| Blind
Justice
Daredevil is the story of a Superhero who walks a fine line between hero and antihero. Matt Murdock’s upbringing would have almost certainly led to a life as a criminal. Growing up, he was surrounded by violence. Toxic chemicals blinded him at 13. Matt promises his father, as he is dying in his arms, not to take the road of the underworld thugs who just killed him, but to walk the line of good.
Matt eventually becomes a criminal attorney with a second job. At night, he takes on the identity of Daredevil, a masked avenger who patrols the neighborhood of Hell’s Kitchen in New York City.
“I was intrigued by the script,” says cinematographer Ericson Core. “This character is a dark and burdened person. His handicap is not only blindness, but also heightened sensitivity to sounds and touch. The sounds of the world are inescapable to him. They torture him with their constant onslaught.
Core’s ability to bring a darker mood to films like Payback and 187 and his boldness in tackling massive chase sequences like in The Fast and the Furious was exactly what director Mark Steven Johnson wanted. The director’s idea was to give a mystical quality to the nights and the locations, whether they are the rooftops of buildings or the churches and alleyways of the city.
“Mark and I agreed that the biggest challenge for us was to create the world of Daredevil, a man who lives without light,” says Core. “One of the first things we discussed was finding a way to keep the theme of darkness––bringing in the light only to emphasize specific moments.”
One of the filmmakers’ first suggestions was to make the picture using the bleach bypass process. This way, they could give the story less color and more of a dark edginess.
“I had shot Payback full bleach bypass through Deluxe,” he explains. “So, I had some idea of what the colors looked like.
“However, it was a great challenge to achieve the right level of red for Daredevil’s outfit,” he explains. “That, and finding the lighting level that we would see with the eye and knowing how it would transpose to the final print.
“We decided to do the bleach bypass in the print and not in the negative only when the studio gave us the assurance that we would be allowed to follow through,” he adds.
“I have a tendency to light everything I shoot darker,” he continues. “I like single source lighting for mood and I like to let things fall off, letting the highlights be hard. Yes, I could still do this with the bleach bypass in mind. However, I had to add a lot of additional fill and be aware of how quickly things fall off. I knew that if I weren’t careful, I would end up with a lithograph.
“I also had to set the printing points much higher,” he adds. “We had a thicker print to deal with. By maintaining the silver on the stock, it makes it harder to print. The shadows can block up a bit and the lighter areas have a tendency to blow out, creating a great deal of contrast.
“In many cases, this goes against the eye,” he explains. “In the churches, for example, I had a tendency to light with candle light or single sources to light up columns, allowing the light to rake the walls. That’s fine, when you are doing the regular process. However, shooting for bleach bypass meant adding an overall amount of fill to make sure, when the film is finished, it will turn out to be what we visually preconceived.”
Core and Johnson decided to shoot Daredevil in Super 35mm, giving them scope for the action and allowing them to accentuate the grain in the blow up, which gave the story an added dimension. Super 35mm also has several added benefits. “For a film with a great deal of visual effects, the format allows edge to edge sharpness, not always possible with anamorphic,” Core explains.
“Spherical lenses allow a great variety and consistent quality, so color matching is possible with all filming units.
“And, one of the greatest benefits of Super 35mm for me is that it allows me to be more intuitive, because of the small size of the camera compared to anamorphic,” he adds. “I find that the cameras we used were more capable of being placed in tight spaces and allowed us to find unique filming angles. Using the Moviecam Compact cameras from Clairmont allowed us infinite maneuverability.”
Because of the process, Core chose to shoot the film with Kodak stocks––5279 (night interiors and exteriors) and 5246 (daylight exteriors and daylight interiors).
“Key grip Jim Shelton masterminded rigging for our massive night lightings and designed numerous truss rigs for flying green screens, Translights and cameras. Jim has a great eye for lighting that makes him a great collaborator. So much of hard lighting is about how you cut the light. Jim always says the key grip is responsible for shaping the light, and on a hard light show this is truly the case.
“Camera operators Collin Anderson and Jacques Joufret served as A-camera operators and on Steadicam. So many of the shots that were designed in Previs on the computer and in storyboards were next to impossible to operate. Yet, both Collin and Jacques somehow pulled them off. Malcolm Brown on B-camera has a great sense of composition and instincts that are fantastic. He has my full trust to find the moments that will visually define the scene.
“Camera assistants Mike Weldon and Kevin Potter provided experience, leadership and flawless focus allowing me to push the limits of what tools we could use and the images we could achieve.”
The opening sequence in Daredevil is a perfect example of “getting into the head of a character.” The story opens with a look at the New York skyline. What makes it unique, however, is the drop of blood that hits the image and obliterates it. It is then that the audience realizes this is not the standard New York skyline, but a reflection of it in a puddle.
“This is a way to put the audience in Daredevil’s world,” Core explains. “The blood and the rippling effect not only gives us the what-you-see-is-not-always-what-you-get feeling, it also serves to expand the picture to the edges, from where it hits––making ripples in visual, not unlike what Daredevil ‘sees’ in sound.”
