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The Cinematography Podcast

The Cinematography Podcast

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Episodios
  • Jeff Cutter: melding the alien worlds of Predator: Badlands

    Jeff Cutter: melding the alien worlds of Predator: Badlands
    Nov 21 2025
    The Cinematography Podcast Episode 334: Jeff Cutter Cinematographer Jeff Cutter first collaborated with director Dan Trachtenberg on 10 Cloverfield Lane. Their successful partnership continued on the Predator prequel, Prey, which became Hulu's most-watched streaming premiere. Jeff and Trachtenberg found they had a strong bond over their mutual interests, such as films like Die Hard with “muscular” camerawork. As gamers, the two often use cinematic moments and cutscenes from both videogames and movies as visual references during pre-production meetings. For Predator: Badlands, Tractenberg created a previsualization (previs) of the major sequences. He and Jeff then discussed the overall visual tone and the right approach for the camerawork. A key thought exercise they use is determining how each scene could be shot as a oner, even if the final plan doesn't involve a single-take sequence. Jeff explains, “The exercise just lets us, it really lets you figure out who is the scene about? What is the context and what is the subtext?” He finds that it's a creative way to focus and narrow down the visual choices to make each scene distinct. Jeff built upon the visual foundation he established for Prey. For that film, he and Trachtenberg wanted to subvert audience expectations of a Predator movie, focusing on a naturalistic approach that relied as much as possible on natural daylight, firelight, and moonlight as the primary sources. Defining the Predator: Badlands look by color palette: -The Yautja Planet (Predator Home World): Jeff chose a distinct brown and blue palette accented with warm tones. The look is designed to evoke a sense of harsh but beautiful reality, defined by sandy deserts and stark rock formations. -The Planet Gena: Shot partly on location in New Zealand, this environment called for a greener, more naturalistic look, with a bluer color for nighttime scenes. -The Weyland-Yutani Base: This section connects Predator: Badlands to the larger Alien universe, notably through the Weyland-Yutani corporation and its synthetic main character, Thia (played by Elle Fanning). Inspired by the industrial, ominous atmosphere and moody lighting of films like Aliens and Prometheus, Cutter aimed for an industrial look dominated by cyan, blue, and green tones. See Predator: Badlands in theaters Find Jeff Cutter: Instagram @jeff_cutter SHOW RUNDOWN: 01:53 Close Focus 12:01-1:04:42 Interview 01:05:03 Short Ends 01:13:10 Wrap up/Credits (with a little blooper at the end) The Cinematography Podcast website: www.camnoir.com YouTube: @TheCinematographyPodcast Facebook: @cinepod Instagram: @thecinepod Blue Sky: @thecinepod.bsky.social
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    1 h y 15 m
  • Jeff Cronenweth, ASC: stepping out of the grid on TRON: ARES

    Jeff Cronenweth, ASC: stepping out of the grid on TRON: ARES
    Nov 15 2025
    The Cinematography Podcast Episode 333: Jeff Cronenweth Two-time Oscar-nominated cinematographer Jeff Cronenweth, ASC is known for visually defining modern classics like Fight Club and The Social Network. With TRON: ARES, he melded three distinct realities: the digital Grid, the gritty real world, and the retro feel of the grid in the original TRON. Jeff’s involvement with TRON: ARES began through his long-standing relationship with Jared Leto. After working together on Fight Club, Leto, who stars as Ares and is a producer on the film, personally asked Jeff to meet with director Joachim Rønning. Jeff found that Rønning had established a remarkably clear vision for TRON: ARES from the start by storyboarding every scene. Having a clear plan was crucial, given the complexity of the environments and the technical demands of the shoot, which included a challenging seven weeks of night shooting in downtown Vancouver. Jeff chose ARRI DNA LF lenses for their character, flare, and artifacting, even for the digital setting, and the film was framed for IMAX. The core challenge for Jeff was using visual language to differentiate the film’s three central environments, drawing inspiration from the franchise's past while exploring something new. 1. The Main Grid: Predictable Perfection Referencing the "pristine" aesthetic of TRON: Legacy, the new film's main Grid environment is defined by machine code—a world that is predictable and perfect. Look: Sharp, clean lines, saturated colors, and a highly geometric, mechanical feel. Color Coding: The classic blue/gray/white color palette is reserved for the good guys, while the presence of the bad guys is immediately signaled by the use of red. 2. The Real World: Embracing the Grit In TRON: ARES, for the first time, the computer programs emerge into the real world. Reality required a darker, grittier visual separation from the digital realm. Look: Shooting in Vancouver's downtown allowed reflections in large glass buildings to enhance the environment's texture. Practical locations, like a chase that concluded with lightcycles crashing into bales of recycled paper on a pier, further grounded the action. 3. ENCOM/Mainframe Grid: A Nod to the Original To connect back to the franchise's roots, the scenes where the character Ares ventures into the original ENCOM grid to find Flynn needed to match the look of the 1982 film. Reference: The 1982 TRON's grid scenes were shot in black and white and then hand-painted to achieve the glowing effect. To mimic this analog feel, Jeff intentionally doubled the amount of grain and desaturated the color, creating a look that closely matches the original. Light is both a symbol and a weapon in Tron: Ares. To get the look, visual effects, costumes, props and cinematography had to work closely together. LED lights were installed in costumes, props and sets, and practically controlled through a dimmer board. This gave the VFX team a base to build upon. The lightcycles, some of which were built as practical, towable props, had LEDs built in and connected to dimmer boards as well. The lights provided real, interactive reflections on the actors and surrounding environment. Jeff also used light beams on set to simulate a recognizer scanning a high-rise office. The VFX crew could then track and enhance these practical effects in post-production. Jeff's choices were crucial for the post-production team. “We all knew what the goals were and what the scenes were going to be about,” he says. “It was a wonderful experience because it took all of us to be in harmony all the time.” See TRON: ARES in theaters Jeff is currently shooting The Social Reckoning, with director Aaron Sorkin. Hear our previous interviews with Jeff Cronenweth: https://www.camnoir.com/ep150/ https://www.camnoir.com/ep72/ The Cinematography Podcast website: www.camnoir.com YouTube: @TheCinematographyPodcast Facebook: @cinepod Instagram: @thecinepod
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    1 h y 3 m
  • Cinematographer Dan Laustsen brings Frankenstein to life

