Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1545910
A U G U S T 2 0 2 6 I 1 3 — continued on page 15 This is a plate shot in the kids' POV, filmed through the gyrosphere glass and into the sun, as the Indominus roars at them. This image is through the eyes of a child — not what it actually is, but what his nightmare would look like. I love how its mouth breaks the frame — it's massive. We shot spherically and released in 2:1, so the dinosaurs are very tall. It's why Steven shot Jurassic Park in 1:85, but I wanted to have more scope. Score kicks in briefly here. Score was deployed in moments when the stakes changed dramatically — for the worse and then suddenly when they had a chance. There's none in the middle of the scene — the greatest suspense is awkward silence and only the SFX of what's happening inside and outside the glass. 3 This was on location so we could get the changing reflections and shadows as we spun the gyrosphere on the dolly as fast as we could send them. Then we shot a 360° plate on the same lens and sped it up behind them — we had little blue cards behind their hair. The little kid screaming moves your eye to that third of the frame; it makes you feel like you're in it with them. Because you're watching his face, it creates much more depth with the things spinning around. We gave them eyelines and I'd roar at them, which isn't really scary, so they just had to feel it. Being spun upside down in the ball was inherently scary so I think we had enough to get a fear that felt real. Children are very good at being scared. They're scared all the time. They know that feeling better than anything. 5 We're pulling back on the Technocrane to widen out, probably on a 75mm lens. We did a lot of long wide angles when dinosaurs were in the frame. The gyrosphere is purely digital here because it's moving so fast as it gets pinballed around, so this would've been a plate that we grabbed on day two. I just remember the loud rumbling of this stampede — their trip has turned from a dream into a nightmare. I dig how dirty this shot is. You're seeing little pieces of what's happening because we're not framing it flawlessly. We didn't really clean up the location—dead leaves, mud, and all — like we just happened to be here while this is going down. The Hawaiian sunlight gave this movie a really rich look. We just put a little bit of smoke in there and the whole thing came alive. 4 The kids are now inverted in the gyrosphere with the Indominus peering at them, like food inside packaging. We shot this in the jungle with the kids upside down, then laid in the animal. You get the size of the head and teeth as it raises out of frame. The light pings in the dinosaurs' eyes are core to these movies. I'm very deliberate about where they get placed. You can define whether a dinosaur is wistful or angry or happy depending on where you put that eye ping. We would experiment to find the best spot. You know it when you hit it. When you design the dinosaurs with that extended brow, you get a shadow over the top third of the eye, which makes it look angrier. Here, we added curiosity to its sense of malice. I also love the barrel distortion they created where the glass curves. ILM was at the top of their game on this film. 6