're going to love how this show looks. No one cares how comedies look, really.

But to be in that world and to be trying to change that needle where let's maybe shoot directional if we can and shoot on some prime lenses and, you know, maybe we do have the book light and we did key from, you know, just to kind of change it up. And there are a lot of other comedies I've watched that are doing that. I feel like it's slowly shifting, which is exciting. And I think shows look better now. Yeah. No, it's, and you know, that language that y'all develops with the snap zooms and the kind of

fourth walls and all that, like look at any sort of creative TikTok. They're all using that language. You know, it's, it's endured over, over a decade now. How long has it been? I don't know. I don't have to. Oh, me neither. What I'm just saying.

I do not talk, but, uh, all right, talk. with my mouth um but yeah there's just that that comedic language uh even people who are not filmmakers uh understand that you know intrinsically they and i think um you know how many people do i know that just have the office on in the background nonstop you know it's it's their safety blanket show um and i think if you're a lot of people the last two years during quarantine came back to that show. It's basically Comedy Central 24 hours a day. Right. They just rerun the entire every episode ever. Yeah. And it should be the office channel. It's not really Comedy Central anymore. It's just say the office. MTV has a ridiculousness. That's the only show that they ever play

now. They should just change it to the ridiculousness channel. But yeah, it's just fascinating how that became the thing. But to be fair, that's, you know, a product of the time and stuff. And like you're saying, now they're starting to push it a little bit. And I'm wondering, I'm wondering if when we finally make that, let's say, full transition to whatever this new look for comedy is, if people will do the old man shouting at Clouds thing of like, it seems too serious or whatever. You know, like it's not it's not what I remember comedy looking like. Yeah, maybe. And I think I've worked with some producers in the past that some have. kind of agreed with that like it has to look a certain way and i've dealt with it in color

correction too which is heartbreaking where you'll get the lights down you they've agreed you know let's go directional as much as we can sometimes we cross we get the lights down we we make it feel more cinematic whatever that is maybe it's you're instead of shooting at a five six you're shooting at a two now and you have side keys and you're not it's not super soft flat light and you have a little definition of a fall off on a side of a face, whatever. And, you know, we spend a lot of time on set, like trying to craft everything best we can in the time frame we're given, which is usually not a lot. And then you get to the color bay and you're sitting there and you're color correcting stuff

and you're like, this doesn't look so bad. I mean, for the fact that we had 20 minutes to shoot the side, you know, you're going through your head, remembering the day. And then someone goes, this just doesn't feel funny. make it brighter and then the colors turn to the knob and the colors go and the highlights go and they're like that's better and you just

you go oh my god we spent the whole week you know what I mean like 12 hours a day it was a 70 hour week we worked and we just went and just blew it out heartbreaking I've worked with some producers that have been on the other way I did a show

it's maybe to date my favorite show I've ever done it was a TBSC series. It was called Angie Tribeca. Oh, yeah. Yeah. It starred Rashida Jones. It was produced by Stephen Nancy Carell. It was like an airplane, naked gun. I was about to say it's very airplaney. So airplaney. And it was it was a parody on the one-hour cop procedural dramas. And it was dry as a bone, incredibly written. And they said, we wanted to feel like a drama. Like, it would be were to have that cop drama super bright and colorful like we want to match the tone of it visually so that was the first time like we were like oh my god we can really do some fun stuff and i think

that is maybe an example of a show where it worked perfectly because the show was hilarious and i sort of feel like it's either funny or it's not there there's definitely something to it like you can't shoot game of thrones like super dark and then have like dick jokes in there like it just wouldn't it's like weird, right? But there's definitely a balance where it doesn't have to be like bright, sunny day all the time, the colors are just jumping off the screen. Like, there's definitely a balance. So trying to, my goal is to try to push that whenever I can and sort of maybe redirect, even a little bit stuff I'm doing to try to bring it more current with some stuff. But that show, season two, the show, Andy Tribeca, the producer came to me. They said, we want to, season one was a little more traditional looking. Season two, they really wanted to push it. And he says, channel your inner. like, I forget the word, he said, like, you're an asshole D.P., like, pompous, whatever. Like, that's the kind of look we want. I was like, oh, okay, I wonder what that would be. And the tone was a little darker in the comedy.

So we just went for it. And we just have hard downsides and really, really strong key sides. And that looked great. We had so, we smoked up, you know, the bullpen, the police precinct bull, but we had so much fun. I thought the show looked good for a comedy. And then we got to season three. and they went, we're not going to do that again. We're going to go a different way.

