104 - The Expanse Cinematographer Jeremy Benning - No Win Scenario

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
I haven't listened to anything you'd saidin the last twenty seconds. Damn it,
Trevor. Oh God, I hateyou so much. Well it to
you. We can cross off thereading. I watch almost everything in the
majority of this terrible What is thispodcast about? My record? He's t
off. Damn it, Trevor.Hi, everyone, and welcome to episode

(00:23):
four of No Win Scenario with Trevorand Don. My name is Don Scheckter
and always we have Trevor, nolast name, t Bone. But what's
your nickname, Trevor? Why doyou have to make an issue out of
it? Why can't you just sayTrevor? Trevor? Move on? Because
Don Checkter and Trevor sounds like I'mforgetting that you have a last name.

(00:45):
Well, then don't give your lastname. I mean, no one cares,
but you don't people care about Trevor. I've noticed, now that we're
deep into season one here of ourpodcast, is that people are really really
responding well on our website where wecall it No Win Scenario Podcast. Two
friends who hate each other talking scifi. That two friends hating each other

(01:08):
who hate each other talking sci fiis really resonating with our audience. See
I don't see that at all,because I literally saw the Facebook post and
I just see laugh emoji reactions,and that is not a lie. So
we're already they think it's funny.They think it's funny. We're already getting
crapped on by the audience. Andyou know, I think we should really

(01:32):
clear the air though, because somepeople are confused about that. Two friends
who hate each other talking sci fi? Are we actually friends? Here,
Trevor, I would Chris, youtell me you hate me all the time.
I would definitely say we are verygood friends. We just are complete
total opposites. And like, thetruth of the matter is, and I

(01:55):
really I'm short and handsome and you'retall and you. I truly believe this.
This is an an insult. Afterthe last fifteen years, I've kind
of concluded I'm your only friend,Like I have never met another friend of
yours. You've met a few ofmy friends, but I've never met another
friend of yours. Now, well, here's here's the truth. Bune of

(02:15):
names. But can I tell youthe truth? Not real? I don't
I don't like to monetize my friends, and I'm trying to monetize you.
Yeah, that that is apparent.I'm failing though. I'm failing horribly,
although I will say that after ourfirst episode got you know, the ads
going, I was really shockingly happyto hear a sausage ad for Whole Foods.

(02:37):
That's actually it was a sausage admentioning that they sell this type of
sausage at Whole Foods, and Iwas for some reason, I got a
real kick out of that. Didthat just make your day? Did you
just plug a grocery store on?Oh my god? The ads are friends
are working for free. This isthe last free ad I'll ever done that,

(02:59):
But I don't. I just Igot a kick out of it.
It went from sausage and Whole Foodsto no in scenario podcast. It felt
good two guys fighting to each other. I was literally I was directing this
this thing at work, and Iliterally had a friend message with me saying
how's it going. I'm like,I'm kind of more excited over the five
cents we made with you listening tomy podcast than the work that I'm doing
now directing something. But anyway,we'll leave this, leave it alone for

(03:23):
now, because I am very excitedfor our special guest today. Jeremy Benning,
cinematographer from The Expanse The Boys.But that's the sci fi part.
He's done a ton of other work, documentary and other feature work as well,
so I'm super excited. The documentarywork is really good, so I'm
super excited. I've been following hiswork for quite some time. He's also
interested in folly, which is basicallysound effects that you do practically for film

(03:49):
and television. So that's super interesting, so stay tuned for that. But
Trevor, my understanding is you justrecently got onto The Expanse. Yes,
I saw the first episode, wasnot looking forward to it. Uh,
what do you look forward to,Barbie? Is that really, Barbie?
What do I look forward to?I look forward to Reservation Dogs, probably

(04:12):
the best show I'm watching on TVright now, not sci fi. So
hold up, Treuv. Yeah,this is a podcast that we lead out
with sci fi, right, andyet it doesn't seem that you have any
kind of knowledge, deep knowledge orinterest in science fiction? What is going
on here? I saw I sawa thirty five millimeter print of Tarkowski's Solaris,

(04:33):
which is a science fiction which isa landmark in science fiction. Have
you ever seen Solaris. Don Isend me both versions of No you have
I've seen excuse me, I've seenboth versions of Solaris. Who did the
second version but can't recall. Yeah, he's he's just a little brilliant director

(04:55):
named Steven Soderberg, you know,just one of the best out there.
That's all the problem with Clara.As I pronounce it, as I think
most people pronounce it. I didfall asleep through both both versions. Oh
my god, you are so pathetic. You are so pathetic. Both of
those films, both versions excellent,riveting, And yes, yes, I

(05:17):
do love Soderberg's remake. I thinkit's very smart. I just recently watched
the Yodorowsky Dune documentary. Literally justsaw it about two months ago, and
I thought it was very, verygood, and it just shows what could
have been. Well. My brotherwas nice enough to get me a DVD
or Blu ray of that documentary afew years ago, and as soon as

