Nancy Schreiber climbed the filmmaking ladder from the electric department to ASC membership. She got her first cinematography jobs shooting documentaries and music videos, lots of them, for everyone from Billy Joel and Aretha Franklin to the Bangles. Aside from a stint shooting HBO series The Comeback starring Lisa Kudrow, Schreiber has mainly made a name for herself shooting indie features. In 2004, she won the Sundance Festival's award for Best Cinematography for November, which was shot in mini-DV, with the Panasonic DVX-100.
Q: What's the latest film you've worked on – and did it have a DI?
A: I have two films coming out this year: On March 31, American Gun, directed by Aric Avelino, and in June, Loverboy, which was directed by Kevin Bacon.
Loverboy was shot in 35mm. We wanted a dreamy almost surreal effect for the flashbacks where Sandra Bullock plays an offbeat but attentive neighbor unlike the parents of the younger Kyra Sedgwick. I used heavy white Pro-Mists combined with shooting at 12 frames, not 24 fps and then later step-printing in post. We tested this effect and the producers supported Kevin and me doing it in-camera which was irreversible. For a lot more money we could have done it in a DI, but the film, shot union in New York, was quite modestly budgeted with no financial leeway for a DI.
American Gun was shot in Super 16mm and there was no way I could have done two of the film's three distinctive looks without a DI. [Director] Aric [Avelino] and I did tests and came up with three looks that we then finessed significantly in the DI. For one look, we wanted a very grainy look and very desaturated, almost blue and white or green and white. It's hard to get that without a DI, but in the DI, with a few dials we could get it. Another look of the film is for the story of Marcia Gay Harden, who plays the mother of a student who went on a Columbine-like rampage. We figured out in pre-production that we wanted to make it look like a hand-done painting – desaturated, pastel colors. Again, it was certainly easy to do with a DI and would have been difficult to do without one. The third look focused on a gun shop owner and Aric wanted it to look beautiful. I did a lot of dolly, long-lens, golden light – not grainy, I over-exposed. It looks more like 35mm and I didn't need a DI to create it.
Q: What was the first DI you've done?
A: That would be November. It wasn't strictly a DI, because I shot it on mini-DV with the Panasonic DVX-100, in 24p. We color-corrected on a huge 40-foot screen at LaserPacific, with Mike Soha, my usual colorist, and E-Film did the film-out. It was a really good experience, but it was funny to use such high-tech tools to color-correct something shot with a $3,000 camera.
Q: Does shooting in 16mm necessitate a DI?
A: Oh yes, you have to – I don't think anyone would go out optically to 35mm. The best efficient way to transfer to 35mm is to do it digitally. When I did my optical work on Loverboy, we looked at digital versus optical step-printing and digital had so much more flexibility.
Aside from the blow-up, the DI is a great way not to have to shoot digitally. If you can find a way to keep your stock costs in control, you can usually find a Super 16mm package much cheaper than an HD package. If I were doing a small budget movie with a lot of effects, I'd consider HD, but otherwise – I've shot three features in HD and one in mini-DV and I don't think any of those producers would shoot HD again. It's a nightmare in production being tied to monitors. It's not flexible and the cameras are large.
Q: What do you look for in a colorist?
A: It's really the job of an artist. I look for someone who has interest or background in photography or painting, some history of art knowledge. Someone who'll get passionate about the work the way I am. Obviously someone creative and – unfortunately, with my budget – someone who's fast. I like people with ideas. I shoot the movie carefully and yet when you get to the DI suite, it's still a collaborative medium and I like to hear their suggestions. I like colorists who aren't just pushing buttons.
Q: Do you have a philosophy about DI?
A: It's a wonderful way to work, another tool at our disposal to control the look of the film. As a Director of Photography, I've been working with these tools in music videos and commercials for years. It's been frustrating in photochemical printing to see how backwards it is. It makes sense that we should be timing in the digital suite where we have total control and can work on skies, enhance or take away certain colors.
That said, I'm not one of those people who leave a lot of the work to the DI. I try to do as much in-camera as possible. You never know how much time you'll have or even where you'll be down the road.