Its not  easy when it comes to deal with an introspective job as pulling out  a reel of projects you have accomplished.  Sometimes you tend to try  and  please an idea outside yourself hoping that somebody might like. I believe in self defining, its paramount for you to get in love in what you are doing, to actually feel it. Its about being truthful to yourself. It doesn’t matter if you are  pulling out a demo reel, filming a movie, an indie project with your film friends or just making a nice dinner to your girlfriend. In anything you do, believe in it and do your best regardless of what other people might think or say. There is a mysterious magic that connects with others when you feel that what you are doing is the way you like it.

I was called by Patricia Venti a great director I know for some time now to shoot a short film that could actually work also as a presentation for a film in search for economic funds and pitching. Ive worked with Patricia  in various projects as first AD, before I decided to decline into cinematography. Its always amazing to work with professionals that   choose to work with you even though we reside in different countries.

This project  had a very specific aesthetics. Patricia wanted a very specific cinematography design. We talked a lot during prep of the project, she had in mind a very poetical film, with few dialogs which translates in comunicating and storytelling most of the time  on image.

I believe as cinematographer that its crucial to deliver a photographical design about how cinematography will be printed in the evolution and narrative of the film.

During the prep of this aesthetics we decided to  go for  a very slow pase movement in camera with few cuts as well as very powerfull compositions. It was important to join our charaters journey, feel the heaviness and harshness during the shot. We relyed a lot in static shots and Panther Dolly when we needed to move camera. It was very important to embrace a different narrative as story develops so we decided to go for steadycam shots when our characters arrive to their final destination in the script.

In terms of light we decided to  empower narrative by  separating our two “main” locations. The story is about a journey so we needed to photographically evolve towards the end. When we shot  exterior mountain snow locations we relied in a very cold environment shooting on Kodak Vision3 500T 7219 with an 81 EF filter + Circular Pol, so we could have this cold image but still be half way  warm to keep skin tones manageable. In terms of film process  I decided to pull down one stop in lab when shooting exteriors so we could have richer blacks, less grain and a more contrasty image. When shooting interiors, which is the last part of the story we decided to maintaining normal lab process to  differenciate texture  from exteriors and to empower characters emotions in image as they are reaching the end of the film.  When lighting interior we maintained our same Kodak Vision3 500T 7219 with 81EF filter but added a mix of warm /cold light, as we had some fire practicals on set.  In terms of equipment we used 1.8K Hmi with chimera, Kino flo´s w/cold tubes,  Kino flo´s light  w/cold+ warm tubes with half CTB for night environment and china balls  balanced at 5600 and 3200 plus full CTS to give practicals more presence.

The project is now in editing stage, hopefully soon we can post the film in this webpage.  I thank Patricia for trusting me, FAMU, Panavision and Panalux for supporting the project.  Also special thanks to my crew, you are only as good as your own team. Best!

When I finish a project I try to focus myself in strategic renewal. I believe its an essential part  and a very productive transition till next shoot.  Cinematography could turn quite tricky and demanding, as you might be working 14-17 hours a day during almost a month during the shooting of a Film. When shooting finishes you might find yourself  in a big emptiness until next project. As athletes understand especially well, the greater the performance demand, the greater the need for renewal. That goes  for mind, body  and spirit. Flexible routines for exercise, meditation, renewal, creative expression are key essential parts to success.

The importance of restoration is rooted in our physiology. Human beings aren’t designed to expend energy continuously. Rather, we’re meant to pulse between spending and recovering energy. The idea is not about how long but how well, my renew matters most in terms of performance. In the beginning I used to spent un organised renewal time hours studying Film tech, philosophy, interviews, news,  watching films  and ended spending all day sitting down in front of a computer. I thought I needed to just keep on going at full throttle all the time.  Along the way I learned that productivity and performance is related and improved on how you implement time.

Inspired by Timothy Ferris and Tony Schwartz I scheduled a total of 2 hour work per day. Which includes: Mail, Clients, Accounts, Networking. Another 2 hour body work per day. Which includes meditation and exercise. And a last 2 hour mind work per day. Which includes, writing, studying cinematography, investigation, reading. For a total of 6 hour per day  organised activity that incremented my productivity by 4x.

