A longtime Lucas collaborator, director of photography David Tattersall, BSC, discusses his contributions to Episode I.
Director of photography David Tattersall, BSC saw the finished print of The Phantom Menace under what could be considered ideal conditions: with an avid crowd of youthful Star Wars aficionados at a matinee show in Los Angeles. I was on location shooting another picture while the final timing was being done on Episode I, Tattersall explains, speaking from New Zealand, the site of his latest production, a mountaineering thriller entitled The Vertical Limit. I also missed the premiere, but I was in L.A. for one day before going out on a location scout in Arizona. The picture had just opened, so I was able to see it with the fans, who really enjoyed it.
By that point, the Star Wars galaxy certainly seemed a long time ago, and far, far away to Tattersall, who has photographed three features (Soldier, Whatever Happened to Harold Smith? and The Green Mile) since filming Episode I for director George Lucas. One has to realize that The Phantom Menace was shot in just 65 days, while the postproduction work took another 20 months or so, Tattersall explains. Many sequences were created entirely at Industrial Light & Magic, so its a film that was defined not only in preproduction and on the set, but in post. In a way, I had one of the shortest tenures on the project!
The accomplished cinematographer, whose other credits include The Wind in the Willows, Moll Flanders and Con Air (see AC June 97), first collaborated with Lucas and Episode I producer Rick McCallum on The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles (1992-93), which not only featured a weekly dose of classic derring-do, but groundbreaking digital visual effects (see AC Oct. 92). The show, which earned Tattersall both Emmy and ASC Award nominations, was a fruitful testing ground for CG effects work. On that project, logging hours in a Quantel Harry suite proved far more frugal than working practically. The main lesson we learned on the series was that we had a lot more control over our locations, in that with a little digital help, we could erase or replace what we had, Tattersall recounts. For instance, a lot of the episodes were shot in Prague, in [whats now the Czech Republic]. We could use it as a double for most European cities, like Paris or Vienna, simply by having the skyline changed. Another important thing was learning how to replicate crowds—to make 25 soldiers look like an army, for example. That type of thing seems very straightforward now, but it was a great innovation at the time, and cost-effective.
Other budget-pleasing innovations included shooting the show on 16mm and utilizing 35mm only for plate photography, as well as using McCallums Canon XL-1 Hi-8 camera to shoot some effects elements. At the time, Tattersall remarked, Ive got a theory that sophisticated postproduction techniques on digital tape will be used more and more in the future, to give scale and drama to otherwise small tableau scenes. And how.
The cinematographer continued to prove this concept with Lucas and McCallum while filming Radioland Murders (see AC March 95), a comedic period piece that served as a final test for the digital backlot filmmaking approach established on Young Indy. That film also offered ILM one of the first opportunities to work without having to lock off the camera or depend on motion control, Tattersall submits. Prior to that, bluescreen work was always done in a careful, very monitored sort of way, which would allow the audience to spot a bluescreen shot coming from a mile away. The camera would suddenly stop moving, the visual effect would happen, and then the film would begin again. But on Radioland, the goal was to shoot unrestricted, so we shot things as if the bluescreen didnt exist. All of the camera moves—pans, tilts and dollies—were matched later in post.
Radioland featured 100 visual effects shots. Hi-8 and 34" video was again employed for some of the element photography, while matte paintings, miniatures, and unobtrusive CG fixes allowed production-oriented creative decisions to continue well into the pictures post phase, extending the physical scope of the film well beyond its modest budget. Lucas was convinced that this filmmaking methodology—a combination of extensive visual effects work, virtual locations and a much more mobile camera—would allow him to revisit the Star Wars universe with exciting (yet cost-effective) new storytelling options.
The lessons learned on these projects and others were directly applied to the conception of The Phantom Menace. During production, Tattersall was called upon to refine the shooting methods hed helped establish. Because so much of the picture would be completed in post, Tattersall found himself working on a largely virtual production. The extensive use of bluescreen on Episode I is what made shooting the picture so very different from any other Ive done, the cameraman attests. The sheer amount of bluescreen material was amazing.
While planning his lighting style for Phantom, Tattersall checked out a number of science-fiction and fantasy films, and then went through a process of elimination regarding things I liked and didnt like. It soon became obvious that the only relevant source of information would be the original Star Wars trilogy. To fly off on a tangent with another style would have really been wrong. George and I always came back to the idea that the feeling of Phantom—especially in the scenes set on Tatooine—should be very much the same as what weve seen before.
Its very difficult to put my finger on exactly what that the Star Wars style is, but design-wise, there are elements that are organic and technical, high-tech and low-tech, classical and futuristic. There are touches of everything, but as in real life, they seem quite naturalistic when theyre blended together.
On sets where the bluescreens were such a large portion of the frame, light balancing became more difficult. The temptation would be to pitch for a brighter exposure on live-action foreground elements to contrast them with the bluescreen. However, if the background plate was to consist mainly of bright tones, a darker exposure would be more effective. But naturalism was always the aim, and we sought to keep the light as soft as possible.
Another major—but subtle—part of the Star Wars visual style comes from the use of classical compositions and camera movement. Its a very solid, restrained style thats definitely not flashy, Tattersall agrees. George doesnt favor cinematography that draws attention to itself, which leads to a more formal style. Id just finished Con Air before signing on for Phantom, and I had to unlearn a lot of things Id been doing—radical camera moves using hotheads, long lenses and such.
[ continued on page 2 ]