Lovely detail pics of the 221B living room set – I love the roses on the bowl of Holmes’ pipe (quite common in those days, many men even had painted flowers on them)and note the tobacco in the slipper!
Larktag asks, did Spectre have a different DP than Skyfall? A-yup; cinematographer on Spectre was Hoyte van Hoytema, who did Interstellar and Her, among others. He suggested to director Sam Mendes that they could get a nostalgic, more romantic feel by using 35 mm film, rather than digital equipment like the Arri Alexa DP Roger Deakins used for Skyfall. Unfortunately, I think it turned out less nostalgic than stultified, less romantic than old-fashioned. The bar was high, though; Roger Deakins is one of the most well-regarded cinematographyers, and his genius is all over films like The Shawshank Redemption, A Beautiful Mind, Kundun, and all the Coen Bros’ best (O Brother Where Art Thou?, Fargo, The Big Lebowski, etc.). Three things marked Deakins’ style for me in Skyfall: the gorgeous lighting traversing palettes across locations, the quiet or very smoothly moving camera that didn’t sacrifice clarity for action, and the framing that balances movement within each shot without resorting to the heavy-handed center framing that’s becoming all too common in action films.
While the colors were obvious and striking (the deep blue of the skyscraper scenes in Macau, for instance, or the vibrant reds in Shanghai, or the chilly desaturation on the Scottish moors), the lighting was quietly masterful: this was a film about mirroring and self-reflection, Bond seeing himself in others and examining his own psyche, and it used a constant motif of glass and mirrors to get that across. Nothing puts pressure on lighting design like filming so many glass walls: how the fuck did they get so many shots like this without the camera showing up in a reflection?
So I went to an art conference at my school. We discussed things there, like how colors can be very powerful and our subconscious picks up the subtlest of hints. Pixar’s UP was a very unforgettable example. The colors of UP had a lot to do with why we cried. You all know what I’m talking about, right??
Ellie’s death.
We were told that her color was pink. That’s why her hospital room had pinkish hue.
And the next scene had strong pink hues. He misses her. I think it’s got strong colors because of her personality.
Also, It’s like her presence is still lingering.
When he got home, only a small part of the frame (window on the right) has a pink hue as the sun is setting. By now, we know her presence is drifting away.
Mr. Fredricksen walks up the porch and goes into his house.
And when he shuts the door, the final frame looks like this:
Ellie is gone.
The entire frame is desaturated and cold because the warmth in Mr. Fredrickson’s life is gone.
And that’s another reason why this masterpiece is heart-wrenching. And that’s how powerful colors are in films.
Reflections on the Taxi Rides: Sherlock Director of Photography, Steve Lawes, & Mary Jo Watts Interview 2/15
This audio clip is edited from the original interview for the sake of time and clarity. Also I apologize for the distant moan of the train whistle in there. 😉
Steve Lawes: We wanted to shoot all the taxi stuff for real and there’s a lot of taxi stuff.
Mary Jo Watts: There’s a lot of taxi stuff.
Steve Lawes: There’s a lot of taxi stuff. So one of the ways that we did it was by using more than one camera at a time so that we could get different angles. We also used the Canon 5D Mark II camera on certain shots because we could just put it in places that we couldn’t put the other camera. I was very keen on shooting reflections. I don’t really like shooting car stuff because it’s a pain in the arse. You know if you’re going to do it, you really want to get the feel that you’re really there. You can, you know, using back projection and CGI, you can get some very good car stuff, but you have to go a long way to get it to be believable.
One of the big things is reflections, you know, you have to shoot reflection plates. You have to CGI them on. Getting reflection plates is quite difficult because obviously you want to see the actors. You don’t want to see the camera, so there’s a very fine line from getting the angle right where you can see a reflection, but that doesn’t show the camera. Because normally what you would do in this situation is you would just put a black cloth up behind the camera, if the camera was reflected, and then it gets rid of the camera’s reflection, and then you just see them, but that’s all you do- is you see them. You see nothing in front of them. It basically loses that dynamic of it being in a moving vehicle. I mean yes, you get the stuff moving in the background, but you don’t get this stuff moving in the foreground. This time of the evening when we were shooting, it was getting into, sort of, dusk. Rather than this reflection burning out…it’s almost like a silver plate. You know you really get this interesting reflection on it.
Ah, of course we did it once. Paul [McGuigan] loved it, so we did it for the rest of the show. We really wanted to feel like this was kind of like Victoriana, and this was London, but in the 20th [sic] century, and bring it up-to-date. In order to do that you need to see it. You need to feel it. You need to get that environment. And that’s one way to do it.
omg I LOVE THIS. I usually get annoyed when directors shoot car scenes because they always look really fake and static to me, and they tend to be very limited in the kinds of angles you get.
But the taxi scenes in Sherlock are some of my favorites on the whole show. They are *gorgeous* and incredibly dynamic and look nothing like most car scenes. I’ve long been intensely curious how they managed them.