The power of renewal is so compelling to me that not only im better prepared when I face a project, increment my productivity day by day, but I have time to do other activities that im interested on, like gastronomy or  design.

“ By managing energy more skillfully, it’s possible to get more done, in less time, more sustainably. Our secret is simple — and generally applicable. When we’re renewing, we’re truly renewing, so when we’re working, we can really work.” Tony Schwartz – New York Times

Getting to know who you are as an artist and respecting that is all about experience and maturing as a filmmaker.  This is paramount in positioning yourself, I believe you should treat  your reel like telling the story of what makes you tick.  Convey your personality, your expression as an artist. This is so important to make it your own, so that your style comes across.

You can watch it on HD vimeo.

I believe  cinematography stands to serve the story in every aspect. Taking into consideration all the production variables to make the best choices for  best completing the project.  It´s not only about delivering a very high quality picture that supports the narrative ,  it´s about  making the right decisions for the project you are embracing.  Its not only about being an artist, but about being well aware of production and budget decisions, and finding a way to make everything work.

I recently finished shooting the film “Tetushki”  produced by  Forma Pro Films  filmed  in Riga, Latvia.  It was an amazing experience, it always is when shooting a film. I  will like to share the adventure of prepping the project, in general terms  how we approached a  15 days shooting schedule  and how we managed to solve some challenges throughout the completion of the film. Let´s face it now days everyone wants something good, fast and cheap and as cinematographer you must be flexible  and creative about how to face the challenge.

One of the first decisions I  made when  starting pre production  and visual design  is which camera/lenses  we are shooting on. This will determine not only the look of the film but  how fast you can be in every other aspect in cinematography and how fast the shooting will go in general terms.  Also will determine how many crew, light and equipment you need for filming.  The challenge was to shoot a 90 min comedy  film in 15 days with sometimes 10+ actors playing on set, and almost 6 days of shooting ( Day/Night sec.) in -20c temperature exteriors.

Having two cameras on set limits the image in terms of  beauty for the film,  you have to lit  two fields of view and  sometimes they tend to flatten each other. But for this story it was more important to  embrace  more possibilities. Shooting  two or more actors at the same time capturing performance every second,  having more angles for dynamics in editing and help  sculpting the story with more possibilities  was the way to go. Mainly because of the number of actors playing in scene at the same time, and the amount of script pages we needed to shoot each day.

My camera choice for this project was the Canon C300, as I  needed a camera that could help me with some important aspects we needed to address:

- Instant backup.  A camera that could give me instant backup of media on board  because of low temperatures possible failure.  For the project was very important to secure media at all times, its my responsibility  if anything was to happen.

-Low light capabilities for budget and speed. This is paramount, a camera that could make me and my team work faster with smaller lights and  help me tighten the overall budget.

- Best Hi Def out there. I like to be faithful to the story Im shooting, and there was no reason not to give this story and excellent, clean and gentle quality. Viewers must focus on the performances and script, its a comedy. For me, giving the best quality for this project was crucial.

-Light weight. This is very important as i wanted to be fast, each operator took care of their camera without any problem, they could manage to prep themselves.

-Easy media. As you know backup drives could be really expensive when shooting a film. I helped production budget by  narrowing the amount  of data that was needed to be managed, keeping it compact, cheap and simple. While retaining excellent quality.

-Creative purposes. I love the possibility of modifying shutter angle, crank up the ISO, print different WB on camera and make some crazy personal effects to empower narrative and drive the story.

Overall I think this is the best budget vs. quality camera out there. I was really amazed by how it performed  and how it helped me as cinematographer   to never say “no we can’t”.  Its about getting the story and performance so its important to have  tools that help you out, not restrain you for getting the shot.

The Cosmonaut is a Film funded for more than 5000 people that is about to come out in next months ( 14 May 2013). I talked about this project previously, its my first film as Cinematographer and I’m really lucky to be involved in such beautiful project. Recently we have heard that business is not about making a product, but about people believing in your vision regarding a product. That is how great things are done, and this is one of the greatest achievements in cinema of our time. Thanks to 3 talented people, Nicolas Alcala, Carola Rodriguez and Bruno Teixidor this film is happening.

