The Cinematography Podcast Episode 366: Eben Bolter, ASC, BSC When Eben Bolter, ASC, BSC signed on to shoot Apple TV’s new adaptation of Cape Fear, he inherited a legacy that includes both the 1962 original and Martin Scorsese’s 1991 remake. Rather than avoid the comparison, Bolter embraced it, and he’s created a visually distinctive look for the series. “I always thought the ’91 movie was weird in the best possible way,” Bolter says. “It’s a really great example of expressionism. It’s the opposite of documentary filmmaking. It’s not verité. It’s not found. It’s not naturalistic. It’s big and theatrical.” That
The Cinematography Podcast Episode 366: Eben Bolter, ASC, BSC When Eben Bolter,
The Cinematography Podcast Episode 365: Lyle Vincent Cinematographer Lyle Vincent believes that visual language can carry subtext without ever calling attention to itself. As he puts it, the craft should always be in service of the story, even when it’s doing a lot of narrative heavy lifting. Vincent’s work on the Netflix limited series The Beast in Me is a continuation of his collaboration with director Antonio Campos after the HBO Max drama, The Staircase. Both are eight-episode limited series, both were shot entirely by Vincent, and both were approached less like television and more like one very long feature
The Cinematography Podcast Episode 365: Lyle Vincent Cinematographer Lyle Vincent believes that
The Cinematography Podcast Episode 364: Christian Sprenger, ASC Christian Sprenger, ASC and producer/director Hiro Murai first met right out of film school on a commercial. The two have spent the last 11 years collaborating on Atlanta, Mr. & Mrs. Smith, and now Apple TV+’s breakout hit, Widow’s Bay. While working with actor Donald Glover on Atlanta, the trio decided to just make something that they thought was good, no matter what the network had to say. Sprenger says that freedom carries forward into all of their projects. “The language that we started building, and that we’ve continued building on Mr.
The Cinematography Podcast Episode 364: Christian Sprenger, ASC Christian Sprenger, ASC and
The Cinematography Podcast Episode 363: Peter Konczal, ASC When cinematographer Peter Konczal, ASC began production on Netflix’s Black Rabbit, the goal was to make something gritty and intense. “It was never meant to really be a pretty show,” Konczal says. “It was always meant to feel more raw.” That rawness, though, was the product of an extremely deliberate and hands-on toolkit that he lead DP Igor Martinović built together. They started with a custom LUT: low contrast, with a deliberately soft toe. The production’s lenses were detuned, and Martinović smoked the glass filters over candle flame. The crew nicknamed the
The Cinematography Podcast Episode 363: Peter Konczal, ASC When cinematographer Peter Konczal,
The Cinematography Podcast Episode 362: James Whitaker, ASC When he was researching the look for DTF St. Louis, cinematographer James Whitaker, ASC found a striking image while scrolling Instagram. “I came across an image of Sharon Tate from 1968 sitting at a cafe in Paris,” Whitaker says. “It just had this beautiful quality to it. Really strong blacks. You could tell it was shot on slide film. It had sort of a warm skin tone.” The photograph, along with suburban street photography, became the visual inspiration for the entire series about male friendship, loneliness, and a murder mystery in the
The Cinematography Podcast Episode 362: James Whitaker, ASC When he was researching
The Cinematography Podcast Episode 361: Richard Rutkowski, ASC Cinematographer Richard Rutkowski, ASC has spent decades lensing visually distinctive shows such as The Americans, Jack Ryan, and Masters of the Air. His latest project, AMC+’s The Audacity, presented a different kind of challenge: a sharp, character-driven drama about billionaire tech culture. Shot almost entirely in Vancouver, the show needed to feel unmistakably like Palo Alto. “We worked really hard to get Vancouver out of the frame,” Rutkowski says. The solution was part location strategy, part lighting philosophy. Stages were lit to suggest bright California sun outside and darker interiors within. A
The Cinematography Podcast Episode 361: Richard Rutkowski, ASC Cinematographer Richard Rutkowski, ASC