The visual then rotates 180 degrees, tilts up and follows a rat scurrying through the water and across the sidewalk. As the rat goes through his micro-world, the audience hears him careen off garbage cans and clomp up the steps of a cathedral. The camera then tilts up several layers, following a trickle of blood, eventually landing on Daredevil, wrapped around the cathedral’s cross, bleeding to death with a view of Hell’s Kitchen behind him.
“It is a perfect way to introduce the audience to this anti-hero and took us quite a bit of time to accomplish,” Core says. “One of the biggest challenges was keeping the light consistent because the sequence was shot at different times on several different locations.
“The crane shot across the puddle was shot on the Paramount back lot, with a motion control crane. This shot took us from the puddle to the rat and the beginning of the tracking up the church.
“The image in the puddle was shot as a plate on location in New York.
“The image of Daredevil on the cross was shot on stage with a green screen background. We had to keep the dark mood of the scene, while lighting from underneath the cross to give the sense of height and scale to it, while still maintaining separation from the green screen.
“And, of course, ending with enough light that would show the audience that it was Ben Affleck in the red outfit by seeing his face and lips and chin stick out from the mask.”
Intricate. Yes. Challenging. Definitely. However, not quite as demanding as the massive rooftop work that is so much a character in the story “and one of the reasons we fought to stay here in the United States to make this picture,” Core says adamantly.
The rooftop shot Ericson Core talked about in last year’s On The Set column was a challenge. However, the action happening on “rooftop #2,” one of six massive locations in downtown Los Angeles, was even bigger.
“In this sequence, Daredevil has been fooled into looking for someone who is trying to kill him and he ends up defending himself against an attack from Elektra (Jennifer Garner).
“Daredevil hears the rustling of the fabric of Elektra’s costume and follows the sound through laundry lines that are all over the rooftop. As pigeons fly overhead, she jumps out and attacks him. A fight ensues as we track them through the action.
“We shot the sequence with multiple angles from crane to Steadicam, tracking to handheld, through the clothes,” Core explains. “This was a tremendous challenge in camera, but more in lighting because we were shooting for the bleach bypass process.
“To do this, we used a 20K as key source of light off a 120 foot condor. This light gave a strong directional source to the scene as well as great highlights and strong shadows. Dozens of smaller units (mainly 1Ks) were used to light Daredevil and Elektra while flags helped keep the light off of the billowing sheets, so they would not blow out.
“An added challenge was that Daredevil could move rapidly in and out of the shadows as a way of keeping with his character, while Elektra required more even lighting.
“One way we helped achieve this was through the use of moving lights. Two sources were manned and moved with the choreographed flight going across the rooftop. I used a Tungsten balanced flashlight with custom Chimera light box on it and moved just off-camera with the actors. This moving key light kept their faces in balance with the surroundings. The biggest challenge for me was avoiding the Sais (short swords) that Jennifer Garner wielded during the fight.”
Although Ericson Core thrives on challenges such as this, the kinds of shots he really loves to do are the artistic moments. There is a sequence of Matt Murdock (Affleck) in his apartment at night. “Remember, this is a blind man’s home,” Core says. “The challenge was to provide the audience with something to see, but still get across that he lives in a world absent of light.
“It was as dark as I have ever gone,” Core admits. “I looked at the meter and the reading was barely there. We let it play two or three stops under to give us a really beautiful sequence of an isolated guy moving through his apartment, alone. There is no dialogue or interaction––just the man and his world.
“We lit it with hard light, yet at a very low key,” he explains. “The apartment existed mainly in the shadows and Matt traveled outside the reach of the light. Much of the look was based on highlights reflecting off of metallic surfaces. We placed most of the light up high to allow the camera freedom of movement. Lights were shaped mainly with black wrap on the door, which allowed exacting control of where it fell. Single sources were critical in order to create a sense of isolation.”
Even in Daredevil’s everyday life, Core and crew worked consciously to keep the character in darkness. “We would keep him hidden from view and play him in the shadows, with the people around him having more light,” Core explains. “In a way, we are trying to show that he is held down by the shadows or by the dark side of his life.”
However, occasionally “light” does come into his world. “Matt frequents a certain coffee shop almost every day,” Core says. “When he is inside the shop, he is always lit for half light, never escaping his dark side.
“One day, however, ‘light’ enters his life in the body of Elektra. When she enters, she is bathed in light, which falls over him and his emotions.
“To do this sequence, we went to the back lot of Warner Bros. and used one of their storefronts dressed as the coffee shop,” Core explains. “We lit the inside with HMIs, mainly from out on the street. We then used large 6K PARs to create strong light that poured into the coffee shop. The look was continued with 1200 PARs rigged above the windows. We used 4 by 8 sheets of foam core inside, for return.
“A large truck was parked outside the window, which kept the light off of him, but lights the rest of the shop. As Elektra enters, the truck pulls out and light floods onto Matt.”