Some days ago they released this last trailer, I think its an amazing job. They are empowering people that believed in them  since the beginning, to change the way cinema is made.

I was called by Monica Suarez, which by  the way  is outstanding in 3D design and design itself. She contacted us to deliver a campaign for the firm Bettina Vega a very prestigious jewellery  Spanish house since 1905.  Even though we are dedicated to Film  we accepted the challenge of making an image that could represent the firm for the specific campaign. The photo was to be published in Telva Magazine, one of the main Fashion Magazines in Spain in December last year.

Meeting with the client was amazing, Bettina Vega is very talented and knew what she wanted in a very specific way.  Bettina needed something with strength, elegance, subtle, and simple.  We came up with this image which had excellent feedback, even from Vogue Italy.

Im always grateful when I shoot fiction, for me its the purest art expression I can offer. It really doesn’t matter how you do it but doing it, the most important is  going out and find the characters in the story.

When I have most fun is when we don’t really have everything thought out, when there is a chance that  together  ( the whole team )  we might find different places, sequences and narrative by chance.  Its kinda tricky for production team and sometimes for first AD, but when you have good  talented actors, good team and positive energy sometimes you find things and places, ambiences that otherwise you could not find in an ordinary scheduled shooting.

For me the best fiction projects are the ones that doesn’t have any storyboard,  I think storyboards in narrative projects actually blind yourself for what you are about to find in the space  with the actors, when you arrive to that place, at that time, at that mood, not behind the desk away from the real action, your real movie.

Some months ago I was called to shoot a script presentation for a pre production stage Film called “Moonlight Drifters”. A Spanish production with English / Swidish actors, actually i was lucky enough to work with Thomas Hanzon which by the way has worked with Ingmar Bergman.

The project approach was very interesting, Director Patricia Venti  really wanted to pull out  the story out of the characters, to have a narrative freedom with some guidelines in the script.   She described the work as a kind  of a documentary shooting but with film quality.

For me as a DOP its a perfect challenge to not only make the shooting work in terms of image narrative and structure. But to find the right mood for what the characters were doing in an improvised space.

Embracing the project  with a very low budget, fast pace shooting almost improvised was kind of tricky. Fast lenses and high sensitivity is crucial, we used Zeiss paired with 5Dmark III. In light approach we used mainly Bi color LED 30X30 mostly hand held battery powered.  In some interiors we had  some 1k tungstens and 4X4 Bank Kino flo.

After 3 days of powered energy shooting we end up with this project presentation which Director and Producer really loved.

Today we’re glad to announce that we’ve been working with the great social travel site minube.com to offer personalized travel recommendations for their users.

This Spot was produced by Riot Cinema Collective,  shot  in Madrid, London, Tokyo and Buenos Aires Argentina.

This project was approached differently. Minube wanted the app to be really present in the frame, so we decided to change things a bit and separate the app  from the background physically. Making it pop out in the frame but still merge good in the image.

We decided to shoot locations first, all the background and the camera movements. Later we shot all the hands with the iphones on set, to be merged in post later on.

In terms of shooting in location we were really time pressured, so we decided to light with 30X30 Bi Color Hi LED Light panels,  with 1/4 diffused 1x1mts frames. So we could lit the characters and backgrounds  without the need of cables nor electrical plugs. Heatless,small and light weight, Light panels gave us a lot of freedom in terms of speed, space, and efficiency.

Particularly in this spot i was kind of worried because we were using some Gopro footage to shoot some backgrounds, To my surprise it turned out really nice, and merged ok with the rest of the footage.

Minube was delighted with results, and have received a lot of positive tweets about the video and the App. That´s what makes us happy!

In this post I will like to change things a bit. Other than talking about  general photography in the project, or how well it went,  I will like to focus on Color Grading, the importance of shooting right  and how we managed our workflow. As you know this days we are constantly shooting with cameras that don´t allow us to play much in post. ( HDSLR´s )  For me it was a good thing to shoot and professionally learn and grow with them. ¿Why? Because they taught me how to do things the right way ON shooting, not relying on  post.  So you have to  put yourself together and get things right, there is no room for error.

As you know the importance of reaching as close as possible to the final aesthetics is crucial with this cameras, and as an emerging cinematographer that is the best thing that can happen to you, ( in my opinion) to push you further and deliver in camera the best possible result. This  gives you the advantage to  color grade and enhance aesthetics,  not fixing problems.

