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Photography was a way for me to freeze time and to capture the moments that were happy and healthy. I saw a photo as a way to go back to a memory if I ever needed to.
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Half of 'Mudbound' were shots I stole in between other scenes.
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I've had something like seven films at Sundance, one of which won the Grand Jury Prize.
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Success doesn't come overnight, especially for women.
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I think lighting is a reflection of what is at stake emotionally in a movie.
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Cinematography is so much about instinct and intuition - you want the same range of experience going into behind the camera as what you see in front of it. Your life experience will come through the lens.
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Usually, if you notice good cinematography, then the cinematographer's failing. I try to make light feel like it's always motivated and natural in some way and hope that the lighting goes unnoticed.
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The biggest difference for me was that I operated almost every frame on 'Mudbound,' and I didn't operate on 'Black Panther.'
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I gravitate much more toward realism, realism in the work that I do, but magical realism got me hooked on film. I think it was my first time realizing that there was something besides popcorn movies.
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We shot 'Mudbound' in the South in the summer, which meant we were working in extreme heat and humidity at all times and that it could go from glaring sun to overcast skies to pouring rain in a matter of minutes, often shifting multiple times a day.
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You can only shoot small movies and documentaries for so long if you want to have a family that you support; eventually, you need to get let into the big leagues.
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Life is unpredictable, and I feel, to some extent, lighting and cinematography should be a reflection of that.
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Part of the reason why I love to operate is because I find that so much of what we do is instinctual. It's dancing with the actors and responding to their body language, and you feel what the right place for the camera is at any given moment.
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A period film is a gift for a cinematographer.
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When shooting in real spaces, the work of a cinematographer begins where location meets production design meets time of day. No movie light will ever look as real as the sun, so scheduling becomes truly paramount to naturalistic lighting.
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The only consistency in the work I do is that I try to use cinematography to best tell the narrative and do justice to the character arcs, but not to do it in such an overt way that people are distracted by it.
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Sometimes it just takes a little longer to get to your destination, but if you make sure to enjoy the journey, eventually you will get there.
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I love faces that have freckles. I love faces that have wrinkles. For me, beauty is naturalism, I guess.
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I don't love cinematography that's very flashy because I find that it keeps the audience from becoming a part of the film; it becomes sort of self-reflective.
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Lighting practically whenever I can when shooting period really helps with authenticity.
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Your movie becomes much more narrow-minded when you have like-minded department heads. Whereas if you can surround yourself with people who have been a mother before, been a grandmother before, you get a much broader and wide-reaching swath of human emotions.
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Authenticity, to me, is something that you feel, and if it doesn't feel authentic, you pick up on it right away.
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The cinematographer's basically translating the director's vision into imagery.
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It would be naive to say that you could make a movie on film for the same price you can digitally.