    Cinematographer Dan Laustsen brings Frankenstein to life
    Nov 7 2025
    The Cinematography Podcast Episode 332: Dan Laustsen For nearly 30 years, cinematographer Dan Laustsen, ASC, DFF and director Guillermo del Toro have produced one of cinema's most visually distinctive collaborations. Sharing a deep affinity for rich colors and dark themes, their partnership has yielded five films characterized by an unmistakable aesthetic. Del Toro's idea for Frankenstein had been discussed since their work on Crimson Peak in 2015. Finally, del Toro let Dan know he was ready to get to work on Frankenstein. Dan re-read Mary Shelley's original work before reading the screenplay. While the script proved a very faithful adaptation, certain scenes were adjusted to better serve the cinematic format. “Because I think Guillermo is a genius director, when he asked me to do Frankenstein, of course I wanted to do that,” says Dan. “His approach to everything is so fantastic. And to me it's a story of love and forgiveness, it's father and son, it's not a horror at all. For me it's much more beautiful, for me it's really about father-son relationships and forgiveness.” As with every Guillermo del Toro movie, the color palette for Frankenstein was extremely important. Red, steel blue, cyan and amber dominate the film, but the beginning features creamy white and warm, romantic colors to represent the creature's innocence and the initial bond between Frankenstein and his creation. Crucially, these colors were not altered in post-production. Dan explains, “When we are coming into the D.I. (digital intermediate) of course, we are cleaning it up, but the color palette is exactly the same.” Changing the colors post-shoot would ruin the integrity of the design. “The whole color palette of the movie, the lights, the costumes, the hair and makeup, and the set design is so specific, that if we change anything in post, in the D.I., the whole color palette will change. So we never do that.” Del Toro also enjoys using timeless filmmaking techniques, preferring to use practical effects and capture as much as possible in-camera. Nearly all the sets were meticulously built in Toronto, minimizing the need for bluescreen. Exterior scenes were shot on location in Scotland, and the iced-in ship in the Arctic was a massive set mounted on a gimbal to allow for authentic motion. Dan and a specialized crew even shot all the castle exteriors in miniature, featuring practical explosions done on the small set. The Frankenstein sets were designed so that all lighting could be built in, either with practical fixtures or with external lights placed specifically through set windows. For the castle dungeon, Dan and his gaffer had to design a special rig to effectively simulate skylights shining from above. Dan kept the camera movement fluid and floating, shooting the entire film on very wide-angle lenses. “Our idea was to shoot a period movie, but shoot it very modern. The camera is a part of the storytelling,” he notes. The camera becomes the third dimension to the storytelling, lending it the ability to be part of the action rather than a stationary, distant observer. Every shot was specifically designed and executed with a crane, a hothead, or a Steadicam, using just one camera. The wide lenses captured the entire set, which was critical to Dan. “Because the set is so beautiful, and the costumes are amazing. Everything is very organic, and we really like to see that as much as we could. And to move the camera again is storytelling in a dramatic way.” Through his enduring partnership with del Toro, Dan has framed Frankenstein and his Creature's story not in shadow, but in the unforgettable light of forgiveness. “Love and forgiveness are very strong things in the movie and the world,” he says. “For me, it's not a horror movie at all, it's a love story.” See Frankenstein now streaming on Netflix. Find Dan Laustsen: Instagram @dan.laustsen Hear our previous interviews with Dan Laustsen: https://www.camnoir.com/ep152/
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    1 h y 20 m
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