But the thing that was fun about that show is they purposely changed the look every season. So it worked for that season, but it wasn't a look they wanted to continue for the whole show, for the whole run of the show, but every season we sort of did a different look, which was kind of fun because they brought new challenges and a new sensibility of creativity to the crew and my gaffir and key grip and everything. Yeah. Well, and that also speaks to, you know, a lot of people, I think, coming up are like when they think of a quote-unquote cinematic image, it usually is something bordering on noir, and regardless of what the script is. And so those are all perfect examples of the script dictating what the look is.

You know, your parks and rec is a lighter area kind of show, lighter area or image, Angie Tribeca, supposed to be at face value taken seriously. seriously. Yeah. Even though what they're saying is absurd. It's completely ridiculous. And we actually, our lighting setups for Angie Tribeca were far more quicker than some of the other shows we've done because we weren't setting fill lights for everybody. We were just set keys. So I was like, we just saved 20 minutes out of this lighting setup because we didn't have to set fill lights for seven people standing. And so it was sort of quicker. Like we worked quicker. That was actually going to be one of my questions was, uh, I assume you must have learned over the years, a few things, a few tips you could potentially share on how to work quickly but effectively. I have a great crew. I have an, I mean, my camera department, we've been together for 10 years, more or less. They're incredible. They work fast. My gaffer, Willie Dawkins, has an incredible electric crew. They've all been together forever. And my key grip, this guy named Tim Merle, who has an incredible team.

We have been, there's sort of a shorthand when you work with people long enough, and you can just sort of stay ahead of things. So for us, the show, we're finishing up a show Thursday. We're doing a Peacock series, a show called Rutherford Falls, which was a streaming thing. Before that, we were on the Save by the Bell reboot. Right. There's a completely silly thing that I never thought I'd be connected to in my life, saved by the bell, which was really funny.

But we have so much fun on it. So we're basically for us to work quicker. We're trying to simplify everything as much as we can, trying to get out of our own way sometimes. So, you know, half the problem is you go through a rehearsal and you're just trying to figure out where does the camera want to be. So once you get the camera placed, most of the other things fall into place for you. but when they fall in the place, we're trying to just simplify things because we don't have a lot of time.

We're doing seven, eight, nine pages a day sometimes. So there's not a lot of time to design these really beautiful shots and have lighting. And, you know, we're doing what we can. But what we're doing is sort of dictated by schedule and time and budget. It's not like we come in and they say,

okay, the day is yours. Like, make the show look incredible. Like we're working within very strict constraints, which is another reason. reason why I think comedies generally look the way they do. There's a lot of pressure to make your day and to shoot a lot. We would have, 10 years ago, you were shooting maybe 25 pages in a five-day episode, and it was very doable. And now, because of a lot of the streaming services, I think, and there's no commercials, we're now shooting 35 pages. So it's almost like you're adding a day

of work, but you're not getting the day to do the extra work sometimes, certain shows. So your days are literally seven, eight, nine pages cross cover when you can do what, you know, it's kind of insane. It's creatively, sometimes it's really fun and challenging another time. It just beat you up. But getting back to your question, we try to simplify everything as much as we can. Let's have a nice big broad source that does most of the heavy work. And then we'll bring in a fill and we call it salt to taste, depending on what that is, what the tone of the scene is,

what the show is, maybe the downside is a little stronger sometimes, maybe it's a little lighter. It depends on who it is, you know. We try to work efficiently. So given those eight or nine page days where we know we're going to be peeled all day and we're just trying to keep our heads above water,

we'll be in a scene, we're shooting a scene, and then we'll go to the AD and be like, all right, the next scene, where are we? Where's the camera? Where the actors? Or we'll take the director in a lighting set up. Let's walk the next set.

And then we'll walk the set. The director says, I think so-and-so's here. They come in the door here. They stand here, blah, blah, whatever it is. And then me and Tim and Willie go, all right, well, cameras here. Let's do this. This is. So we're sort of getting a jump and leapfrogging to the next set, the next stage,

and getting things at least roughed in a little bit, even though we're going to tweak them a lot. We do that a lot, and that saves us. no go ahead go ahead i was going to say how you know just imagining that sort of lineage going from you know the office to say by the bell how is technology made your job easier and how is it made your job harder that's a great question um it's made my job easier because I think the cameras have come such a long way and I never went to film's goal

so I never really grew up shooting film I was always connected to video somehow I learned on three quarter inch pneumatic the cameras were tube cameras so if like you went through a light there was this giant streak and you were like oh my god now we got to like fix it you know it was like a huge deal if you caught in the 70s music video look

yeah it was just smear everywhere So when, like, the CCD cameras came out, it was like, guys, you can point these in lights. Like, it was the biggest deal. Like, everyone was just pointing them in lights every because it's like it didn't break anything. It didn't ruin anything. But we had digital is I've been working on the Sony Venice pretty much since 2019. I did. And I know, like, everyone's on the Venice now.