(05:40):
I find out mailbox to play itin, I will watch the documentary.
But I am excited to see itone of these days. Do you even
own a four K Blu ray player? I do not, because I got
burned because years ago, when therewas a choice between hddvds and Blu rays.
I chose HDDVD, so I hadan HDDVD player, so did I
and that lasted like four months andthat was it. So I just kind

(06:02):
of said, you know what,I'm all in on digital and that's it.
I was able to resell all myHG DVD player and the movies that
I bought for a good price,so I'm not worried about that. Explains
that palatial environment that I see youliving in behind you, Yeah, you're
not kidding, where every ounce isdedicated to your Cat's just a mecha of
cat toys and cat paraphernalia. Sothe Expanse, Trevor, you just started

(06:26):
it, loved. I love theshow, But your impressions before we get
into our conversation. My original impressionwas that if Don loves something, there
really is a ninety percent chance thatI'm not going to like it. Where
our tastes are that much the opposite, they rarely rarely run parallel with each

(06:49):
other. I watched the first episodeof the Expanse, and I thought it
was very compelling, and I wouldlike to watch more. I don't know
when I'm going to get to it. I thought it looked really good.
I thought our cinematographer that will beinterviewing Jeremy, I thought that he brought

(07:12):
and I know people hate this wordusing it with regards to television, but
I thought some of it, alot of it was very cinematic, which
is amazing to see that level ofcraft brought to TV. A lot of
the shots were fantastic, and thestory started out really really good, and

(07:34):
I like the whole Philip Marlow angleof it a lot, but it's already
been spoiled for me that that kindof goes away with and knowing that I
kind of don't want to continue withit, it doesn't go away. There's
just the world opens up more,but it doesn't go away. See,
these are the lies that Dawn tellsin order to convince me to keep going

(07:59):
with the show. And when hestarts lying that, that just shows me
that gives me more conviction to notcontinue watching. You know, it's it
reminds me of Breaking Bed, whereI thought Breaking Bed always got better every
episode, it got more interesting andmore compelling. And I thought the expanse
started strong. It just kept goingand kept going, and you know,
even season two I thought every episodein the beginning of season two could have

(08:22):
been a season finale. It wasthat interesting and that meaningful. There were
a good number of episodes. Thingshappened, the story moved, a lot
of things happened. You're gonna hatethis, But I felt like, even
though the story could, it couldn'thave been any different, couldn't have been
more different. I should say thestyle was different. It was like a
more modern Babylon five in terms ofhow it took a lot of its content

(08:45):
very seriously, and whether that washow they filmed it, how people moved
in space, how ships moved,how people were treated different classes of people.
So you're going to enjoy it.I know you will, and just
if you keep watching. And Ipromised to keep going with Neon Genesis Evangeline,
did I? Oh? Did Isay it right? God? No,

(09:05):
you didn't even pronounce it correctly.The second you start talking Babylon five.
You see the top of my microphonehas this like metal grated pattern that's
kind of rough against the skin.And the second you started talking about Babylon
five, I took this and Ijust started shaving the skin off my face
like it's a cheese Grater because I'mso sick of you talking about that show.

(09:30):
And let's go back to the verybeginning of this. Okay, I
want to go back to because yousaid something that that blew my mind.
You said, the Expanse reminds youof Breaking Bad in that every episode of
said that, the Expanse reminds youof Breaking Bad. Yes, the experience

(09:56):
of it, the experience of watchingthe experience of watching it where it got
ba better and better all the waythrough the end. Okay, did you
watch Breaking Bad? Yes, twice. It's a wonderful show. I just
want to say now that I mean, I've watched more than a handful of
episodes of Babylon five, and Imean, since we're being so open,

(10:20):
Babylon five reminded me of some ofthe crappiest episodes of Night Writer. There
is no bad Wait wait, therewere no bad episodes first of all,
not one episode. And what remindsme of what they have in common is

(10:41):
that they're both not very compelling.If you insult Babylon five, it directly
goes to Don's ego and he justwears pain on his face. This is
how much Ride or Die he isfor that it is. He thinks it's
the greatest thing ever created in thehistory of fiction. I mean, am
I am I wrong? You're notwrong? Yeah? See there you go

(11:05):
the look that you're seeing and itreminds him of breaking bad, Like this
is great, like this is great, greatest pieces of fiction ever and it
reminds him of breaking bad. Okay, yep, okay makes sense to me.
The Wire, No, well,the Wire along with Twin Peaks are
the two greatest shows made in theWest that I mean not not up for

(11:26):
debate facts V, the original V. I'll throw that up there. Uh.
I watched V as a kid,and I was too young for it
because seeing people's you know, withskin hanging. Yeah, that was I
can't deal with this. I sawthat when I was in elementary school.
You must have been in like collegeat then high school. I'll give you.

