We decided on four locations around Hollywood, my favorite being a dark tunnel with amazing color reflected on the walls.  I used a 70-200mm lens to take the portraits, with a silver reflector kicking up some extra light.

Here are a few of my favorite shots (you can view the rest here!):

On the last few days in Berlin,  we were hired to showcase the inside of the Ghostwriters Studios for a video spot on their website.  Owner/producer, Neco Tiglioglu, rented a steady cam and dolly for the shoot.  We also used two 500 watt Arri’s with soft-boxes for illumination.

Ghostwriter final #1 from Damon Cirulli on Vimeo.

Our trip to Europe in August of 2009 came about as a result of a job offer to shoot a music video for an iconic singer named Ivy Green, who works for a talented young Berlin music producer by the name of Sebastian Budde.

The idea behind the Ivy Green music video “Stomp Yo Feet” was simple enough.  Ivy would paint a picture of herself in an art studio. As she is painting the picture of herself, it comes to life and begins singing the “Stomp” song.  After the painting is fully converted to a moving landscape of colors and textures, with the pictureland Ivy in the middle, the real Ivy takes the painting down from it’s isle and carries it through the streets of Berlin.

We shot all over the city, mainly using a 5D Mark II, with a 50mm 1.2 lens, mounted on a steady cam. We focused our first two days of shooting on the eastern side of the city in Friedrichshain, by the crumbling wall, that is now covered with graffiti and large art exhibits called the East Side Gallery. The art studio we used was also nearby.

To make it easier for our VFX guy to track and composite Ivy in the painting world, while being carried down the street, we fastened a thick piece of green screen paper to the inside of the picture frame.

The third day of shooting took us to strange partially abandoned building that every inch of was covered with old concert flyers and graffiti.  It was ten stories high; and the very top floors had been converted into shabby artist residences.  We shot on the bottom two floors.

The scene was: Ivy carries the painting into the building and mounts it on one of the graffiti sewn walls.  The camera zooms into the painting and we are suddenly transported to a huge party in the exact same room with tons of people wearing strange animal masks.

We shot with two 5D’s, one on sticks with a 70-200mm lens and the other with the earlier steady cam set up.  The extras and dancers were great, though it took a few beers to loosen them up that my producer handed out.  Oh to be shooting in Germany where beer is subsidized by the Government! It’s everywhere, even in movie theaters and Mc’donneys.

I digress, after pulling off the party scene that left only the last green-screen shots of Ivy to capture before we could rap.  After negotiating with multiple small studios there in Berlin, we found one that would work with our budget.  The place was called Frogfish Studios.  The shooting went smoothly, though they didn’t have a green screen available so we were forced to shoot on a blue one.  Which was not ideal but for the short notice and price was worth it in the end.

The Ivy Green video will be available the beginning of 2010.

The Clara Chill music video “Wie weit wirst du gehen” or “How Far Will You Go” was shot entirely in two and a half days in six locations including the Tempelhof Airport; which is now closed to the public though it is one of the biggest buildings in all of Europe.

For the video we decided on a simple static approach, with no steady cam shots or dolly movements.  Instead we tried to capture the emotion of the song by focusing on the singer, more then the movement in the frame.

We also shot Clara on the same blue-screen at the Frogfish Studio in Berlin so we could add some textured moving backgrounds later in post. During the shoot we opened up the piano and shot the keys moving with Clara playing for an interesting look.

The Clara Chill video “How Far Will You Go” will be available in January 2010.

Click here to play video in Fullscreen HD from RareForm on Vimeo.

Footage shot with the Canon EOS 5D Mark II. Camera was mounted on a Zacuto DSLR rig with a Zacuto Follow Focus and Redrock Micro Matte Box.

Lenses used includes:

• Canon EF 16-35mm f/2.8L II USM
• Canon EF 50mm f/1.2L USM
• Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM
• Canon EF 100mm f/2.8 Macro USM

Do you have questions or comments about the Putt Putt Lean production?  Add them to the video here, or in the comments below.

After months of preparation, it was time to shoot “Grave Dawn” a WWII epic film based on the true historical account of a man named Erwin, who was in the Nazi regiments but decided to defect due to his moral conflictions.

The writer/director, DJ Turner of Kindest Cut Productions, herded most of the film crew up from Los Angeles to the remote area of Petaluma, where a man named Han’s owns a massive collection of war memorabilia and weapons . His stash of equipment would be considered a legit arsenal in many countries and includes Russian and Nazi uniforms, a full sized Tank, multiple anti-aircraft canons, and all the authentic rifles, shotguns and machine guns imaginable.

Additionally, for the shoot we were able to hire a professional FX guru, Silvester Stallone’s old explosive expert, who made sure to blow things up properly with precision. In addition, the guns were all fitted with blanks, the actors with squibs, and even the tank was rigged up so that it could fire off a round. Ear plugs were a nessescity on set.

As for cameras, we rented 2 Red One’s and used my 5D Mark II as well, mainly on the huge battle shots and the behind the scenes interviews with Erwin himself. Overall the R1’s looked great; the quality of image and variable frame rates alone make it an astounding camera to have in the field. Other then the fact that the R1 has a higher res and adjustable fps then the 5D, the images looked very similar and could easily be cut together. Only when trying to do a full film transfer does the difference in quality start to become apparent, but for TV and online streaming this is not an issue.

After a little over a week of shooting the actors and extras were sent home and the tedious process of post-production began. The film should be out soon, so enjoy some of these teaser shots and keep your eyes peeled for the final cut of Grave Dawn!

We’ve just finished one of our first videos shot with the Canon EOS 5D Mark II. The camera was mounted on a Zacuto DSLR rig with a Zacuto Follow Focus and Redrock Micro Matte Box. Shot with a variety of Canon L lenses with pretty minimal post-processing:

• Canon EF 16-35mm f/2.8L II USM
• Canon EF 50mm f/1.2L USM
• Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM
• Canon EF 100mm f/2.8 Macro USM

Special thanks to our model Noel Adeline Ward–check out her more extensive portfolio here.

Check out some stills taken from the video shoot:

Photos by RareForm