I worked. I know what knows that? Everyone's surprised to hear that, that the Venice is like the camera right now. Yeah, not DPs, but like other people who are tangentially interested. It's the Alexa and the Alexa Mini and the Amir, like those are really the kind of the A was the Everest of digital cameras and they're beautiful cameras. I never got into red. I spoke to some colors when the red was new and there was a lot of issues with some of it through post and some colors for like the green channel is always a nightmare. And sometimes, you know, there was this thing.

And I was starting out my career and I'm like, I don't want to, I have enough problems. I don't want to deal that. never went down the red route, although I know it's a beautiful camera now, and it's probably perfect. But I just sort of veered toward the Alexa. And then I had the opportunity to do a feature and the Venice wasn't even out yet. And they approached us to see if we wanted to use it. They had a couple cameras and it was like the beta software of the Venice. And we sort of tested it out. And we were like, it's sort of a gamble, but let's do it. Like, why know? So we shot, I shot my first feature on, I think the feature I did was the first feature ever

officially shot on the Venice. Was that Moxie? It was Wine Country. Oh, okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was Amy Poller's feature directorial debut. So we shot that on the Venice on the very first beta prototype and had a couple bumps along the way, but it was just they were still developing software.

And once they ironed stuff out, it was incredible. And the tech support we had was phenomenal. nominal from Sony and it's so getting back to your question the technology saves me because I love the Venice because I love the dual ISOs it's a dual ISO I love I like the image it's it's they're all comparable you have the same dynamic range it's not like one is superior than another basically the same you're going to get a great image whether you shoot Venice red Alexa it's just personal preference to certain things right especially the grade yeah the the dual ISO because sometimes We show up and it's like, we're going to do nine pages today and we have two company moves and we're in practical locations.

It's like worst case scenarios. Sometimes I'll go to with Tim and Willie and I'll say, let's get a jump on the next set. Let's just turn all the practicals on. I'm going to go 2,500 base on the Venice. We're going to have all the ambient we need. We'll dim some practicals to get where we want and we'll just take like a little two foot esteratube. We call them torpedoes. We'll put them in like these little cardboard.

soft box housing with maybe some opal or whatever and we'll just slide a little key side in and it saved us we would have five minute lighting setups and we're waiting we're waiting on cast to go through the works so like we're ready to go like we're here ready to go just when they get here just put everyone through and it's literally saved my ass so many times being able to go to 2,500 and not having to light sometimes like I would prefer to light things and make things look a little better if I can but if it's the 11th hour and you have three pages to go, you know, you do what you have to do to make your day and survive. So I love that about the Venice. And I love, this is such a little nothing thing. The built in ND, it starts at N3. That is, that is not a little thing.

Game changer. Yeah. Tickin changer. I'm always like, uh, let's throw an N3 in. And, you know, trade comes out and everyone works quick. It's not like it really holds you up, but I hit a button. It's still like a minute. Yeah, it's like incredible. So it's such a small little. Well, and the Venice has the variable, right, where you can just like kind of micro millimeter your way into where you want to go? Or is it just, uh, that I don't know.

That I don't know. Is it just the FX9? It could be the FX9. Yeah. Unless my crew's lying to me. I'm going to see tomorrow work. I'm going to talk to it. I think it just three, six, nine, you know, it just works its way up.

That, that does sound correct because that's, I mean, that's what the C500 does. That's what the Alexa does. That's what no reds have built in Indies, which is silly. But yeah, those are absolutely the most important thing to me. If I'm buying or renting a camera to shoot on, it must have built-in NDs. Yeah, it's so great. It's so convenient. And I haven't had a chance to see the new Venice yet.

I'm super excited to get my hands on it for some project. Yeah. How much does the, obviously, the larger sensor just gives you a more, detailed sort of softer, not softer in the like a diffusion sense, but just kind of gradation-wise image. But how much does something like 8K matter to you? Let's say you're shooting a feature. Like do those higher resolutions really make a difference or is that more for maybe the producers or maybe the distributor? It's a good question. We've, you know, all the streaming services, everything has to be 4K.

That's sort of the standard, which is great, you know. I've accepted that. Yeah, you've gone from HD to now 4K. That was a huge jump. There's so much detail. Actors are going to look different. They're not going to like the way their pores. You know, like there's all this conversation for years.

It's too sharp. It's too sharp. So I'm happy to stay at 4K. If it's a project I'm going to do where it's going to be a lot of heavy special effects and all blue screen work or whatever, I'll happily go 6K or 8K just to have more info to work through the post process. But you're also, especially on the half-hour comedies, you're not doing a lot of visual effects work. And the higher you go in the resolution, you're just jamming up the pipeline with more cards, more drive space.