(11:54):
I'll give you one one of thebest sci fi shows please from that
era V. Like, no,the best sci fi show that was on
TV from that era, Max Headroom. Okay, we actually just talked about
it here at work the other day. I didn't know that show. I
didn't know that. In Chicago therewas this thing where someone took over the
airwaves, and like broadcast, likesomeone wearing that mask or something for a

(12:18):
while took over the airwaves. TheGood Show. I was a little young
for that one, but like theI used to watch it. Talk about
deep cuts, you talked about nightwriter time tracks, that ring a bell
time tracks. I used to watchall this stuff. I actually used to
tape on VHS every all those showsin those blocks, and I just had
VHS tapes everywhere of that. ButI don't really think anyone's interested in this,

(12:43):
Trevor. So my pained face earlierwas all about how much of your
nonsense I would have to cut out. Yeah, I mean we said this
was only going to be a fewminutes, and we're at eighteen minutes already,
so like, you know, Ithink eighteen men's oh yeah, you
can count look at that. SoI think, before we do any more

(13:03):
damage to our friendship here, Trevor, I think it's time to bring out
our guests, so everyone stay tunedup. Next. Cinematographer Jeremy Benning.
My name is Jeremy Benning. I'ma drugging photography I live in Toronto,
Ontario. I shoot a lot ofepisodic television. I've got a history of

(13:24):
doing commercials and music videos and documentariesand it sort of led me to working
on a lot of long form projectsfor various striving platforms. Yeah, and
you've got quite the diverse portfolio justlooking you know, any of your credits
you've got just for our listeners.You know your work has aired on Discovery
and BBC and Netflix. You knowyou've you've shot a Disney Plus movie spin

(13:48):
And you know the reason that Iinitially, you know, heard about you
and and started following you many yearsago was your work as this cinematographer on
all the years of the Expanse.But quite quite a lot of work.
You've got awards from the AC forOutstanding Cinematography, for Killing Lincoln, tons
of awards and things like that.Correct me if I'm wrong, But the

(14:09):
Expanse was that was your first forayinto sci fi? Is that right?
That's correct? It was also myfirst foray into long format television as well
into episodic television. How did youget to that? I mean, that
seems like it was a pretty Itseems tough, is it not? To
go from normal? I mean,you were a steady cam you'r dpeing.

(14:33):
But like that seems like a littlebit of a leap, or is it
not? Is it? Does?It does not matter? Genre not matter.
I mean, I guess gram itdoesn't matter. But I guess it's
how you get there that can bethe leave. It wasn't something I was
pursuing. I mean, this wassort of the era of the beginning of
the golden era of streaming. Houseof Cards was kind of at its peak
at that point. This was twentyfourteen, and I had kind of avoided

(14:56):
long format television only because I hadexperience as a steadycam operator in the early
two thousands, working as a asa daily operator on various episodic shows that
were shooting in Toronto. So Ihad a little taste of doing days here
and there on shows, and Ithought, you know, this isn't I
didn't really enjoy it as a Icouldn't see myself getting into it as a

(15:18):
cinematographer. And I already was shootingand dping a lot of commercials and indie
projects and things, and I enjoyedthat kind of work that I was doing,
so I really didn't pursue it.But this was that was a different
time of television and then you know, years go by and then it's twenty
fourteen and you know, starting tosee what was happening on the streaming platforms

(15:41):
and thinking like, wow, there'slike this is a whole new type of
storytelling. These like larger scope,multi episode shows like House of Cards was
sort of like that first big onethat I had started thinking like, well,
that would actually be kind of coolto work on a show like that,
and it sort of opened my eyesto it. And then it was
just by coincidence around that time thatthe Expanse came along, and it was

(16:03):
because of a local rental house inToronto sim SIM Digital. They they had
had a lunch meeting with one ofthe line producers and they were I guess
the line producer, who was MannyDanelon, who's from Toronto as well.
He had was asking them saying like, hey, we're doing this. This
big show is coming to Toronto.And at the time it was the biggest

(16:26):
science fiction show of its time,of its kind because Star Trek I hadn't
come back yet, so that wasbefore Star Trek, you know, came
back. The SIM guys passed myname on too, Manny, and then
I got a phone call from himout of the blue saying, hey,
I got your name from these guysat sim who I knew, and you
know, we described the kind ofdeep we were looking for, and they
said we should talk to you.And I guess they looked me up a

(16:48):
little bit and saw my background.And Terry McDonough was the like producing director
who was starting the expanse and hehad at that time had just done Breaking
Back and you know, so hehad, you know, he had some
pretty good success himself, and hewas a British director. But I didn't
know him and I'd never worked withthem, but he had seen I guess
when they got my name, they'dshowed him my work and he had come

(17:11):
from a documentary background as well,and he saw that in my reel,
in my my CV and and he'slike, this is the guy. We
have to meet him. So whenI went into to have an interview with
them, Terry was there, andreally he was. He was my biggest
proponent. I mean, he pushedthem to consider me. And it's funny

(17:34):
because one of the things they saidto me up front was like, we're
trying to find someone who's from outsidethe television box. We want someone who's
going to bring something new to this. We like the idea of the fact
that you've done documentary because we wantto kind of approach the show in that
way. It was with a senseof realism, but also someone who knows
how to make things look good andhas technical abilities. So I guess I

(17:55):
ticked all the boxes. So oneof the other American producers asked me in
that interview, said, well,you know, we see you haven't done
any episodic television in your resume andyour resume, so how are you going
to do this? Which is kindof ironic because it was the same day.
We're like, we want someone whohasn't done it, but we all
also see you haven't done it,so how are you going to do this?
To me? I look at thisas I've done a lot of smaller
things that are chunks of what thisshow is as a as a bigger hole.

