Soon after wrapping a three-day series of interview and tutorial shoots for Vizcom on a white cyc stage, Director Reza Bird scheduled a commercial on a completely blacked-out stage.
Life is all about contrast, right?
Similar to our last Vizcom commercial, we employed my ARRI Alexa 35 camera. This time, we shot with my Zeiss Super Speeds and kept them almost exclusively wide open (T1.3). The softness and dream-like quality that imbues added a little extra character to our lineup of mostly stationary objects.
I couldn’t risk having the slow-motion shots of Omar drift out of focus for long stretches, so I stopped down to a 2.8/4 split for those two setups. I didn’t want a camera issue to render his skateboard stunt or quick breakdancing movements unusable. This also marked my first time cranking the Alexa 35 all the way up to 120 FPS. I love that the recording resolution remains high even at that extreme frame rate: UHD (3840×2160) in ProRes.
I’m grateful we had enough time to give each object in the commercial its moment to shine. Lighting inanimate objects isn’t easy, and doing it against a black void made it even trickier. My gaffer, Valentin Selembier, employed a number of lighting tactics for separation. The Aputure Amaran 300C through a 36 degree spotlight attachment gave us precisely shaped lines of contrast without spilling everywhere.
Can you guess which shot before the :31 mark wasn’t shot practically? We did shoot the iPhone you see just after that moment—everything else before it is computer generated.
Congratulations to those who guessed the incandescent light bulb. Even though it’s stock footage, I love it. The sound of it turning on gets me every time. What’s your favorite shot? I really like the metronome.
Crew
Script: Emil Lukas
Voice: Nicolas de Peyer
Director of Photography: Dustin Pearlman
Gaffer: Valentin Selembier
Photographer: Ebrahim Safi
Motion Design: Black Canvas, Drew Lewis Guerra
Colorist: Francisco Lorite
Sound Design: Travis Devin
Model: Tomas Flores
Dancer: Omar Gonzalez
Director: Reza Bird
Editor: Sara Bird
Creative Studio: NXT Animal