Black Wrap

Incandescent film lights can get hot. So hot in fact that I have heard stories about filmmakers throwing a frying pan on top of one to fry up an egg. And I believe that. Because film lights, they get hot. While we sometimes use our lights to replace kitchen appliances, we sometimes use kitchen tools to work with our lights. I’m talking about one of the most useful film tools a gaffer or grip (the people on set who do the lighting) has available: aluminum foil. Not just any... Read More

Trainspotting

Although a great location can’t make a great movie on its own, it definitely helps. Locations are full of what BU film professor Mary Jane Doherty calls “compositional gifts” – the little nuances of a space that can be arranged in the frame in a pleasing, interesting, or dynamic way. Great shooting locations therefore lend themselves to some creative cinematography and a satisfying visual aesthetic. So great locations don’t make great films in themselves, but they... Read More

Standing In

Night shoots. They’re the most fun, often the most challenging, and always the most tiring of film shoots. Last Tuesday night, all three proved true. From 10pm to 6am, a truckload of BU filmmakers (myself included) headed out to the suburbs to shoot a car crash scene for COM Graduate student Padrick Ritch’s MFA thesis film “Limbus.” We had a whole street to ourselves (blocked off on either end by police detail) that became our film set. For the first... Read More

LED Lights & Changing Technology

In my post on the difference between film and video, I discussed the differences between film, the tried and true medium of the past 100 years, and digital video, the squeaky-clean, super-cheap choice of the twenty-first century. There is something uncomfortable about being part of the generation of filmmakers that will undo the technological traditions of generations past. At BU, we still offer courses that use actual film, but as more professional cinematographers make... Read More

Light Meter Woes

You can’t make a movie without light. Further, it’s very difficult to make a movie without a light meter. This is especially true when shooting photographic film. Unlike digital cameras, film cameras don’t show exactly what an image will look like when captured – they only show composition. A light meter – specifically an incident light meter – then becomes necessary to measure the light falling on particular areas of the frame so that the camera lens can be properly... Read More