(18:18):
So I just kind of think ofit as applying those same strategies to
a thing that's going to be youknow, instead of a few weeks of
a shoot, it's like months ofa shoot, and I can do that.
And so when I finally actually gotthe job, within that, you
know, a week or so later, you know, it was a combination
of super excited but also terrified becauseI knew it was the biggest thing I'd
ever done, and I was reallygoing to have to drop up on every

(18:40):
everything I'd learned in like the twentyplus years up to that point of being
in the business. I was goingto have to littally use everything I had
learned. And you know, therestless history, I guess you can say,
yeah, and did it put pressureon you to come up with something
new? For them? I mean, they already had something new. Their
concept was the something new. Itwas really about how do we like applying
a philosophy to how we were goingto light it and shoot it that fit

(19:03):
the world because they had already createdan amazing look book. They actually had
what to make this beautiful pdf thatwas like a sixty page look book of
the show's world. And I'd readthe script and I looked at this lookbook
and I fell in love with thelook book right away because I love the
aesthetic and the vision of the futureand all that. So they had kind
of like that heavy lifting had beendone. Now it was like, how

(19:23):
do we how do we light andshoot these worlds that have been beautifully rendered
in these artist concepts. So youknow, it was really about, okay,
well, obviously we're going to haveto create sets and environments that are
completely three sixty bills where you're youknow, there's ceilings, there's walls all
around so you can look in anydirection, and it has to all be

(19:44):
lit kind of practically, because ifthere's no if the if the sets have
ceilings, you can't have like filmlighting hanging above it like you would on
a kind of a traditional set.So it was like, I my philosophy
right away was like we have tolike build in a ton of LED lighting
that we have to custom make tofit these sets. I mean, and
that's how mean all these shows aredone that way now, but that at

(20:04):
the time twenty fourteen, it hadn'treally been done on that scale. And
it was a big investment because thosekinds of things you can't rent those lights.
You have to buy that stuff.So you're literally buying like one hundreds
of thousands of dollars of LED ribbonand controllers and all that because you can't
rent it and you're you know,you're cutting it up. It's a consumable
item that basically, once you've boughtit, you own it. So they

(20:26):
had to kind of take that leapof like will this show have legs beyond
the first season, Because if you'regoing to invest that kind of money,
it works out great if it's goingto get used for multiple seasons because you
amortize it over that. But ofcourse nobody knows that in the first season
of a show, so they hadto take that risk, and all of
us were basically telling the higher powers, like, this is how we have
to do it, and to convincethem to spend that money. Why do
you think they took that risk?I think because everyone, Because the people

(20:47):
who are running it were smart.All the people involved were smart and understood
that, you know, knowing theworld that they've set out to make,
this is the way to do it. Everyone knew that, so it was
just kind of like collectively getting everyonetogether of that mindset. But I mean,
the show was was very well run, and that's why I stayed with
it for so long. I mean, the the Rain, the showrunner,

(21:08):
the Alcon people, the guys whowrote the books, Tie and Daniel,
they were all equally involved and heavilyinvolved and They all are smart people and
knew how to make a show lookthis from a technical level. So they
gave me that freedom and they trustedme, which was interesting because they didn't
know. Nobody knew who I was. I was kind of an unknown at

(21:30):
that point. But I think therewas a collective. I had a good
plan. It all made sense,and the crew that I was working with
the end, the production team andthe production designer staff, everybody was like,
this is the way we have tomake this show. And everyone got
behind it. And that's what wedid. And you did a lot of
tests, right in terms of justcamera movement and steady cam. First movie
you can talk a little bit about, like, yeah, we did a
ton of testing. Yeah, Imean, Terry was a big proponent.

