Page 31 - Fujifilm Exposure_45 Ondine_ok

“WITH THE VIVID 160T YOU MAKE A CONSCIOUS CHOICE BEFORE SHOOTING THE LOOK, RATHER THAN WAITING UNTIL IT REACHES THE COMMITTEE IN THE GRADE.”
BOOSHANDBEYOND
INTO THE WORLD OF KASABIAN AND THE YEAH YEAH YEAHS WITH DP ERIK WILSON
MUSIC PROMOS
moustachioed killer, played by ANoel Fielding from of The
Mighty Boosh, walks across the English countryside looking for victims, the moving image
scratchy, worn and handheld. “It’s called Vlad The Impaler,”
laughs Norwegian born cinematogra- pher Erik Wilson. “It’s a viral. It was heavily post-produced afterwards to make it look like a horror film shot in the Seventies, the only living copy of which was just found in Russia.”
The promo, which is actually a music video for the British band Kasabian, is one of the fruits of Wilson’s profitable creative partnership with director Richard Ayoade (who starred in Channel 4’s acclaimed sitcom The IT Crowd).
“He only shoots on film,” says Wilson, with his Scandanavian twang, “and I love film, because it’s very, very simple. I learned on film, no computers whatsoever. It was fun.”
The complicated shoot required several different Fujifilm stocks. “ETERNA Vivid 160T, ETERNA 500T and ETERNA 250D, all depending on the situation,” he says. “We used a Bolex camera, bought a Zoom lens and then rented a 10mm with a fish-eye adapter.”
Wilson is particularly enamoured of the ETERNA Vivid 160T. “It’s good that someone still develops and releases new stocks that have different characteristics inherent in them,” he says.
“The trend for the rest of stocks seems to go towards being as clean, crisp and neutral as possible so that
you have as many options as possible in the Digital Grading suite. With the 160T you make a conscious choice before shooting the look, rather than waiting until it reaches the committee in the grade.”
Wilson’s career has ranged from small British films like Shooters (with film school director colleague Colin Teague) to the upcoming ITV2 series Trinity starring Charles Dance (with Teague again) via Hollywood, where he camera-operated and directed second unit on The Hills Have Eyes remake and its sequel for helmer Alexandre Aja.
But the humble 33-year-old admits his style is still developing and he’s loath to be too precious about his ‘vision’.
“The things I’m proud of have a personality to them, definitely,” he says. “They have some part of my thumbprint on them. It’s heightened reality, not naturalistic. I like it when you can see something has been done. Not like Michael Bay, where you can see the flares, but I still appreciate it when it has a style.”
“Nevertheless,” he continues, “I’m learning more and more not to plan too much, to be flexible enough to change when you see something better than what you’ve lit. You light something, then you look around where you’re not intending to shoot and see something a lot better and it’s ‘let’s do that instead’.”
This dynamism and versatility is what draws him to talents like Ayoade, who has become something of a tyro in the frequently stagnant
world of music video. The pair have also collaborated on Last Shadow Puppets’ Sixties-themed Standing Next To Me and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ Heads Will Roll.
The latter, “which we shot in the vaults underneath London Bridge Station”, sees the iconoclastic group as the house band in a seedy, gothic nightclub. Onto the stage in front of them strides a Michael Jackson- esque werewolf, who proceeds to dance for the punters before attacking and killing them all, substituting blood for red confetti. Singer Karen O chants the last bars of the chorus while dismembered on the floor.
“It’s blood and guts,” grins Wilson, who’s just finished an ITV three-parter Murderland, starring Robbie Coltrane, “or at least a stylistic version of that. I like the darker things a lot.”
“We used ETERNA 500T 8673 exclusively, as we needed the speed for shooting anamorphic. We had an Arri SR3 camera, with Cooke Xtal Express lenses.
“There was tungsten and strobe lighting all mixed together and one of the reasons I shot on Fujifilm was because mixing lights together works so well with it.” BEN FALK
The Kasabian promo was origi- nated on 16mm Fujicolor ETERNA Vivid 160T 8643, ETERNA 500T 8673 and ETERNA 250D 8663; the Yeah Yeah Yeahs promo was originated on ETERNA 500T 8673
FUJIFILM MOTION PICTURE • THE MAGAZINE • EXPOSURE • 29