Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1536119
there's a process of engaging them and working through the award process. From there, it's really about building an efficient pipeline. I think the unique part of the process for this show was really look- ing at how we move from film. Knowing that this was going to be a celluloid show, which was going to have such an impact on the aes- thetic of it. Thinking of the technical pipeline side of how we move from film into a digital workflow, and build it from there. There are all kinds of interesting things in terms of the imperfection, irregularity, and visual nuance of film that we don't get with a digital pipeline. So once we understood we were going to shoot on film, we were going to work at 4K and have a digital workflow, and we knew the visual effects partners that we wanted to work with, it was really a case of bringing all of those components together and working out the best way to go from there. Michael Ralla: I think it's really important to see visual effects as a team—it's not just about the supervisor. This is a partnership, and it's not just one person that does it all. Giving credit to the team behind the work is really important to me. How did you work with Autumn to translate her cinematogra- phy into the digital realm? Michael Ralla: Every single one of Ryan's films—from Fruitvale all the way to the ones that I was a part of—it's always about collab- oration. That's one thing that's really important to him. He hires de- partment heads who he really trusts. His mantra is, "I'm not hiring the best people to tell them what to do. I want them to tell me what they think is best." You're actually invited to show your A-game, and it's absolutely appropriate to use this kind of sports terminology be- cause that's what his background is. In the past, Autumn has told me, "For some reason I have never really been happy with a lot of the visual effects work that I'm seeing on my projects, because it seems as if the VFX folks make shit up." That's more or less verbatim what she said, to a point where I put that into a write-up that I handed out to some of our visual effects partners. "Look, we have a DP who says we make shit up, so we can't do that. We are always shooting lots of references—let's take our cues from those for as many aspects as possible." One of the big reasons for that is also because she is very lens-cen- tric. The glass that she uses is custom-made or detuned to her liking. It's part of her visual language, and that's a really big challenge for digital visual effects to replicate because they're somewhat unpre- dictable. So on Wakanda Forever I studied them, and I had to learn the terminology to describe the different aberrations. We had to find ways to actually replicate what the lenses do with our visual effects tools, and that was one thing that made us collaborate very closely— she really appreciated that effort. Wakanda Forever was digital, so it was all about the lenses. Now we're shooting large-format film, five-perf 70mm as well as 15-perf IMAX. So now it's all about the film and the lenses, as if the lens- es weren't enough. This time I also asked her to explain her lighting more in detail and had a lot of conversations with her chief lighting technician, Brian Bartolini, so I could study it more. A visual effects artist has so much power to change the image. You can essentially change everything—make this dark, brighten that a p r i l • m ay • j u n e 2 0 2 5 c g w 9 DP Autumn Durald Arkapaw utilized large-format IMAX 65mm film.