(21:52):
He really wanted the movie was newat the time and it had just they
just released the bigger model just forpeople listening. Yeah. So it's a
cancercapels, right, that's not you'renot tied to like you're in a steady
cam, right. Yeah, it'swell, it's also called a gimbal.
You know, you see it alot now, you know. It's the
thing you can hold. And there'sconsumer versions of these things that are can
fit small cameras, and but atthe time it was new and no one

(22:17):
had ever used it on a bigproduction. In that sense, it was
more of kind of like an indiefilmmaker's tool at the time. And Terry
had seen these demo videos of it, because there's a lot of viral videos
of people shooting these crazy shots withthem back in like twenty thirteen. It's
like they're going from a skate fromlike someone on rollerblades and into a taxi
and all that. So they anyways, they I was like, that's great,

(22:38):
and I'd had experience with them,but I'm like, he wanted to
shoot the entire thing with it,and I'm like, I'm not. We
have to really test this because Idon't have enough experience with it, and
no one has to know that wecan rely on this thing to shoot like
the majority of the show that way. And he liked the look and feel
of it and this thing, youknow, for zero gravity and the idea
could float through spaces and anyways,we tested it. We did a lot

(23:00):
of tests, and we landed onon that particular version of the of the
movie, and that's kind of weuse that tool heavily throughout the show.
But it was I mean, again, Terry push forward. He really wanted
it, and I actually, youknow, I don't think I would have
considered it if it wasn't for thefact that he really wanted to try it.
From what I understand, Jeremy,is that TV shoots fast. I
don't know with the you know,the era of the last fifteen years of

(23:23):
prestige TV, if they give youmore time. But what I've seen of
the expanse is that. And andI know people get offended when I use
this word with regards to TV,but it looked cinematic. And does are
you afforded more time on the onthe on the TV set to achieve that?
Look? I mean, I'm seeingcamera movements in there and certain setups

(23:48):
that you don't normally see in inTV shows or I haven't seen in many
with the accept The major exception tome would be Peter Deming's work in twin
Peaks of Return, which I thoughtlooked very cinematic. Is there is is
there more pressure on you to getthese shots and maintain the speed of television

(24:08):
production? Well, I think Imean you could maybe if you compare it
to the old model of a televisionshow where you get like eight days to
make an episode. Now you mightget you get nine days, or you
know, you get a nextra day. And then they also do this thing
with with blocks where you're shooting you'reshooting two blocks or two episodes together as
a block, so you're you're combiningthe resource one director does the two episodes

(24:30):
and you're block shooting two episodes together, which there's a certain efficiency to that
in terms of combining resources of prep. But then what they'll do is they'll
do what they call double up days. Some shows call it tandem days,
where the next block, which isdirected by a different director, will overlap
the outgoing block, So you actuallyhave this period where there's like there's almost

(24:52):
like there's two blocks shooting at thesame time. So you're in a way
you're actually from an overall production scheduleof the entire run of the season.
You're actually gaining a cup a dayor two per block by combining the two
blocks. So you have this overlapday where you bring in and another supplemental
crew to sort of shoot the firstday or two of the incoming block while
the outgoing block finishes and that's acommon thing. Now it's a bit of

(25:15):
a headache for all departments because thennow everyone has to prep for the incoming
block of the next episodes to beshooting at the same time as the outgoing
one, and you have to behave kind of like two sets running at
the same time, so props,wardrobe, makeup, sets, lighting,
everybody has to now like it's likea double workload for those couple of days,

(25:36):
and it does a lot. Itdoes afford you extra days in a
sense, and a little bit moreresources because there's a savings overall at the
end of the show. So it'skind it's kind of a blessing and a
curse. Yes, you get atiny bit more time, but you now
have this like added headache of thesedouble up days, so you know,
and we basically did that throughout theentire run of the show, like all
six seasons. We did that,right. I recently heard this and photographer

(26:00):
Roger deakins, I know, Ithink the idea might apply. I know
we're talking, you know, TVversus film, But he said that early
on his career he worked on hecalled him rock promos. There were music
videos and documentaries and documentaries and That'swhat taught him to work fast and still

(26:25):
achieve the look that he wanted,that the director wanted. I see that
you have a very very similar background. Is it was it music videos and
documentary that gave you those skills towork and you know this is your this
was your first foray into sci fiand television. But did those skills help
you in this new or at thetime new venture one hundred percent? I

(26:49):
mean there's I mean there I drewso much from the documentary and music video
world going into the expanse that itwas almost kind of like completely intertwined.
I don't know if I could havepulled it off without having that background.
I mean that's the only background thatI know, But I also know I
fully drew from it, you know, like the working with small resources and

(27:12):
how to how to like think quickly, especially in the documentary world. You
know, when you have there's maybeno lighting department, it's just you and
a sound person to be an assistant, and you're working in locations where you
have available light, or you onlyhave a couple of small lights, or
and it's you setting it up onyour own. You kind of have to

(27:33):
you develop a set of instincts ofknowing where to put the camera very quickly
based on what the conditions give you. You know, so if you're if
you're walking into a place that youhaven't necessarily had a chance to see before,
and you have to shoot a sequencewith a couple of people and they
have to move through this space,whether it's outdoor, indoor, or a
mix of both, you have tovery quickly figure out what's the best way

(27:56):
to do this visually that's going tolook the best and tell the story.
And you kind of you you sharpenyour your skills that way, and and
you do get presented with that ona on an episodic kind of show or
long format things where you have allthese resources in the big machine, where
you often have to like go backto that small mindset of like I'm it's

