Brooklyn South – A Different Country
with its Own Look
By Bob Fisher

This article originally appeared in American Cinematographer in 1998.

It was a simple scene that runs for less than a minute. The setting is a grungy alley in the space between two tenement buildings. If you stand in the middle of the alley, and stretch both arms sideways, you can almost touch both brick walls. At the far end of the alley, two cops are talking to a character who is standing in a half open doorway. Glaring light spills through the opening into the darkness. Mid-way down the alley, a window high on a wall drops a pool of soft warm light on the ground. The camera is in the foreground dollying slowly toward the actors. The director is Marc Buckland. He’s about 20 feet behind the camera, looking at a TV monitor, watching three stand-ins walk through the scene. He thinks aloud about augmenting the dolly shot with a zoom timed to catch the characters as they turn and walk toward the camera.      

Cinematographer Bill Roe hears Buckland from a position near the camera. He saunters back and makes a casual suggestion. Buckland doesn’t seem to be listening. He’s talking to one of the producers about a line that doesn’t sound natural in the circumstances. Buckland runs through another take or two. Then, he calls for the “first team” (the actors). They make the shot in two clean takes. Buckland dropped the line he questioned. He also took Roe’s advice and made the zoom much subtler.

“We try to work as a unit,” Roe says. “Instead of me saying that dolly zoom is not going to work, and trying to talk Marc out of it, I showed him another alternative. He trusted me enough to look at what I suggested and decided that was the way to go.”

The alley is actually a set on a basement stage at the CBS Center, in the San Fernando Valley, where Brooklyn South is produced. The latest cop show from Steven Bochco Productions shoots five days a week on standing and wild sets at the CBS Center, and two other days at practical locations, mainly in downtown Los Angeles in neighborhoods where old brick buildings look and feel like Brooklyn.

Mid-way through its first season, Brooklyn South is defining itself as no N.Y.P.D. Blue clone. The same people, David Milch, Bill Finkelstein and Bochco write the stories. Their roots go back to the early 1980s and Hill Street Blues, which invented a cop show genre that couples visual reality with character-driven stories. But Brooklyn South has a different look and pace, and a distinctly different approach to story telling.

NYPD Blue is about detectives who get to the scene after the crime and investigate. It’s hyper-reality, visually punctuated by what Brian Reynolds, who shot the past four years of the show, calls a “flickering eye” camera. The setting is Manhattan where tall buildings diffuse and filter the warmth out of sunlight before it reaches ground level. Brooklyn South is set in the same city, but it might was well be in a different country. The buildings are three or four stories high. Sunlight is more direct and warmer. The scripts are about cops dressed in blue who live every minute of each day with the unexpected.

“It isn’t unusual for us to have 10, 12 or 13 people in a scene,” says producer-director Michael Watkins, ASC. “There may be five or six different things happening. Bill’s camera is almost always moving, passed off from one character to another. He shows you where they are and reveals what different people are saying and doing.”

Watkins gives a generous slice of the credit for defining the look and pace to Roe, who is shooting his first episodic series after 14 years of experience as a camera operator, and another three to four as an assistant and loader.

It’s not a bad way to start a career, particularly when the praise comes from Watkins, who earned a couple of Emmys and three consecutive Outstanding Achievement Award nominations from the American Society of Cinematographers for his camera work on Quantum Leap. Watkins’ cinematography credits include such MOWs as Family Album, Steel Justice, Little Nikita and Hearts and Souls for the big screen. He shifted his focus to directing several years ago; earning credits on such shows as Millennium, The Client and NYPD Blue before settling into his role on Brooklyn South.

“I grew up in the industry,” Roe says. “My father was a production manager. I used to visit him on location. When I was around 15 years old, I told my dad that I wanted to become a grip. He told me that cinematography would be a more rewarding career.”

Roe started as a loader with Owen Roizman, ASC on Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. Fifteen years later, he was an A-camera operator when Roizman earned an Oscar nomination for Wyatt Earp. Victor Kemper, ASC moved Roe up from second to first assistant and later to operator. Watkins made him a cinematographer on a TV movie called Detention. Roe had done some second unit work before that project.

“I’ll tell you how it happened,” says Watkins. “Billy had worked with me as an operator on Body and Soul and a few other projects. I don’t think I worked with anyone who had more loyalty to the project. I also noticed the actors loved working with him.”

