Telling the story of a man who changed the world

	DP Robert Fraisse (right) checks a shot with a crew member during the shooting of "Luther."

It is a cold day inside the castle of Frederick the Wise in Wittenberg, Germany, in the winter of 1530. Sitting before a blazing fire is the ailing Frederick, Prince Elector of Saxony, and the young revolutionary monk, Martin Luther, who presents Frederick with his inflammatory document exposing the corruption of Pope Leo X and the excesses of the Roman establishment. Frederick reaches into a cupboard for a manuscript among candelabras, jeweled silver goblets and golden crosses, when suddenly, "Cut, that was good so far, let's pick it up from there" breaks the silence. It is British Director Eric Till, who approaches Frederick (Peter Ustinov), and Luther (Joseph Fiennes), for some brief exchange as the dolly tracks back to number one and the crew reassembles before the fire on this 25th shooting day of principal photography of Luther. The Relic Room at Wittenberg castle is a set on Stage 12 at the Bavaria Film Studios in Munich and French Director of Photography, Robert Fraisse, is checking that the firelight from the hearth is flickering on the faces in just the right place, at the right colour temperature. Fraisse speaks to his crew that he has reunited from his last picture in Germany, Stalingrad, a.k.a. Enemy at the Gates in French, English and German.

"Luther."

Till reviews the morning's work on the monitor... "I hope we are telling a good story. Martin Luther was an extraordinary man of infinite complexity, with remarkable courage and compassion, someone who changed the world. There is something in him in all of us, I think. We would all like to, at some point in our lives, stand up in front of (what was) the greatest power of the time and say, 'I don't give a damn, this is what I believe and I don't care what you do.' I am a great believer that stories passed down from generation to generation to generation have more strength and validity than what theologians or historians write. It was John Ford who said, 'If it's a question of legend or history...go for the legend.' "

	Martin Luther (Joseph Fiennes) presents Frederick the Wise (Peter Ustinov) with his inflammatory document in a scene from "Luther."

Grabbing lunch before rushing off to watch yesterday's rushes, Fraisse says, "Most of my career I have worked with Kodak products, but recently I found the Vision 5279 too contrasty, so I tried the Kodak Vision 5277 which is more pleasant to look at on the screen. The Kodak Expression 5284 had less contrast than the 79, and a bit more than the 77, so I chose the 84. I shot some very basic tests, and perhaps it varies from lab to lab, but I noticed my printer lights were a bit lower than usual. The numbers you see on the sensitometry curves, which tell the E.I. numbers, indicated it was closer to 400ASA than to 500. As this film is a drama, I didn't want the images to be too soft, so I decided I would rate the 5284 at 400ASA.

"We had two scenes with candles, one was a wide shot in a church in Germany and the other was in a monastery in Rome. In the church, we had a wide shot and I used over 800 candles. I had to key it with a warm light, as the light from the candles acted almost as a fill. In Rome, we had a situation with 120 monks each carrying one big candle, but as they were dressed in black, the candles didn't give off much and I had to light them. With all these dark clothes the monks wear, I found the darks too hard, so in the last week or so, I started using a light SFX filter- one half or a one, just to break the edges a little.

"It is such a pleasure to work on these wonderful sets. Look at these incredible tapestries, these murals and old paintings, and these enormous wooden cabinets with hand carved figures made of real oak! It takes 3-4 men to lift them. If it were Paris, they would be made out of balsa wood. I am always trying to get in more wide shots to show off the beauty and detail of the sets."

Fraisse's gaffer, Ronnie Schwarz, adds, "Robert is trying to keep everything natural. You can't tell where the light is coming from, it's just there. We use a lot of diffusion frames and fresnels to make the light soft. Only rarely do we have a backlight as a hard light.

In the Middle Ages, you didn't see much in the dark of night. If you did, it was some source of firetorches, lanterns, candles, so for our night sequences we use patches of light.We use HMIs to give an ambient backlight just to make it readable, otherwise you couldn't shoot. On our tungsten sources we use a combination of gels, an eighth of CTO orange and wheat which gives a nice warm atmosphere that will go all over the movie. And for our night exteriors, we don't have that ridiculous blue moonlight that you see in most movies. Robert is a perfectionist; he is only happy when everything is just right and he will continue working until it is."

Finally, Kevin Jewison, veteran camera operator with three feature film projects as Director of Photography under his belt says, "It's great to work with Robert again. On this show I am using new equipment and materials I never used before. I haven't worked with ARRI cameras in a long while, this is the first time I've used the Cooke S4 lenses, and also it's the first time I've worked with the Kodak Expression stock. It seems to have a lot more latitude than the Vision. It is a flattering film for faces, especially women, and the skin tones are natural and clean without being too contrasty. The job of the Director of Photography is all about predicting how something is going to look. Most DPs like using the same materials and the same tools they are used to because then they know pretty much what to expect and how it will turn out. If you change your cameras, lenses, film stocks, and labs all the time, you never know where you are, especially when you are doing things by feeling and by eye. Having said that, all these new elements are great and I am really pleased to be working with them."