You know, there's, I think, a financial aspect to the end of that, too, based on what you're doing. And kind of the world I'm in right now, 4K is completely fine. There have been times we've rented cameras that do 6K for a certain scene because in the script it was, oh, this is a motion control shot. People get out of a car and they do this thing. And then we have to do plates of these people in different things. And the camera just has a continuous move. And then they will affect, you know, whatever the shot.

This was a show we did. And it was like, oh, my God, wow, that's going to be incredible. This is going to be so much from the shoot. And they were like, yeah, that's going to be a motion control. and it's probably going to take a couple hours. I'm like, okay, great, you have one hour to shoot it. We're not doing motion control. You know, so it's like, okay, well, what do we do?

And we basically landed on a variation of what was written, and we shot it 6K just to have the info, and then they visual effected up and came out fine, but it was a little different than what was written initially. Yeah. When you're in the grade, I mean, I've over the old pandemonium, over the Panda Sanctuary, I was doing a lot of color grading because I couldn't get out and shoot. So I had the skills and the tech here, you know, the calibrated monitors and

everything. And so I was like started hitting people up like, hey, if you have something that you shot before we all locked down, I will color it for. Or we all die. Yeah. I'll get it out there. And so I've been really interested in coloring over the past couple of years. But I'm wondering if there's anything that you notice when you're in the grade that helps lead to a more polished sort of traditionally film like, not film like emulsion, but, you know, television movie image. Is it all about sort of keeping the dynamic range kind of squished down but still a little stretched out or is it, you know, is it just, we throw windows on everything or what kind of

are you doing in the grade? It is a combination. I personally, as much as I can, I try to do everything in. camera as much as I can with setting flags or dimming practicals or whatever I can do because there's a chance I'll let something go and then I might not be in the bay when I need to fix it because maybe I'm on another job by them and other people are doing it and they're not they don't really know the sensibility of what I was hoping to do. So I try to do as much as I can in camera in terms of if I need to set some nets to knock a wall down or you know take someone's edge light down or

whatever it is but it's generally trying to provide my colorist um the best negative i can give you know so i usually under expose everything just slightly a little bit just so i have all the information there knowing we can pull stuff out and then it's a little bit of windows here and there the comedy world doesn't go crazy with its color correction but we're definitely i've been on some shows we do a lot of beauty work on some people and you know we you know we do a lot of the cut out bags under the eyes and make people look a little nicer certain shows i've done way back when you know that's something but it's i think it's more delivering a good negative to everyone that you can then really tweak how you want yeah well and that experience

shooting with on tape uh early on i'm sure helped helped you kind of conceptualized shooting digitally because, you know, at first, definitely the film guys seem to have a lot of trouble figuring out where to put the exposure on the sensor because it wasn't the same. So I'm sorry. The second part of your question was, and what made it, what was a, what was hard about it? What made it better or what made it hard? Well, now what made it hard is everyone's a DEP now.

Everyone can come up to your monitor and go, this, this isn't do this. We need a light over here. We don't need a letter here. That's too dark. We need to brighten that up. Like, there's not that, you know, I hear stories of like the Conrad Halls that people would be like, Conrad's on set.

Like, don't leave him alone. Like, let him just, and he's walking around with his meter and figuring stuff out. And there is sort of this magic behind shooting film and what you're looking at, but then what gets exposed on the negative. And then what you see in Daly's, you're like, oh, my God, that looked completely different

than what we saw on set. Like, this guy's a genius. But now you look at a monitor. And you're like, this is what it's going to look like. So everyone's DP now. And they're like, we don't like this, change this to that. So not, it's not all the time, but it happens. And I'm like, yeah, I've heard plenty of times.

Yeah, you know, you don't know what I'm saying. Yeah, it's, it is interesting too because now the, you know, I was, uh, have you ever read any of Steve Yedlin's, uh, diatribes or like seen as display prep demo or anything like that? No. Uh, fascinating. So his, uh, briefly, I mean, that he spent years and, years and years, probably decades figuring all this out, so I'm not going to be able to parse it

down easily. But essentially, his thesis is that with film, there was one pipeline. You exposed it and it came out and you had very minimal ability to change. But now with digital, you're not beholden to the off-the-shelf look that a camera gives you. It's just data. You can, it's, it's, all cameras are, yeah. So you can, once you get in the grade, do whatever you want and make it look any way that you're trying for you know no one camera is they give you different starting points but they're not like inherently changing the image and so uh now that um cinematography is kind of has one leg firmly in post and one on set it it can be incredibly difficult so i've heard because i try to do my own stuff to try to explain to people like oh maybe you know maybe this

is just a viewing lot this isn't necessarily what it's going to look like there's still like a whole half that we haven't done yet that you just have to know. And I feel like that's where the cinematographer's brain is now. It's not behind the eyepiece anymore. It's like thinking about the grade, putting a good data set. Yeah. Another thing that was sort of a wake-up call, sort of along those lines, which I'm going to try to connect with, is you think, at least when I was coming up, like a cinematographer, like you're just, it's images, you're telling the story visually and you're doing all that. It's so much more than that. It's managing people. It's, it's it's less of that. It's more managing people. It's more the politics of the production and

just dealing with people than it is more, you know, like setting frames and lighting. And, you know, there's so much more to that than what it was. And a lot of that is sometimes calming people down and being like, it feels a little dark now. It's not going to be that way. Like, it's fine. Or you're reassuring other things about the frame. Like, this will be this way. will look that way. It's a daily occurrence. Do you have a DIT onset usually? I don't have a DIT.