Core had a lot of fun with the sequences pitting Daredevil against the various villains, from Bullseye (Colin Farrell) to Kingpin (Michael Clark Duncan). “I loved the shots with Bullseye, aptly named because he can throw any object from a paperclip to a peanut with deadly accuracy,” says Core.
“Bullseye’s frames always had an edge to them,” he explains. “In the rooftop fight sequence, Bullseye appears high up on a roof above Daredevil. Long lenses are used to bring us to him from a distance, which is the way he prefers to attack, as if he were a sniper.
“The frames in this sequence are all dutched to create an edginess exemplified by Bullseye. The camera work was also designed to move erratically, much the way Bullseye thinks.”
Kingpin was quite a different challenge for Core. The character is the underworld crime boss who is trying to take over Hell’s Kitchen. He has multiple facets and faces and works in areas filled with multiple refractions. Everything around him is glass, marble and stainless steel. “Anything that reflects toward his own ego and creates an environment to show he isn’t who he is or this isn’t what he is really about. His world is totally opposite the warmth of brick and wood and tradition that makes Daredevil’s character comfortable.
“We had a fight sequence between Fisk (Kingpin) and Daredevil, inside Kingpin’s office, which is white and sleek,” says Core. “This place is pure torture for our hero because everything reflects off everything else, and he can’t ‘hear’ where things are to ‘see’ where he is going.
“To give him the ability to ‘see,’ we had water break through the walls and create a spray of rain that will show Daredevil how to navigate through this house of mirrors. The water hitting the walls clears his senses and gives him a pattern to work off of.”
The sequence was shot on stage, with a giant Translight outside, a thunderstorm and water everywhere. “The set was oval shaped,” Core recalls. “It had giant panels of six by 12 foot glass about 120 feet of it surrounding us. In the middle, there was a stainless steel structure. The floor was white.
“We began the lighting with Kino Flo tubes sealed into the floor and the curved structures and Lightning Strikes outside for the hits on the building.
“Above the set, we had an elaborate grid system with lights controlled from a dimmer board to highlight the architecture and to edge the actors and separate them from the background.
“We actually lit the set twice,” Core adds. “Once to see the structure and interior of the set and once for Daredevil’s point of view. The set lighting was with Tungsten, pre-water breaking, so light hit everywhere.
“Then, as soon as the water breaks through, we used Clairmont’s strobe system, which are 48 strobe lights sequenced together and hung from pipes and covered with waterproofing. This allowed us to make back and side light, and to light every drop of rain crystal clear so we could see the drops and stop the action––feeling how Daredevil navigates his world.
“Although the lights don’t have a great deal of throw, they are really designed for tabletop, we were able to fire them at 1/50 thousandth of a second, giving us enough light to illuminate Daredevil’s world.”
For Ericson Core, the technical challenge of Daredevil was lighting within the contrast range of the process without anything blowing out and keeping the mood with bleach bypass in mind. But, what captured Core’s imagination even more was finding ways to support the emotional content of the story.
“On this picture, I took my cue from photographers like Nan Goldin and Bruce Davidson who are able to take outcast and isolated figures and exemplify their lives through composition,” Core explains. “It is their instinct for framing that helped me conceive of shots like Matt Murdock’s silent moments, whether in a church or crossing a busy New York street. There was a sense of an individual existing alone in the world. It is from this isolation that the hero’s spirit can be born.
“So often these shots are not accomplished with those high tech tools we have all gotten used to,” Core adds. “Those cranes, shaker lenses, Steadicam equipment and strobe systems work great for some moments, but often times, shots like this cry out for the personal touch and for the creative approach.
“As much as I loved those rooftop sequences for their challenge and making them another character in the story, there is something about taking a camera, laying it on a sandbag and dutching it for just the right angle and a very different point of view.
“The simplicity of this can transcend all the logistics of the film set. When nothing stands between the story and the camera, it is one of the purest joys of making a film.” • |
“As
Daredevil, he tries to overcome these burdens and use them to his advantage to
right the wrongs that he cannot correct in the courtroom. Yet, he is constantly
struggling with his dark side. I found this an interesting approach to a different
hero. And, it provided for the possibilities of a very dark visual design.”
Core
teamed with his trusted collaborators once again. “Gaffer Carl Boles’ experience
and energy is unmatched,” says Core. “I have an old fashioned sense of style,
when it comes to lighting that is more influenced by the Film Noir of the 1940s
than modern films. So many gaffers have a tendency to solve lighting situations
with soft light. Carl has no problem tossing around hard light. 
“We
wanted the clothes on the line, white of course, to feel like ghostly billows,
and still light for the blood red of Daredevil’s costume and the pitch black of
Elektra’s outfit. The biggest challenge was being able to shoot the action and
make it look good while still using hard lighting techniques with all the movement.
We had to balance everything, without it being overly confusing, and we had to
be able to turn in a certain direction and see the city in the background.