This project  was shot on my  1D mark IV, which by the way I sold yesterday, yes im buying a 5D mark III, but thats worth another post for explanation.   The 1D mark IV is an excellent  camera that responds great to low light situations, ( I love to work with low light, for me it  just gives me more control with light). But its heavily compressed output video is something to be careful about.

Forma Pro Film Company in Latvia called and asked me to shoot a sample film for presenting producers  and search for financial approval for a film.   In this project I got hired  as a Production Designer as well as a Cinematographer.  Its kind of funny but this experience taught me  to do better my job,  as a Cinematographer   its crucial to really  open wider and work the  production design in a project. Here in Europe is not common to have that specific figure on a project, so  you just have to do it, you have to design everything that reflects light and comes into your lens and shoot it right. For you to get as close as possible of what you imagined in your head.

Below you can find some stills before and after color grading.  We edited in FCPX which by the way  i like a lot,  ( It just works great and fast). And color graded on Da Vinci Resolve. One thing I like about this mixture is that you can work directly with the h264 codec of camera, without any compressions, so you edit on FCPX,  send XML to  Da Vinci Resolve. Do color grading, and then go back to FCPX for Subtitles or any aditional work without loosing a generation in every export.

Director Valery Savonof was very happy with results, I think the whole crew did an amazing job, and working with Forma Pro Films is always a pleasure, great work, fun and talented people.

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This video was produced by Riot Cinema Collective for a renowned Design Firm  in Madrid. Unfortunately we cannot give a lot of details about what´s the spot about or which is the Firm we are talking about, but we can show some captured frames from the video.

We shot the spot on studio, working with 6 2k tungsten  diffused by a 6x6mts frame hanged from the studio ceiling. I wanted a very soft light to lit the objects we were ment to photograph. Sometimes I used some extra power from a 4bank kino flo  to fill or to give some direction to light depending on the frame. My gaffer Adan Martin made an excellent job building the whole thing and making it work.  On some shots  we needed  the lights to interact  with some  camera movements, travelling action  that discovered lines, shapes and design.

Directed by Bruno Teixidor and Produced by Carola Rodriguez, this spot definitely is one of our best work while working together.

This video was produced  by Riot Cinema Collective for Movistar.

Joyn makes everyday mobile to mobile communications more engaging, brings you closer to the people in your mobile address book by combining all the ways you want to be in touch – talk, chat, share videos, photos and files.  Joyn is mobile phone and network aware which means it automatically ‘knows and shows’ the ways you can share with any of your contacts – via chat, video, call or files – at any moment in time.

The spot was directed by Bruno Teixidor and produced by Carola Rodriguez.  Two days shooting, working fast and accomplishing clients product perception Joyn is a great spot for a great product.

The official trailer of my first Feature Film  as DOP, “The  Cosmonaut“. Is an upcoming Spanish science-fiction feature film directed by Nicolas Alcala and produced by Carola Rodriguez and Bruno Teixidor. The first feature-length project of Riot Cinema Collective, it is notable for its use of crowdfunding techniques and Creative Commons license in its production.

A SCI-FI feature film about a soviet cosmonaut lost in Space (and Earth), produced by lots of people (like you) starting from 2€. It’s Creative Commons-licensed so that you can edit, copy remix and share it as you wish. Free.

Working with the guys of  Formapro Films (http://formaprofilm.com) is  always an amazing experience and adding in the mix a brilliant Director such as Bruno Teixidor ( Riot Cinema Collective) (http://www.riotcinema.com/) was just the perfect mix for an excellent result.

This Videoclip was shot for Russian Singer Svetlana Surganova, in Latvia. Bruno had this idea where he wanted the background to change while Svetlana wondered in an abandoned house. The shoot took one day  inside an empty house, we filtered all windows and lit the place with 2  4Bank kino flo and one  1k HMI with Chimera window. The shooting turn out really quick and simple, having in the camera department  Operator/Steadycam Paco Serrano and  Gaffer Denis from Formapro Films helped to work faster and efficient.

XS Studio serviced camera rental for the videoclip, Cinematography and Color grading.