Watkins explains that Roe has a talent for giving the actors maximum freedom to use the environment without worrying about missing a mark. When a cinematographer establishes a bond of trust with the actors, it almost invariably results in better performances. Watkins says that’s an intangible Roe brings to the set.

“They know he’s looking after them,” Watkins says. “I’ve watched him make the actors understand why he is lighting a certain way, or why he needs them to hit a mark. When you have a big ensemble cast, it’s a little like choreographing a ballet.”

Watkins contends that filming an episodic TV show takes more than talent and skill. It requires an ability to pick the right battlefields. There is never enough time to do everything you want, he explains, so you have to choose key scenes.

“There’s a real danger of becoming bored with your own work,” he observes. “Billy doesn’t play it safe. He’s willing to push the boundaries and do some exploring of new territory. That’s why the look of Brooklyn South is constantly evolving. His choice of lenses, and the dynamics of where and how he moves the camera is a special talent.”

Watkins explains that instinct and know-how translate to an ability to put more information on the frame. He points to a recent episode where two cops are brawling in an alley, and counts six separate things that were happening in that one shot. Two people are talking in part of the frame. The guy who lost the fight is being helped out of the alley. There is a lookout in the foreground, someone who is totally depressed in the background.

In the middle of that description, Watkins notes that the hard rain falling during the fight wasn’t part of the original script. During a brief conversation they had about prepping the scene, Roe and Watkins agreed it would be more dramatic to film the two cops in silhouette during the fight. That led to a decision to make it rain.     

“Billy backlit the rain, which provided a background for the silhouettes,” Watkins says. “He really went for it. The water on the ground formed a glistening, reflective surface. Mid-way through the fight, Watkins turned the water off. That signaled an end to the turbulence. By then, several police cars blocked the back of the alley, and red and yellow light was bouncing off the walls and ground. It’s a stunningly dramatic sequence.”

Roe says the decision to use rain to create silhouettes was pure instinct. There was very little talk between the cinematographer and director. Watkins wanted the mood subdued, and it seemed obvious to Roe that he should add water to the scene.

“There are different stories and sub-plots,” Watkins says. “Bill feels these stories viscerally. The lensing is always aggressive. If it’s not a 17 mm or a 20 mm lens, it’s likely to be a 200 or 250 mm. Everything between the knees and waist is boring on TV. While this is a warmer look, we’re not afraid to use harder, colder light at times.”

Watkins talks about how the environment plays a role in the stories and look.

“The first time I saw Brooklyn, I realized it was a country divided by streets with natural born enemies separated only by a double yellow line,” he says. “You could cross a street and be in a different world. The police actually work with the population, not based on intimidation, but on interaction. We are trying to tell the stories from the policemen’s point of view, but that changes from show to show and scene to scene.”

Roe shot about a week of backgrounds in Brooklyn, and got additional pickup shots from a couple second units. He generally sees a script the day before he shoots the scenes. Roe tries to prep lighting and stay one step ahead, but frequently he’s shooting from the hip.

One episode directed by Watkins had a tense foot chase running through three to four city blocks, weaving through traffic. Roe used a Pogo-cam to show the chase from one of the cop’s viewpoint. When an actor hurdles over a car, Roe decided to show the scene from that perspective. He put a ramp over the car and had his operator run right over the top, parallel to the action. Meanwhile, the second camera was following the scene through the perspective of a 1000 mm lens which had a totally different point of view, like that of a pedestrian standing and watching in amazement.

Roe explains that the intensity of the chase wasn’t spelled out in the script. It just seemed to him to be a natural way to shoot it. He and Watkins spent a few moments talking at lunch, mainly about prepping the next day’s work. Roe mentioned his idea for shooting the chase scene, and it was as if Watkins had already tuned into the same idea.

Watkins says that isn’t an accident. On the front edge of his new career as a producer who also directs, Watkins says he is discovering that you cast the actors, and then you cast the crew that is going to work with the people and the stories. There is a temptation to cast a cinematographer based on the look of different things they’ve shot. But you can’t apply that to Roe, since he had slim experience as a shooter, and the Brooklyn South look is open to re-interpretation every week.