In fact, I’d love to know more — is there any behind-the-scenes footage showing camera and lighting placement, etc.? Or might there be in the future?
IN the pilot they used rear projection. Benedict and Martin sat in a sawed off taxi— the back of a cab in the studio.
Compare that to Steve’s results with Benedict and Martin sitting in the actual taxi riding through London on a low loader :
I think that gif shows better than anything else I can think of why I love Steve’s judgement. The pilot cab scenes are just plain cheesy in comparison. I believe they’re in a cab in the series. Perhaps because they ARE!
The following image is NOT from setlock— it’s for another film but it’s a London taxi on a similar rig:
the difference is like night and day.
thank you for the pic of the rig! I was having trouble picturing how Lawes was getting those results. it must be so much more money and work and trouble, but scenes like these are why I watch am endlessly obsessed with this show.
A shot where the camera is placed on a crane or jib and moved up or down. Think a vertical tracking shot. (x)
CROSS CUT
the editing technique of alternating, interweaving, or interspersing one narrative action (scene, sequence, or event) with another – usually in different locations or places, thus combining the two; this editing method suggests parallel action (that takes place simultaneously); often used to dramatically build tension and suspense in chase scenes, or to compare two different scenes; also known as inter-cutting or parallel editing. (x)
DUTCH TILT
A shot where the camera is tilted on its side to create a kooky angle. Often used to suggest disorientation. (x)
ESTABLISHING SHOT
The clue is in the name. A shot, at the head of the scene, that clearly shows the locale the action is set in. (x)
FADE
a transitional device consisting of a gradual change in the intensity of an image or sound, such as from a normally-lit scene to darkness (fade out, fade-to-black) or vice versa, from complete black to full exposure (fade in), or from silence to sound or vice versa; a ‘fade in’ is often at the beginning of a sequence, and a ‘fade out’ at the end of a sequence. (x)
LAP DISSOLVE
a transitional editing technique between two sequences, shots or scenes, in which the visible image of one shot or scene is gradually replaced, superimposed or blended (by an overlapping fade out or fade in and dissolve) with the image from another shot or scene; often used to suggest the passage of time and to transform one scene to the next; lap dissolve is shorthand for ‘over’lap dissolve (x)
LOW ANGLE
A shot looking up at a character or subject often making them look bigger in the frame. It can make everyone look heroic and/or dominant. (x)
Technical term for when a director cuts from one scene to a totally different one, but has objects in the two scenes “matched,” so that they occupy the same place in the shot’s frame. (x)
MONEY SHOT
A shot that is expensive to shoot, but deemed worth it for its potential to wow, startle and generate interest. In pornography, it means something completely different. (x)
OVER EXPOSED
refers to a film shot that has more light than normal, causing a blinding, washed-out, whitish, glaring effect; deliberately used for flashbacked or dream scenes; aka flared or bleached (x)
OVER THE SHOULDER SHOT
In film, a shot that gives us a character’s point of view but that includes part of that character’s shoulder or the side of the head in the shot. (x)
POINT OF VIEW (POV)
A shot that depicts the point of view of a character so that we see exactly what they see. (x) This is Redbeard’s POV on a Dutch tilt shot.
Watch how Lestrade, out of focus the entire scene, frames the action. Ms. Wenceslas is in focus as she talks to him. Meanwhile Sherlock, also out of focus, is deducing and rolling his eyes. When Ms. Wenceslas turns toward Sherlock he comes in focus, turns away from her, and she fades out. She tosses the focus to Sherlock like a tennis ball.
SLOW MOTION (SLO-MO)
refers to an effect resulting from running film through a camera at faster-than-normal speed (shooting faster than 24 frames per second), and then projecting it at standard speed; if a camera runs at 60 frames per second, and captures a one second-long event, a 24-frame playback will slow that event to two and a half seconds long;… this filmic technique is usually employed to fully capture a ‘moment in time’ or to produce a dramatic (or romantic feeling) (x)
…
We did [the slow motion shot of Cumberbatch] on a bungee 1000 fps on a Phantom camera. -Steve Lawes, Director of Photography (x)
STEADYCAM
a hand-held camera technique using a stabilizing Steadicam (introduced in the late 70s), developed by inventor Garrett Brown, with a special, mechanical harness that allows the camera operator to take relatively smooth and steady shots, though hand-held, while moving along with the action (x)
TOP SHOT
A shot looking directly down on a scene rather than at an angle. Also known as a Birds-Eye-View shot. (x)
TRACKING SHOT
In such a film shot, the camera is literally running on a track and thus smoothly following the action being represented or perhaps thus giving the viewer a survey of a particular setting. (x)
WIPE
a transitional technique or optical effect/device in which one shot appears to be “pushed off” or “wiped off” the screen by another shot replacing it and moving across the existing image (x)
