OUR UNIVERSE PRODUCTION.
BENEATH THE WAVES Diving scenes were shot on Red Helium with Cooke S4 primes, in specialised Gates and Nauticam underwater camera housings
range, inconsistent weight and front element dimensions, undesirable lens breathing and a lack of minimal focus lengths,” Bremner says. “Considering all these factors, I needed a base set of anamorphics that held up in low light, with minimal distortion, a uniformed casing, a realistic minimal focus range and a balanced visual consistency. Personally, I find when shooting the ocean’s horizon line, any skew feels amplified, so any deep distortion needs to be minimised as well. It’s almost as if we’re subconsciously conditioned to see the ocean within a perfectly horizontal plane; anything else feels completely off.” Bremner explains that Panavision’s G Series anamorphics ticked these boxes perfectly, so he combined them with the Sony Venice for its resolution, high-ISO capabilities and internal NDs in the majority of the on-land sequences. “When the G Series were pushed beyond their low-light and minimum focus limits, I supplemented them with Panavision Primo sphericals to match the G Series aesthetically,” he adds. “A Panavision Super Macro 90mm was used to capture hero shots of our baby turtles emerging for the first time, as dioptres can distort and amplify resolution loss.” UP IN THE ATMOSPHERE For the aerial sequences, due to their size and weight, the team combined P+S Technik Kowa anamorphics with a Red Komodo on a DJI Matrice 600. Bremner says they performed perfectly. “I had a backup set of vintage Zeiss Super Speeds for the lower-light flights, but the Komodo held up to my satisfaction even when pushed, and the Super Speeds weren’t needed,”
“The choice of anamorphic lenses tied the two strands of the show together”
The team needed to meet Netflix’s delivery requirements: a minimum of true 4K delivery, and on 2x anamorphic squeeze. Director of photography on Our Universe Dale Bremner explains how, given both the environmental and physical constraints, he knew multiple set-ups of both camera and lens combinations would be required to successfully achieve this. The BBC’s original desire was to shoot Red Helium with Atlas Orion series lenses, though he opted for Panavision G Series combined with a DXL2 and Sony Venice package. “Some key technical hurdles that present themselves when shooting anamorphically are: vertical and horizontal resolution loss, horizon barrel distortion, smaller aperture
both planet Earth and the wider universe itself,” Cooter explains. “We shot in a widescreen 2.39:1 ratio, and although we left the final decision to individual DOPs, our go-to package was Atlas Orion series anamorphic lenses with the Red Gemini to get the cinematic look that the epic nature of the storytelling required. The choice of anamorphic lenses tied the two strands of the show together – the intimate ‘character’ moments with the animals, and the huge cinematic space shots – to illustrate that everything you see in the show is connected. It is these cinematic aesthetics – taking references from the science-fiction films of Steven Spielberg and JJ Abrams – that demonstrate this wasn’t a standard space or wildlife documentary show.”
OPTICAL COLLUSION A mixture of Panavision lenses were utilised, including glass from the Primo, Macro and G Series
47. MAY 2023
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