Finnegan
Well-known member
Hey everyone, I just got off the phone with Brandon Trost, cinematographer of Crank: High Voltage, and I figured I'd share the experience with you since it was definitely interesting for me. Yesterday, I got into contact with Brandon to ask him about his experiences at the LA Film School, since I was accepted and am considering going. But in this economy and certainly this new era of film, film school isn't considered to be a necessity for working in the industry. So, I wanted to see if he'd give me some insight to his experiences there...what he gained from his time there, what the shooting environments were like, and how well the institution allows its students to flourish and make movies. Anyhow, he messaged me back and gave me his number and told me to call him.
So today, I did. And it turned into an hour long conversation about the present state of cinematography within the film industry, movies he has made, experiences in the industry, and people in the industry. I mentioned that one of the reasons I want to attend film school is so I can learn to shoot on 8mm, 16mm, and 35mm film since I haven't had the chance to do that yet. He said that while you do learn to do that there, he feels that there is so much more room within HD-video to be explored when it comes to cinematography. He cited a movie he shot which he believes to be the best movie he's ever shot (he wouldn't give me the title but said its small and coming out in the next year or so) that he shot entirely with the gain bumped up to 12db on the XH-A1. As an owner of an XH-A1 I was stunned because to me, the footage at that high of a gain looks questionable at best. But he was adamant and told me that cinematography is about having the willingness to push the limit, and that people have told him all his career not to do things because it looks bad but he does them anyway, and yeah sometimes it turns out bad (he is the first to say he's made A LOT of bad movies, his words, not mine) but other times it can really put something out there that people haven't seen before.
And that was pretty much the most interesting thing that he said today that I figured I'd share with you. Even though Crank: High Voltage is no Citizen Kane when it comes to cinematography, he does raise a good point about exploring and pushing the limits with what is technically an entire different medium. I think Brandon's point is that ever since video/hd/new media has developed, it's been the goal of users of that medium to make it look like film. And by doing that they're forgetting that there's still a lot of cool stuff that is unexplored when it comes to the digital medium, and that we as young cinematographers should be mindful of that. Because in the future, maybe we'll use it and it'll be the next big look of movie-making.
Overall, it was such a great experience for me to be able to talk to a working cinematographer so closely about film. So I thought I'd share it with you all, since if you're anything like me, experiences like this are pretty cool.
So today, I did. And it turned into an hour long conversation about the present state of cinematography within the film industry, movies he has made, experiences in the industry, and people in the industry. I mentioned that one of the reasons I want to attend film school is so I can learn to shoot on 8mm, 16mm, and 35mm film since I haven't had the chance to do that yet. He said that while you do learn to do that there, he feels that there is so much more room within HD-video to be explored when it comes to cinematography. He cited a movie he shot which he believes to be the best movie he's ever shot (he wouldn't give me the title but said its small and coming out in the next year or so) that he shot entirely with the gain bumped up to 12db on the XH-A1. As an owner of an XH-A1 I was stunned because to me, the footage at that high of a gain looks questionable at best. But he was adamant and told me that cinematography is about having the willingness to push the limit, and that people have told him all his career not to do things because it looks bad but he does them anyway, and yeah sometimes it turns out bad (he is the first to say he's made A LOT of bad movies, his words, not mine) but other times it can really put something out there that people haven't seen before.
And that was pretty much the most interesting thing that he said today that I figured I'd share with you. Even though Crank: High Voltage is no Citizen Kane when it comes to cinematography, he does raise a good point about exploring and pushing the limits with what is technically an entire different medium. I think Brandon's point is that ever since video/hd/new media has developed, it's been the goal of users of that medium to make it look like film. And by doing that they're forgetting that there's still a lot of cool stuff that is unexplored when it comes to the digital medium, and that we as young cinematographers should be mindful of that. Because in the future, maybe we'll use it and it'll be the next big look of movie-making.
Overall, it was such a great experience for me to be able to talk to a working cinematographer so closely about film. So I thought I'd share it with you all, since if you're anything like me, experiences like this are pretty cool.