(28:17):
if it was just me here andnone of this giant machine and we've got
five minutes to make a decision wheredoes the camera go, and you have
to block out all that giant circusof stuff there that you've got all these
trucks and people and everything, butyou're you're in a situation where you've got
only a short running you know,out of time window to get the shot,
and you have to think quickly oflike where do we where do we
put the camera in the least youknow, amount of places to get what

(28:40):
we have to get in like thehour we have left or whatever. And
you you are basically using all thoseskills that you that I find that I
got from documentary. You you're usingthose things when you're when you're in those
pressure moments. So you've only gotlike you're running out of day light,
or you know, we've got achild actor and they have to be off
the clock in exactly thirty five minutesand you've got two shots left to get.
Where are you going to put thecamera and how are you going to

(29:02):
do it? And all those skillscome into play at that point. All
that knowledge of like documentary or musicvideos where you're working small and you have
to get a whole bunch done ina small amount of time with limited resources,
it scales up to on the onthe bigger things. I'm paraphrasing here.
I don't remember the exact quote,but I got the gist of it.
I remember a few years ago somebodyasked the director David Fincher, what

(29:23):
is directing and they were expecting somelofty answer, and he said, directing
is that you have fifteen minutes leftto get the shot and only five minutes
of sunlight. That is directing.Do you find that even though this is
you know, it's a different it'sa you're working as a cinematographer, do
you find that it sounds like youfind that to be the case. I
mean, we're I'm in the sameboat as the director. I mean we're

(29:45):
both faced with that same challenge thatwe both have to work together in those
sort of crisis time crunch moments ofhow can we how can we tell the
story, how do we get whatwe have to get in this bit of
time that we have left. Andsometimes, you know, the plan that
you had of what you were goingto do goes out the window because circumstances
change and location issues happen and whatever, and now you have less time than

(30:08):
you thought to get the thing youwere going to get, or the weather
changes something like that, and youhave to find a way to make it
work in that little bit of timethat you have. And I've been in
those situations so many times. It'slike and there's many times on episodic television
where you do feel that you've gotthis kind of like gun to your head
of time throughout the day where you'reaware constantly of like, we have this

(30:30):
much time to get it. Andthe successful director DP partnerships are when you
both understand that together and you boththe director is also kind of like subconsciously
aware of that without kind of likebeing kind of strangled by that like worry
of the time, but you bothare thinking constantly of like, Okay,

(30:51):
like every little bit of time wespend in the first few hours of the
day is going to be time thatwe wish we had in the last hour
of the day. So you're alwaysthinking of, like you want to be
quick and efficient. You don't wantto like short change yourself for what you
are trying to get creatively, butknow that that extra take or those two
or three extra setups that somedimes youthink like do we really need that?
And that's often the good The directorsthat I've I've really found a good partnership

(31:14):
with are the ones where you're bothon the same page where you're like,
we got it, we got it, Like you don't need to know the
take because you know that extra fiveminutes or whatever. It all adds up
all those little five minute, oneminute things that you you you're fussing over
if the director wants to keep fussingwith something at the end of the day,
like oftentimes, it's like it doesn'tit isn't really really going to matter.
You've got what you need. It'sknowing when to move on because that

(31:34):
at the end of the day you'regoing to that time is going to be
so precious that you've that you've bankedby not doing that extra take or that
one extra shot that you maybe don'tneed. Yeah, so the Stanley Kubrick
one hundred and fifty take method isuh, it's yeah, I can see
from your reaction. It's a luxurythe few people have. I mean,
yeah, you know you've got like, you know, months of a production

(31:56):
schedule and that that's I mean thatvery few people have that luxury. You
know, those are the top zeropoint five percent of the filmmakers out there
that have that luxury. The restof us have the realities of time that
we have to contend with, andand you know, like Revenant is an
example of that. You know theydid they made that decision of shooting as
much as possible at Magic Hour orin you know, so they've basically it

(32:20):
took them. You know, theyspent nine months making that film that if
it was a smaller brother film,you'd have you'd have like six weeks to
shoot that, and you'd have toshoot it in whatever time of day it
is. But they had the timeand the money and the and the clout
to say we're only shooting this atthe right time of day. And that
movie was like mostly Magic Hour,you know, So that gives you you
got like an hour or two aday to shoot maybe, and you spend

(32:40):
most of it rehearsing and planning,and then you're getting little tiny pieces of
the of the of the film perday. Yeah, like a like a
Terrence Malick production. Yeah. Yeah, I'd love to go back just for
a second. Just it's it's sorare the people that we've talked to that
for someone to last years on ashow, you lasted the whole run.