It's, I wish I did. And here's something really interesting that someone told me. We work off of REC 709 that just goes out, comes out to the camera, goes to all the monitors, and that's what we see. And we're just trying to balance everything best we can for that. And it's just something to look at rather than just the raw image. So having a DIT is a luxury. I've had a DIT once or twice, and it was great, but shows don't want to pay for it,

mostly because when you get to the pipeline, you do whatever you want. Anyway, and I've been in color correction sessions where our color says put his grade on. And, you know, this isn't a season one show. Maybe it's been going a couple seasons. And there's just, they're not happy with, it just doesn't feel like the show for whatever reason. the scene and they'll say go back to the dailies like we liked how the dailies looked and i'm like the dailies are just rec 709 they're not that's generic and they're one camera's a little green the other one's a little red like don't look at the dailies like we should be figuring it i hear

that that's sort of a struggle sometimes that you're dealing with yeah that's challenging but someone someone told me once um because you can create a lot and i'm going to try this at point. You know, you have an idea what you think the show is going to look like. Maybe you have a lot in mind. You want to sort of affect something with put it on, create it, whatever it's going to be, and put it, and I've had a producer tell me this works. So I'm kind of interested to try it. Put the lut on whatever you think it is. Doesn't matter. Hopefully it's not crazy enough where people freak out. But you'll spend your time with the Lut through dailies and this frame grabs that get sent out

and the post process, people will slowly get used to the way that show looks rather than the rec 709. You've been living with this show for months and months and months. And then all of a sudden you get to the color correction process. And if you do something that's not quite what the lot was or vastly different than the let you had on,

sometimes they go, this doesn't feel like the show because they're so used to what it looks like. And interesting story I had that I heard, I assume it's true. There was this NBC show called AP Bio, which. Interesting grade on that show. Right? Really interesting grade.

I remember watching you going, wow, this is incredible for a network comedy. And it wasn't even streaming. It was on prime time. Had this super interesting grade. And I heard that that's sort of what happened. Like they sort of put this lot on. The DP sort of interpreted the show. Like, this is what I think.

It was a beautiful. looking show for a half hour comedy, but it had such an interesting color grade. And by the time they got to the actual color grade, I think I heard, I hope I'm correct. I heard that they were so used to that being the show that they left it. And then that was the, that was the look. That's what the show looked like. Yeah. It was very like pastel and kind of, I feel like there was a lot of cool blues in the, in the blacks, too.

Like, it was really creative and unique for a comedy. I kind of liked it. I really like. Well, geez, do you remember the, the like sort of what I heard called the vice effect, which was everyone was shooting log, but no one knew how to color it. So it just went out that way and people started to get it.

Oh, man, there was a whole, there's like a whole genre of TV shows, not like television shows, but like vice type stuff or music videos or just kind of maybe lower budget things who were inspired by that where they were shooting log, didn't had no clue you know about color correction

no clue that the image wasn't finished and that became for a while there like the professional look quote unquote because these professional cameras were kicking out this super low con thing and so they're like yeah that's how we know it's fucking

you know like luckily resolve is free now so people are starting to get into it is that what you use you use resolve for yeah yeah yeah Yeah, yeah. Premiere is not anywhere nearly capable enough to like, you can do very big. Even the way it handles exposure isn't like correct.

You know, it just like it's, I feel like everything in Premiere is very gross, you know, like in the, not gross like, like, in the, not gross like icky, but just like it's aggressive, you know. Okay, right. And whereas resolve is very subtle in very many ways. But also, like you're saying, like making your own luts and being able to load them into the camera. And I come up with like probably two new looks a week, just goofing around with like test footage that I have. And it's a lot of fun. Yeah. I need to sort of experiment more with that and sort of see if I can push some things on maybe some future jobs that it would sort of fit with and sort of see if that theory really holds true.