“I don’t think there’s a visual style that defines Brooklyn South,” Roe says “We try to keep it gritty at times. I use Primo 11:1 zoom as much as I can. I like the way it stacks up, and the look it renders, especially on close-ups. We do a lot of passing back and forth on shots. We shoot with two cameras 90 percent of the time. It’s for coverage, but also for the mood and feel of the scenes.”

There is rarely a static shot. Both cameras are moving with dollies and panning from person to person. Most of the time, the two cameras are at right angles to each other. That makes lighting and composition more challenging. There are video taps on both cameras, mainly used to monitor composition. Roe lights from the camera.

Watkins notes that the longer lenses help keep the audience focused on the story, and it gives the cinematographer more control over what they are watching. Watkins gives Roe free rein to explore scenes and discover what’s going on, and the multiple cameras keep the pacing vigorous. When they are shooting in the dingy brown and dirty gray precinct lobby, the busyness is tactile. There are five or six stories going on that may be incidental.

Usually the A-camera is assigned to a basic master and the other one is either trying to get a different angle, or it is assigned to cover a character. Watkins says he’s tried different lenses, but the 11:1 zoom gives him more choice in lens sizes, and the ability to punch in on a close-up at any time.

“The widest angle we use is 17 mm, and mostly we use that for the opening or closing shot in a scene designed to show the audience what the actors are seeing,” he says.

Roe believes that Brooklyn South is a reflection of the changing tastes of audiences, and points to the high quality writing and acting on contemporary TV, particularly in the 10 p.m. time slot where dramas reign. His mother gets E-mail from people who know he’s shooting the program. They are more likely to tell her they like the stories and dialog than his camerawork. Roe accepts that as a compliment. He believes good cinematography should be felt and not seen. “When we isolate someone with a long lens, or we are following an actor who passes us into a conversation, it only works if we are bringing the audience into something interesting. If you come into a scene at a key moment, when somebody is saying something that encourages the audience to listen -- that’s when it’s magic.”

Watkins adds that images can speak as powerfully as words.

“Maybe someone is wiggling their foot, and you isolate the camera on that, or you find a clever way to show the audience that somebody is nervous,” he says. “Just one shot like that can change the rhythm of the scene and even the meaning of the dialog.”

The passing camera moves aren’t always planned. It is not untypical for a scene to have four pages of dialog. Roe knows when cues are coming up, and he also knows where the director wants the camera. But, he also follows his instincts.

The B-camera operator is wearing headphones, and that enables Roe to point him in new directions on the spur of the moment. “Maybe an actor really gets into a scene, and he’s subconsciously doing something interesting with his hands,” Watkins says. “Billy notices those things, so he might tell the B-camera operator to come in on the hands.”

In addition to Roizman, Kemper and Watkins, Roe has also crewed with Michael Chapman, ASC, Adam Greenberg, ASC and several other worldclass cinematographers.

“The most important lesson I learned during all those years when I was an operator was patience,” Roe says. “That was the consistent lesson I learned by watching those great cinematographers. Michael was the one who told me that as you move up through each level, from first assistant to operator, and from operator to cameraman, you have to become more patient because you have more to think about.”

Watkins observes that at the beginning of the first season, Brooklyn South got into a brown mode, reflecting the drabness of the main sets. However, by the sixth or seventh show, the producers and Roe were letting the scripts dictate the look.

Roe is mainly lighting the monochromatic interior sets with HMIs that emulate daylight coming through the windows. He augments that main source with a couple of units hidden in niches that are motivated by practical lights. The light might be harder in one episode and softer in the next one; warmer one week, and icy blue the following week.

“The crew does a great job of being ready for anything,” he says. “The main set is basically pre-lit, but it can change week by week. Some changes happen in post, but we are part of that process. I’ll make appearances in the telecine suite, and so does Mike (Watkins) and the editors (Farrel Levy). There are constant phone conversations.”

Roe says he makes copious notes scene by scene for the colorist, describing his

intentions, and Watkins frequently adds his comments. There is always someone from the production present to make sure nothing is lost in the process of film to video transfer.

Roe decided to shoot with the 500-speed, Eastman EXR 5298 film, he says, because of its broad range of latitude, and the importance of controlling contrast. Roe observes that every type of camera film has a distinct set of imaging characteristics -- kind of like a personality. The more the cinematographer knows about how each type of film reacts in different light and colors, the more flexibility they have to do interpretive work.