(33:00):
So was there something? Was itthat relationship with the directors, was it
producers? Was it just your ownsomething like what allowed you to do that
grind versus saying, you know whatI've done three years, let me go
work on a film or doc oryou know, do something else. What
kept you there that whole time?I mean the funny thing is when I
did the first season, I thought, I'll just do the one and that's

(33:22):
it. I'm not a TV guy. I'm not going to go into this
world. I think what I realized, like the Rain said something to me
early on, like in my firstseason, the our showrunner, and he
was the showrunner for the whole run, and I learned a lot from him,
and how you know, because Narrainhas a huge experience of having done
like CSI, and I mean he'she really is one of the top show

(33:44):
runners out there. And he said, remember you are like I'm not going
to be there very often. Youare the sort of the visual gatekeeper of
the show. And I kind oflook at you as like my deputy when
I'm not there. And remember too, of the first two seasons of Expanse,
I did them by myself. Ididn't have an alter a DP,
which at the time I didn't knowany better. And I mean, it

(34:04):
was crazy that I did that,but I did. And I after the
second season, I'm like, Ican't do that anymore. But but in
the Rain gave me that lesson ofyou are you have that responsibility. You
know, you are like if anythingis going wrong that's weird or or something's
not the way that you know,director's making a bad call on something,
like, you know, reach outto me, and I will, I
will try and get involved. I'lldo what I can. And I didn't

(34:27):
think of it that way. Iwasn't used to being told that I had
that power and responsibility as a DP. But on a on an episodic show
where you're sort of the lead DP, and it started there's like you are
that person, and I didn't know. I hadn't thought of that yet.
So over the course of that thatfirst season, and I got to the
end of it, I realized Ihad we were building this world, we
had this we had all these booksof story to tell, and I realized,

(34:50):
this is like a really rare opportunitywhere we have all this source and
sield to work from, the guyswho write it, are involved with it.
The showrunner is a super smart,like collaborative guy that I've developed a
relationship with, and what other thingcan I do that's going to have that,
you know? So that's when Idecided to do the second season,
and every year I'm like, wellshould I go back again? Most of

(35:12):
the people on that show what cameback like when we finished. I think
one of the I think Jason Brown, one of our producers, said that
from the first season to the lastseason, something like they had like eighty
percent crew retention. Wow, whichis a very that's like several hundred people.
Yeah, to state, that's veryunusual for a show, an episode
of TV show, And that speaksto the story we were telling that everyone

(35:36):
wanted to be there, telling itthat the people running it, we're running
it in a way that everyone wantedto stay and continue to work with him.
It wasn't a toxic place was Itwas a functional, collaborative, enjoyable
work environment. And that's why Ikept going back. And it was always
like, well what else would Ibe doing? There was nothing else that
came along that was better, andyou know, I did do other things

(35:57):
in between, so I used thetime I had off because we would have
months of downtime between seasons. Andthe thing is, we never knew if
the show was going to be renewedeach season until the last second, So
usually like there we'd wrap, thenthere'd be like three four months of post
and whatever. The last window oftime like where the network had to tell
us if we were being renewed ornot. It was always like the midnight
of the day before they would say, Okay, you're renewed, So there'd

(36:20):
be months in between where we alld and then Amazon after season three.
But but with sci Fi, originallysci Fi wouldn't tell us until like they
literally their contractual final day of whenthey can tell us, which was like
months after we wrapped, so wedidn't nobody knew if we were going back
to it each year. Our jobin security is just for everybody, is
just job and security. So Iwould take I would take other things in

(36:42):
between, and I made a consciouseffort to take things that were very not
sci Fi, you know. SoI did. I did The Long Road
Home. He did The Boys,I did. I did other things in
between the seasons of Expanse so Icould kind of just try other things and
not be just so the sci fiperson, you know, and I did.
I was asked to do Star Trek. When the new Star Trek came
along, I was asked to dothe first season of Star Trek becse I

(37:06):
had just done the Expanse and theywere actually building We were at Pinewood,
which went Picard or Strange New Worlds, No, No, Next Generation,
the first one Next Generation Discovery,Sorry, Discovery, Discovery Discovery. That
was the first. That was thefirst thing that they started. And they
were actually building the sets at Pinewood. We were at Pinewood and they were
like across the way in the samecomplex building the sets for that. And

(37:27):
so we were like seeing them buildingthe sets where we were actually filming the
first season of expans And they askedme if I wanted to, Like I
was approached by the show, andI it was a tough decision, but
I thought, well, here's ashow that I'm on that we've built ourselves
from the ground up. It's asmall family we have, we're building,
we're doing something new. I havea very good relationship with the creative team.

(37:50):
If I go to Star Trek,they were asking, they're basically wanting
me to go to that show totake the ideas that I've got from Expanse
and and injected into Star Trek togive it a new thing interesting. But
it also would lose my creative powerin a sense because it's a much bigger
machine. It's a legacy show.You're dealing with a giant committee of people,
and it's also something that's been donefor decades, and I felt,
I really felt that the Expanse wassomething special and I should stay with it.

(38:15):
So I, you know, againstthe better advice of some of my
colleagues and representatives and stuff. Theywere like, you got, what are
you crazy? Like You've got totake this. This is like, this
is the prestige show that everybody wantsto be on. And I'm like,
I think I should stay with theExpanse. It's like all those horror story
It's been all those people who goon to work for Disney for Star Wars
and they just feel trapped in thein the franchise, in the system.