Yeah. I mean, I've definitely heard of everyone gets, everyone gets married. to whatever they see first and then anything that changes they're like how but i like because i assume they're talking to themselves into liking whatever it is yeah because everyone's always stressed out like oh is this going to for me that that's good that would be like one camera slightly green the other one slightly like magenta it's like no no we don't want that to be the look we want to fix all that stuff it's like the producer goes like no i thought like this person's mindset was green and there's i like that yeah he feels envy

envy I envy having a DIT sometimes for people that have it do you what let me ask you the same question when you're shooting what are you exposing your stuff and you know how are you shooting it thinking

this is how I'm going to do X when I take it through the pipeline and color it on that so it does depend on the camera you know each each camera kind of puts middle gray slightly differently so based on that, it's kind of like, where am I going to put skin tones?

And so I primarily shoot Canon. And I've found that with the older cannons, basically all the way up until these brand new ones, like the C-500, C-300, C-3 and the C-70, everything before that, you kind of wanted everything really bright, near, not clipping, but like kind of up there. You wanted your skin near like 70 IRA, and then you'd bring it all down because the shadows were just fucked on those cameras. And so you brought everything down and there was plenty of detail in the highlights up until clipping and then it was gone versus the Alexa where you seem to be able to just chuck it into Never Never Land and you can always bring it down. But with these new cannons, I found that if you expose skin at about 50%, 50, 60, that seems to be like you've got so much dynamic range.

You're not worried about the shadows. You're not worried about the highlights. And once you get in the grade, that ends up getting pulled down a little bit, but you're really just kind of operating on either side of that, you know? Yeah. But it's kind of always about because, you know, especially coming out of the early digital stuff, everyone was always talking about like, oh, just, you know, exposed to the right, but protect the highlights. And that was true with the older cameras, but now because that sensors are so good. you're not having to deal with the shadows on any camera, not just canon. And you're not, um, you don't have to apply digital photography techniques to digital

cinema, you know, um, and there's just something about like if you overexpose, I found getting that good data set it, you can see, I'm sure you've seen this where like you can see if you overexposed skin just a little too much. There's just like a peak. It won't be too aggressive but there's just like it gets a little too bright on a highlight you're like no no no down from there and then the image ends up looking a little too dark but it's like when when we hit the grade it'll be fine which is why making your own lutz is helpful yes yeah and which is also why i tend to i think lean towards under exposing things a quarter of a style you know whatever it is i think oh the other thing that is has changed the game for me too is uh false color on my mind oh my goodness

You know, we meter the key in the backlight, you know, we'll get in the ballpark and sort of salt to taste as we say. But I hit a button and I'm like, let's take this down 20 points. Let's see. I mean, I see things instantly. That's a game changer. Yeah. And for me, getting the, just changes. Yeah.

Just getting the flesh tones in that sweet spot knowing they're probably going to crank this later anyway. So it'll at least sort of help keep it within a range that feels normal to me, you know, is great. false color game changer it's it yeah it it's like spot i i spent so much time kind of pining over a spot meter and then right when i was able to afford one false color hit everything and i was just like well good for me because i mean like especially like being able to combat like if i if i've shot you know i have this like vintage nicor set i have a a icon f2 that you know was just my photo camera and so i have this big set of lenses and i've been using those on my cameras because they're full frame. They look really great. But sometimes you'll turn on false

color and you can see the vignette. Oh, wow. And so depending on what I'm doing, either I can just cancel that out, you know, stopping down or whatever. But like I've also sometimes like, if it's a white wall, I'll just punch more light until that vignette that the lens is giving me goes away, just in that spot where it's really visible. And then it's like, all right, that looks great. And like, you don't, in the grade, it looks fine. Are you filtering anything when you shoot stuff? You know, I did for the longest time. I was a big filter guy. And what's funny is when I first started, I was doing contrast filters because I was working on cheaper cameras, you know, a Canon C-100, stuff like that. And they were 8-bit. And Canon log, especially, that initial one,

is not really log. It's more like 709. And so I was just trying to squeeze as much dynamic ranges I could onto the sensor. And so I was buying these contrast filters and then that led me into diffusion filters. And then everything started to get really soft and fuzzy, but I thought that looked great. And then now, no, like the large sensors, the full frame sensors, like give you a soft enough image that I don't, I don't find that like filtration, you don't need it. And also, I used to hate like, don't do it in post, get it in camera. Certainly for lighting situations, that's true, but like you can mimic a lot of filters, not all of them, but you can mimic a lot of filters and resolve, especially diffusion, contrast filters, stuff like that.

And easily too, and they're not processor intensive anymore. You know, computers have gotten to the point where 4K footage, you know, XFAVC or pro res especially, very easy to grade and these OFX filters. or whatever, don't tend to clog up my system anymore. So it's not like a consideration when it comes to the edit. Like, oh, shit, I can't play back this in real time because blah, blah, blah. Because, you know, if that were the case, I wouldn't, I'd just go straight back to filtration. But now I'm sitting on a whole bucket of filters that I don't really use anymore.