Brooklyn South is breaking new ground in anticipating a future need for

re-releasing programs in the 16:9 wide-screen format. Rowe is composing images with a common top and left and right edges of the frame. He is leaving room at the bottom of the frame, relying on a ground glass matte from Panavision to show him the bottom line for composing images for 4:3 and 16:9 shaped TV screens.

“Composition is important to us,” says Watkins. “We have a lot of people in a lot of scenes, and we want Billy to use the whole frame from edge to edge. I wish we were shooting widescreen now. It has more of the look and feel of a movie.”

Most TV producers who are concerned with how their programs will play on wide-screen TV are composing for 4:3 and “protecting” the edges of the frame by making sure there is nothing that doesn’t belong there. Watkins and Roe say it isn’t possible to compose emotionally charged images for two different forms.

“As a camera operator I hated the notion that you could somehow protect the edges of the frame,” Roe says. “It takes away a lot of the story. Composition is a big part of what we do to put the audience into the story. You are going to lose all of that in the films that are going to be panned and scanned, resulting in extending the edges of the frame.”

Watkins believes that composition is an art form that can’t be taught. He describes it as a sensibility that is either there or not.

“If you have that ability, you need the skill and confidence to trust your instincts and see where they lead you,” he says. “If you try over-thinking, you cripple yourself.”

It has been an interesting experience for Roe, getting off the camera, and learning to work with and rely on camera operators. He lauds Dan Gold, his A-camera operator. At the same time, Roe admits that he still feels frustrated because he has given up operating.

“Sometimes I see how a tiny adjustment can make a real difference,” he says. “Just move the camera a few inches and you change everything. That comes from deep inside. But, I’ve learned that every operator adds something, and some are better than others.”

Watkins observes that an ensemble cast requires some time to gel before you can see what works and what doesn’t.

“You look for a symmetry in the cast,” he says. “Sometimes, you change one part, and the new character changes all the dynamics. There is a certain sense of harmony, but you have to seek it out. It takes getting to know the actors and the sets and how they relate. If you have a big cast like ours, there are a lot of people doing different things, and the cameras can only see so much. Maybe I’ll tell the B-camera to go over to Titus (Welliver, who portrays Jack Lowery) in the corner and look at what he’s doing and what he’s talking about. It’s not something you can plan.”

Watkins notes that the role of the cinematographer is changing.

“The cinematographer’s role in television has been underrated, but today’s producers understand what they really bring to the project,” Watkins says. “The cameraman is the horse. The director comes in every week and he gets on the horse and it takes him for a ride. If you don’t have a thoroughbred you’re not going to succeed.”

SIDEBAR:

REFLECTIONS ON THE PILOT

The pilot for Brooklyn South was photographed by Brian Reynolds, who shot NYPD Blue for Steven Bochco Productions during the past four years. On the surface, the new series seemed to have most of the same elements. Both are character driven cop shows staged in different boroughs of the same city, both in contemporary times.

QUESTION: With so many elements the same, what defined the different looks between the Brooklyn South pilot and NYPD Blue?

REYNOLDS: A lot of the same textural things were going on when we shot the pilot. The noises and colors and the way the light falls. One big difference is that you don’t have real high structures in Brooklyn, so you see more of the sky. The light is a little warmer with a lot more mixed color temperature lights. It is more of a natural look with a more exposed light source and less light bouncing around.

QUESTION: These seem like fairly subtle distinctions. Can you amplify?

REYNOLDS: You’re right. These aren’t obvious distinctions. You have to pay attention to the environment, and you have to trust your instincts.

QUESTION: How were the stories different?

REYNOLDS: NYPD Blue gives you a feeling of reality. It is like you’re there... a witness. You are standing in the corner watching a scene unfold. The camera mimics the way your eye would follow the action. Someone would walk across the room and you’d stay with him and you’d pan back to the other person. Brooklyn South is about nitty-gritty blue cops on the street. We wanted the audience to feel like they were part of the scene. It’s like being in the passenger seat as a ride along.            

QUESTION: You mentioned the blue uniforms. Was that a factor?

REYNOLDS: The blue uniforms contrast with a much warmer light source that I mentioned is characteristic of the quality of light in Brooklyn. That’s significant, because in telecine, you need contrast. If you want something to read warm, you need something blue or cooler or at least neutral in the frame.