Page 17 - Fujifilm Exposure_41 Happy-Go-Lucky_ok

“For Cass the 50s and 60s were the roughest time, for which we used the ETERNA 500T. For the 80s, the time of the football hooliganism, we used the ETERNA 400T low contrast stock. Here we wanted to really lower the colour saturation and con- trast and bring that in with the light- ing as opposed to the stock. There was also a soft and glowing feel to the skin tones.
“As far as the lenses were con- cerned, we shot the early part on Cooke Zooms. Then we moved on to Canon Zooms. Finally, for the 90s, the sharpest, smallest grain, snappiest sequence to show Cass’d nearly made his way out of the violence, I chose Primos, using a combination of ETERNA 250D and 250T.”
Like all Ross’s features to date, his latest will be going through a D/I, “but I don’t like to rely on it as the place to set these effects. I prefer to do as much in-camera as possible so every- one should be able to see what we’re trying to do as we actually go along.”
With all this Present, Ross must have had some kind of Past – which, in terms of his filmmaking aspirations, got its first flowering at university in Nottingham where in between study- ing Physics – appropriately enough, the science that deals with matter and motion – he discovered other like- minded “film geeks” with whom he shot films on video and helped foster the uni’s Filmmaking Society.
After Nottingham, he tried to get into the industry and following a fruit- less first six months of letter writing and door-banging, he then got a job as an assistant location manager fol- lowed by one as a camera trainee.
“At that point I realised I needed more knowledge and somebody recom- mended me to a rental house, VFG, where I stayed a few months.”
Photo main: Keilly Reilly in Eden Lake; above l-r: on location with Eden Lake (Photos: Nick Wall); scenes from London To Brighton and The Cottage
The real ‘break” came when he moved on to work for Panavision as one of eight in the maintenance depart- ment based in Greenford. Over the next five years he gained huge experience notably working abroad on three big movies – Proof Of Life in Ecuador, Cold Mountain in Romania and Syriana, in Morocco, Geneva and Dubai.
“These were big films but the camera departments were surprisingly small by comparison and, on location, quite a close-knit family. During my time abroad, I had many conversa- tions particularly with John Seale [on Cold Mountain] who is perhaps my greatest influence so far. He taught me that there wasn’t such a great gap between the likes of me and the likes of him as well as other elder DP statesmen. As far as he was con- cerned, he told me, all it took to do what he did was to have a light meter and an opinion.”
Ross’s years at Panavision were also a golden opportunity to self-edu- cate – “they were very kind to me” - which he did by way of lighting shorts, music promos, commercials and cor- porates, meeting up again in due course and working variously with filmmakers like director Jon Gilbert and producer Al Clark both of whom he’d first met at university.
Despite his still comparatively tender years, there is already devel- oped a strong streak of pragmatism as he approaches his craft: “Films are like exams. You do all your homework then sit the exam. After that you hand itover–inthecaseofafilm-tothe audience. There is nothing you can do about it then.” ■ QUENTIN FALK
Eden Lake was originated on 35mm Fujicolor ETERNA 500T 8573, ETERNA 250D 8563 and ETERNA Vivid 160T 8543; Cass was originated on 16mm ETERNA 500T 8673, ETERNA 400T 8683 ETERNA 250T 8653, ETERNA 250D 8663 and ETERNA Vivid 160T 8643
Fujifilm Motion Picture • The Magazine • Exposure • 15