Just keep them, just as soon as you're going to sell them or? There's still a look. You know, they're still, still nice to have. But I just in general, I'm sure there's going to be something where it's like we really you it's all about time though right like do i have the time to do that if not you know throw up throw up that's true pearl on their um glimmer glass yeah it was a big glimmer glass when glimmer glass came out and you know we wouldn't use heavy stuff but sometimes you want to help people out or whatever you know you throw a quarter or an a than a thing or something even

sometimes a half depending on who it was and the glimmer glass you could shoot you know if it was a day exterior and you were working with some people that needed a little help just take the little curse off some of the other you know like the some of the promis stuff you'd go to like a if you were to five six or whatever you start to see the bubbling in the glass read on camera the glimmerglass it didn't exist so i was like glimmerglass that's all i'm using so we did that for such a long time but now where we are with the grade and a lot of the shows i'm on well the one there's a colorist i work with is he's at a company called point three 60 His name is Patrick Woodard.

And anytime I have the chance to work with him, I can. He works off of DaVinci Resolve, and he's incredible. And we sort of have a shorthand. And the software is at a point now where it can recognize people's faces. So it'll pinpoint like eyes and nose in the mouth. And then it just sort of, you know, has like a little circle on the face. And if you need a little help with something, just like hit a button. And you can determine the thickness level of the help you're giving it.

And it's like, I don't need to filter anything anymore. I just go, Patrick, that's help. That's just smooth. It just like the littles, but you'll never even know it's there. You hit a button, Patrick, they're like, do, too, dude. And it's like, we're cruising. You don't, it's awesome. That's called the face refinement tool.

Is that what it's? Yeah. And it's, yeah, it came out like a version ago, maybe, two versions ago. I call that. I'm coming back to shoot next season. Because everyone's like, oh my God, I look so great. What's the trick? It's the lighting.

It's the angles. Like, if I ever told anyone, like, I just do the thing. Like, hit the button and, like, that's all it is. Like, I would, I probably shouldn't have just played that hand right now. It's a tool. I guarantee everyone uses that. Everyone, you know. And it's so quick, too, you're just like, it goes, face detected.

And you just hit track and it figures it out. It used to be like, especially if a face was moving, you would have to go frame by frame and then adjust the window. And now it's like, it just. Well, the big thing. future. Kenny, we're living in the future. Absolutely.

That's why I enjoy coloring, too, because it's like, it won't hurt my feelings if you don't like it. We can just change it. You know, as a DP, they're like, oh, I don't like that angle or, oh, this lighting looks like shit. You're like, oh, I suck. But in the grade, if they're like, yeah, can we change this? You're like, yeah, okay, whatever.

Like, doesn't, no skin off my teeth. But the nice thing I like about the face or front of it tool, too, is like, even the windows, even though the tracking is so good, if you're not careful, you get that halo effect. Yep. You know, I'm sure you've seen really obvious windows places and that. face or frame it, like, just like you're saying, the eye light or the bag removal or even just skin tone adjustments. Like if you don't want to make huge broad adjustments, like just changing even just like the color temperature on someone's face, just to nudge it right in the right

direction. It's money. It's incredible. Thank God. Thank God for colorists. Yeah. Well, and the crazy thing is resolve is free. Oh. I mean, the studio version that you work with is $300. dollars but uh you can get a lot that's pretty affordable yeah and it's and it's just to use like 4k and like 10 bit and uh some of those i'm sure face refinement is locked behind the studio version but 300 or buy a black magic pocket and they just give it to you they're like here you go have the software that used to cost 15 grand you know um the future is now uh we are what is oh sorry go ahead uh you no i was going to say uh uh what's literally the future going to be 10 years from out what are the cameras going to be

how are we going to be working on on footage we've we've shot in post like what is that going to be so i have two theories one it's not going to be camera i think cameras have pretty much peaked because how much more dynamic range do you need let alone want you know 12k doesn't who cares you know we're not going to yeah and we're there already you know um but i think the sort of virtual production, the Mandalorian style volume stuff, I think is not going to be the, it's not we're all going to be doing that. But I think your traditional studio stages are probably all going to be outfitted with some version of that. Not to take over like that first season of the Mandalorian, but to just supplement in the way that, you know, you can build a set and then just

have that be your set extension or whatever and you don't have to travel and you know returning to why all those stages were built you know we own it you just park it here it's cheaper instead of having to fly to bangladesh you know every studio i think should build a stage that is just a stage of just those walls so you can go in and do driving stuff or whatever you need it's just easily accessible on every lot for every production that would be amazing yeah Yeah. So I think that's a big part. And I think machine learning in the sense of editing, probably color, but like imagine, you know, editing this podcast. Right now there's no feature where when I talk, the camera switches to me and when you talk the camera switches to you in like Premiere, like an auto cut. Yeah. But there are things that are similar.

