Public Enemies director shoots in HD

June 30, 11:30 AMLA Asian American Movie ExaminerEd Moy

Previous Next

Comment Print Email RSS Subscribe

Subscribe

Get alerts when there is a new article from the LA Asian American Movie Examiner. Read Examiner.com's terms of use.

Email Address   Include other special offers from Examiner.com Terms of Use

Johnny Depp stars in Public Enemies.

Director Michael Mann and cinematographer Dante Spinotti, ASC, have worked together on several hit movies, including The Insider, Last of the Mohicans, Heat, and Manhunter.

When the two came together to shoot Mann's latest gangsters and guns epic, Public Enemies, they decided to capture the period drama using modern HD technology.

“Michael’s idea was to create a hyper-reality, to bring a very realistic and beautiful look – not in terms of cosmetic Hollywood, but in terms of a direct approach to the number of locations and realistic settings,” explained Spinotti, who earned an Oscar nomination for his work on L.A. Confidential.

“We’d done a number of commercials together using the Sony F23 cameras and decided to test them against film. The shots done with the F23 cameras were sharper and gave us the hyper-realism he wanted.”

According to Spinotti, the depth-of-field of the Sony F23s, combined with the ability to go into the camera and to make modifications as they were shooting rather than recording to raw signal and doing corrections later in the D.I. process, was also a plus for the team.

“Digital gives you creative freedom,” says Spinotti. “No matter what the situation, you can go in without any predetermined rules.”

For Mann's team, the combination of the F23s with the ZEISS 6-24mm DigiZoom or the DigiPrime lenses was also a factor.

“We could get anything we desired,” Spinotti adds. “The lenses are sharp. They gave us the hyper-sharpness Michael wanted for this picture. And, their rendering of the chromatic was amazing.

“Public Enemies featured a vast variety of challenges, including extreme darkness, extreme cold, and hard to reach locations. No matter where we went or how hard we rode the cameras and lenses – the images were spectacular. Sony and Zeiss really came through for us on this picture.”

Mann began working primarily with HD technology on his action drama Collateral starring Tom Cruise and Jamie Foxx.  He would later shoot Miami Vice in HD. 

But it was with Collateral that Mann exploring various digital filmmaking techniques by "combining footage -- captured from the Thomson Viper FilmStream, the Sony CineAlta HDW F900 and Panavision 35mm Millennium cameras -- and devised an HD screening and preview system to maintain exacting creative and technical control."

"Film doesn't record what our eyes can see at night," Mann said at the time. "That's why I moved into shooting digital video in high definition--to see into the night, to see everything the naked eye can see and more."

Mann's Public Enemies starring Johnny Depp as John Dillinger opens July 1st.