Trabajar con el equipo de  Formapro Films (http://formaprofilm.com) siempre es una excelente experiencia. Si a esto  sumamos el talento del director Bruno Teixidor ( Riot Cinema Collective) (http://www.riotcinema.com/)  los buenos resultados están asegurados.

Este videoclip se rodó para  la artista Rusa Svetlana Surganova en Latvia. Bruno tenia esta idea en donde  los fondos cambiaban mientras la cantante recorría una casa vacía.  El rodaje duro un día dentro de la casa, se filtraron todas las ventanas  e iluminamos con 2 kinos de 4 tubos 1,20 y un 1k HMI con Chimera. El rodaje fue rápido y sencillo, teniendo en el departamento de cámara como Operador/Steadycam Paco Serrano y al Gaffer Denis del equipo de Formapro Films ayudo a que las cosas fueran rápidas y eficientes.

XS Studio hizo el service de alquiler de cámara, dirección de fotografía y etalonaje.

Starting from the point that working with Formapro Films (http://formaprofilm.com) during the Film “The Cosmonaut” was one of my best working experiences  and that this spot had a great script,  great director, I was pretty sure this project had a  promising future.

While maintaining a low-budget and a great creativity we manage to deliver excellent quality. It was meant for broadcast distribution, in the end the clients were so happy it ended up in cinema projections in USA.

The spot was shot in the beautiful city of Riga which by the way is a UNESCO world heritage site.  Director Stas Tokalovs contacted me  and told me about his idea, I found it great, flew over there immediately for pre production and scouting. We shot for one day, edited  and color correct in 2 days = everything sweet, well done, and fast.

XS studio serviced camera rentals, cinematography, editing and color correction. Reducing costs to the client while maintaining excellence in quality.

Trabajar con el equipo de Formapro Films  (http://formaprofilm.com)  durante la película “El Cosmonauta” ha sido una de  mis mejores experiencias laborales.

 Este spot tenia un guión estupendo, un director talentoso y un equipo de producción muy efectivo detrás.

Se rodó en la ciudad de Riga, que como curiosidad es patrimonio de la UNESCO. El director Stas Tokalovs  me contó su ideay  me pareció genial. Al poco tiempo me encontraba ya haciendo el scouting y  pre producción en Letonia. El rodaje duro un día, se edito y etalono en 2 días, todo fue sencillo, rápido y bien hecho.

El  spot inicialmente estaba destinado a TV,  el cliente estaba tan satisfecho con los resultados que ha sido distribuido incluso en cines en EUA.

XS Studio hizo el service de alquiler de cámara, dirección de fotografía, edición y etalonaje. De esta  manera al cubrir gran parte de la producción,  los costes se mantuvieron bajos mientras manteníamos excelencia en calidad.

This September we launch our new Narrative Reel.  This edition contains some “Authorized” shots from the movie “The Cosmonaut” and some other projects we shoot  during this year.  We will have  a re-edited version of the reel after the movie premiere.

Nuestra nueva Reel,  esta edición contiene algunas imágenes autorizadas de la película “El Cosmonauta” así como algunos otros proyectos en los que estuvimos trabajando este año. Re-editaremos una nueva versión dentro de muy poco. 

Also on October we will launch our new Spot Reel. Where we show our best work in Broadcast & Web Commercials.

The past April XS Studio had the pleasure to shoot the new intro for CAMEO.  We worked for the guys at Riot Cinema Collective in Madrid.

The intro was amazing, we worked with Dragon stop motion program to conform all the photographs we took of the paper figures. The intro was shot on Canon 1d mark 4  and Zeiss glass.

XS Studio serviced camera rental, cinematography and color correction.

En XS Studio tuvimos el placer de volver a trabajar con el equipo de Riot Cinema Collective ( http://www.riotcinema.com/) en Madrid.  Trabajamos en la nueva intro de CAMEO. Utilizamos el programa Dragon Stopmotion para conformar todas las fotografías y estudiar la evolución de las figuras de papel.  Se rodó con ópticas Zeiss y Canon ID Mark4.

XS Studio hizo el service de alquiler de cámara, dirección de fotografía y etalonaje.

Im am very grateful for being envolved in a such beautiful project, and give life to such an excellent script.