So I think that type of stuff is going to be more available where or the face refinement tool. That's like kind of a machine learning thing where it discovers faces. There's another tool and resolve where you literally just take a little pen tool and you just draw over like someone's body and you just select like hands, shirt, hair, face and it automasks it. Wow. And tracks it. I need that. I need that now. Before you post whatever you're going to do with this, do that to me.

a line through me and, like, clean me up a little bit. I could use a little. We're going to polish this up. But yeah, so I think, I think those virtual production screens and just machine learning when it comes to certain editing, but also color correction, I think are probably because at a certain point, and this is, I think, what is exciting to me, going back to the original thought of what was it about the 70s and 90s that were really cool, we're going to have all the tech and all the shiny stuff's going to be gone and we're going to have to go back to just filming

really good scripts. Good stories. Yep. It all comes down the story. And I, and I think that's really what's exciting is the writer is finally going to have their moment where it's like, well, we can do anything. I guess we have to care about the story. You know, no more like, I mean, it's, I love, you know, flashy sort of action. You know, your, you're John Wicks, although maybe John Wicks a bad example because that's like very specific kind of genre but like I like a quote unquote dumb maybe chronicles or just just spectacle you know I that's totally built for me but I do miss you know a little bit more of attention to to writing and making you feel a story you know what I've been doing is buying a shit ton of criteria in Blu-rays I've over the

pandemic I think I bought half their collection wow just to because a amazing films you know amazing curation there but the behind the scenes stuff I was raised on behind the scenes featureettes and EPKs and stuff directors commentary all that stuff yeah yeah I remember those days they're still here they're still making them it's just they're harder to find you know we're a little bit over but I really appreciate you spending the time we can definitely have you back and keep chatting thank you I had a great time yeah but we do end every podcast with the same two questions. One being, what is a piece of advice that you

were either given or maybe read somewhere that kind of plays in your mind a lot as you're going through life and working and stuff. And it can be cinematography related or not, but just one of those thoughts that keeps bouncing around. That's a good question. Two come to mind. You could maybe apply them however you want. One, this is more cinematography, especially in the fast-paced of what network comedies are in terms of production. I think it's an old carpenter's saying,

which is measure three times cut once. Right. The thing, which is have all your ducks in a row, have it figured out, do it once kind of a thing, right? So that's maybe one that subconsciously everyone's trying to do on set all the time as be as efficient as you can be. Another one, I guess maybe life advice,

is kind of someone told me once, follow the heart, you know, follow what makes you happy because you could chase money, you could chase jobs and make money, but in the end you're not going to be fulfilled or you're not going to be happy. If you follow your heart and you do something that you truly love and enjoy, the money will eventually catch up to where you are with it. So go after your dream, follow your heart, pursue what makes you feel alive kind of thing. I would say maybe that's some good life advice. Absolutely. Yeah. And especially the measure three times cut one's thing is like more broadly. Pre-production is really important, everyone. Have a plan. But second question, maybe a little easier. Suggest a movie for people to watch. That isn't yours.

Right. That would be very weird if I was like, hey, everyone, I got a great film. Moxie, you can stream it. Yeah, it's on Netflix. I think, well, okay, I come from the comedy world. You could say that's sort of the genre I've been making a living in. I'm going to go with a comedy movie. My favorite comedy movie of all time. It's a cult classic.

It was done in the late 80s, and it's midnight run. Great film. My favorite comedy movie of all time. It's so dry. it's so sarcastic. Like, I have to watch it once a year. And it's De Niro and, like, how brilliant are they together? Like, everyone said that, you know?

And there was almost a time they were going to remake it. They were going to do a sequel. And I don't think it really came together. I don't know how it would be. But it's a midnight run. If you haven't seen Midnight Run, and you're looking for like a really dry, sarcastic, fun, somewhat actiony, buddy,

like it's tops for me. That's a great one. Great suggestion. Yeah, the other, part of me has been thinking about rephrasing that question to your movie is in a double feature. What's the other one? Ooh. But it's like, I don't know. Yeah, that's also like we're not, we haven't really specifically talking about a specific film.

But yeah, man, again, thank you so much for talking to me. That was a lot of fun. Thanks for having me. It was great to meet you. I look forward to hearing more of some of your other interviews. that you have coming up. Frame and reference is an Owlbot production. It's produced and edited by me, Kenny McMillan,

and distributed by Pro Video Coalition. Our theme song is written and performed by Mark Pelly, and the F-At-Art Mapbox logo was designed by Nate Trurax of Truax Branding Company. You can read or watch the podcast you've just heard by going to ProVidiocoolition.com or YouTube.com slash owlbot, respectively. And as always, thanks for listening. Thank you.