Page 24 - Fujifilm Exposure_15 Melinda Messenger_ok

“I used Fuji’s 500 Tungsten – which you can underexpose quite a bit and still get very tasty pictures - and the 250 Daylight and often pushed a stop then overexposed a stop.”
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firmed Cohen, who has since complet- ed two dramas, Cyclops and Ibiza for £99 in Channel 4’s upcoming Shockers series). The credits will, however, remind audiences re-assuringly, “No animals were harmed in the making of this film. All animal stunts were co-ordi- nated by professional animal handlers.”
He could hardly have envisaged these later cinematic excesses while working way back as a photographic technician at Middlesex Poly after gaining a social sciences degree in Sheffield. “The technician has the worst job in the world. The lecturers do the teaching and we had to pro- vide the back-up for the students to do their projects. Basically, you get dumped-on by everybody. Still, it was good training, there was access to the dark room - and a few film cameras around the place,” Cohen recalled.
Moving on to become a freelance camera assistant at the BBC on docu- mentaries then some dramas, he moved out into feature films working principally as loader for focus puller Simon (son of Albert) Finney building up credits like Blue Juice, Metroland and The Butterfly Effect as well as films such as The Leading Man and The Loss Of Sexual Innocence under the watchful eye of, respectively, cine- matographers Jean-Francois Robin and Benoit Delhomme. The latter, directed by Mike Figgis, was an impor- tant stepping stone because he got the chance to pull focus on one of the cameras and also meet his future operator Lucy Bristow, who was then focus puller on the first camera.
But how to make that final crossover to feature lighting? “I did the usual thing – freebies, low-budget promos – but,” said Cohen, who lately seems to have cornered a lucrative market in Turkish-based commercials, “it’s very difficult because so many people want to make films.” A short called the Snatching Of Bookie Bob, with Rod Steiger, also proved a useful calling card.
Cohen added: “Nobody’s going to come up to you and just say, ‘Look, here’s a fantastic job as a director of photography.’ You get there by hook or by crook.” Or, until you get the call for something provocatively titled Dead Babies. ■ QUENTIN FALK
Dead Babies and the Snatching Of Bookie Bob were originated on Fujicolor Motion Picture Negative
DANIEL COHEN
Photos from top l-r: Daniel Cohen and Camera operator Lucy Bristow on the set of Snatching Of Bookie Bob with Rod Steiger; a scene from Dead Babies; images from HLA music video - Fused, commercial USA - Phillips 66 and Ralph Steadman; a scene from Dead Babies; Daniel Cohen with crew
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