Working with Director Nicolas Alcala was amazing, always pushing forward in search for the best possible image to tell the story he wrote. We decided for the movie to have a very naturalistic approach relying mostly on soft light  lightning and what Nicolas called “pools” or  ”zones” of light.

For me in terms of light less is always more, so we worked a lot with natural light,  reinforcing the actors or the spots we wanted to mark within the action.

The cosmonaut shooting served for me as one of the most enriched experiences in my life. And I thank with all my heart all the camera and grip department for their impecable job, and will like  to express my gratitude to all the cosmonaut team  and the people that were involved in the project for this marvelous experience.

Estoy muy agradecido de participar en un proyecto tan hermoso, y retratar en  imágenes  un guión tan bueno.

Trabajar con el Director de cine Nicolas Alcala ha sido una de las experiencias mas importantes de mi vida. Como persona es excelente y como profesional  es muy talentoso y exigente. Siempre lograba sacar algo mas de mi, algo imprevisto, colocarme en un punto incomodo que al final llevaba a resultados sorprendentes.  Decidimos darle a la película una aproximación naturalista, con una evolución narrativa  que nos guiara al estado anímico de los personajes principales. Para mi menos es mas, trabajamos mucho con luz natural reforzando personajes y puntos de atención narrativa dentro de la acción.

La película “El Cosmonauta” me ha enriquecido muchísimo como persona y  como profesional. Agradezco muchísimo a mi equipo de cámara y luces que demostraron un talento y una  capacidad resolutiva impresionante. También me gustaría hacer mención a todo el equipo involucrado en este proyecto y agradecerles la experiencia.

This is our latest cinematography work,  and our last before the Film project ” The Cosmonaut”.  Its an amazing videoclip we shot at the island of Mikonos, Greece.  Our two artist  were,  Arsenie Todiras and  Lena Knyazeva.  We had great fun shooting in amazing locations,  our approach was relatively simple,  we worked mainly with Litepanles and reflectors.  I love working with Litepanels, cause they work on batteries and you can have great constant light even if there is strong wind.   The optics we used  were Zeiss prime lenses, shooting on 1d markIV and some multi cam shots also on 5d mark II.

Our great producer Alexander Konovalov, (which is in fact in the production team of the film “The Cosmonaut”)  prepared every detail  so we could have a smooth, creative, productive shooting.

XS Studio serviced camera rentals, cinematography and color grading.

Este proyecto es el ultimo antes de embarcarnos en el proyecto cinematográfico “El Cosmonauta”.  Es un videoclip que se rodó para los artistas Rusos Arsenie Todiras y Lena Knyazeva en Mikonos, Grecia. Las localizaciones eran impactantes,  tuvimos una aproximación muy sencilla, trabajando con litepanels y reflectores, dejando mucha libertad a los artistas. En lo personal me gusta mucho trabajar con Litepanels porque pueden funcionar a baterías, y es una ventaja tremenda en exteriores o tomas  en steadycam. También es fácil de mover, manipular y sostener, incluso en situaciones con viento fuerte.  El Videoclip se rodó con ópticas Zeiss / Canon 1D Mark IV  y como cámara ”B” Canon 5D Mark II

Cabe mencionar que trabajar con Alexander Konovalov en producción hizo que el rodaje fuera suave, productivo y efectivo dando cabida a tiempo de creatividad, incrementando la calidad del video.

XS Studio hizo el service de alquiler de cámara, dirección de fotografía y etalonaje.

We have been working with the guys at Riot Cinema Collective (riotcinema.com) to create a visual experience of the Video on Demand and TV service for Movistar.

This video explains the concept and the product the guys at Vostok (vostokstudio.com) created.

XS Studio serviced camera rental, Cinematography, Editing, Color Correction.

Hemos trabajado con el equipo de Riot Cinema Collective (riotcinema.com) para crear una experiencia visual de lo que serian los servicios de  Video on Demand y TV de Movistar.

Este video explica el concepto y el producto diseñado por el equipo de  Vostok (vostokstudio.com) 

XS Studio hizo el service de alquiler de cámara, dirección de fotografía, edición y etalonaje.

Movistar Video as imagined by Vostok [ENG] from Vostok Studio on Vimeo.