(38:37):
Yeah, they lose all their creativethe reasons they were hired to begin with.
That's right. And I just knewand that and that feeling stayed to
the end. I had that levelof creative control and collaboration with the showrunner
and the and the people who ranthe show like I'm and in fact,
my role kind of expanded and becamemore important as it went, so I

(38:59):
felt that we were really empowered totell the story in a way that I'm
like, when am I ever goingto get to do this again? I
mean, I may never get todo this again, so I should stay
with it. So you strike meas somebody that has a strong sense of
self and maybe not maybe you're awareof it or not, but protects your
mental health. Hear you had anopportunity to go work on Star Trek,

(39:20):
but at the same time, I'mhappy here. I have control here.
This is a you know, eightypercent retention. People are happy here.
It's a you said it wasn't toxic, and I'm not saying Discovery was a
toxic. I don't know. Butyou chose to work on a production that
felt special to you and that youwere satisfied doing this hard work with where

(39:45):
yeah, you could go to somethingbigger, probably paid more money, but
you're rolling the dice on whether thisis going to be a happy experience,
And that tells me that you knowwho you are. Well I was.
I was certainly aware of that thatStar Trek had probably two or three times
the money that we had and muchbigger resources and everything. But I just

(40:06):
thought, this is still better.I'm I'm happy here, and you know
and from what I heard between peoplethat I knew who went onto that show
that it was actually a very difficultshow in terms of just mentally for people
who went on too it. SoI was like, Okay, I kind
of confirmed what I thought might happen. But that being said, like I
certainly because I had never done episodictelevision before, even with Expanse as much

(40:30):
as I loved it, I had, I think what I had seen when
I did steady cam on those showsback in the two thousands, is I
met through and others and cinematographers thatI was working for as an operator,
where I could just sort of getthis sense of kind of like jaded bitterness
from people. I could see it. I could in that world of like
kind of the grind of of likeregular episodic television back in the early two

(40:54):
thousands, and I remember at thattime thinking like, I never want to
be that guy. I don't wantto end up like that. So and
that's why I avoided that world.But then once I started doing Expanse as
much as I loved it and Itotally was invested in every way, there
were certainly days after like months intothe run each season where I started to
think, like, do I reallyenjoy this? Because there's you know,

(41:15):
you've got good days and bad dayson anything, and even on a show
that you love, you're still goingto have days where you're not quite into
it, or it's you've got achallenging thing, and maybe there's like it's
just like there's bad days. There'sdays you just don't enjoy it as much.
And and when you know you've gotsuch a long run, I started
thinking like, well, is thisnow my career? Like I've now that

(41:36):
I've now that I'm doing this,the writing on the wall to me is
that this will be what I'm goingto do for the next ten years of
my life, and everything I donow will be a three to five month
or seven month commitment where you're init, like you have to fully drink
the kool aid and you're buying intothat. You have to go and eat
and breathe and live that world everyday. And I started to thinking like,

(41:57):
well, can I, like doI have that in me? Like
do I actually? Because I couldfeel a burnout, like little tinges of
it coming and will I will Isurvive this? And but what else am
I going to do? Like,what other kind of work can I do?
This is what I love and thisis my career. But when you
do it that much, and youdo it that intensively, you definitely start
to feel like the this, youknow, the faint bits of burnout coming

(42:22):
in and just feeling like your creativeenergy is running out. It's like I
have to I have to go inevery day and be positive and inspired and
have good ideas and problem solved.And that takes a lot, you know,
it takes a lot out of yourpersonal life and your your relationships with
your family and friends, and evenyour own partner. Like my partner,
I mean, he knew what Iwhat I was doing when I got into
it, but it created stress forus at home. I mean because even

(42:45):
though he knew the drill and whatI have to do like it, it
affected us for sure. And andI look around. I see people all
around me in the industry who hadmarriages fall apart and divorces, and it
affects their children and all that.Like it's it is. It is a
very hard industry in that way becauseit takes you away from your family for
such a long time. Just thehours. So many people are just going
to other countries, other you know, yeah, locations. It's not like

(43:07):
it's around the corner for everybody.I mean, right now, I'm four
hours away from home and I won'tI won't be going home until this is
over, which is in like sevenweeks, so I won't really see people
for a long time, you know, I was. I'm very aware of
it, and I and it stillis an ongoing concern for me because every
job I take, I think,Okay, well that's another seven months or
six months of my life, andhow am I going to get through this?

(43:30):
And well, I do I havethe creative energy to get through this?
And I so I'm very selective obviouslywith what I take, because I
get offers for things all the timewhere I'm like, I can't. I
can't see myself doing that for fivemonths? You have to, I think
you learn to start gauging yourself oflike what what do I have this in
me? You look at the projectand what it is, and you think
about what it's going to entail,and you think, do I love this

(43:52):
enough that I'm going to want toI'm to make it to the other side.
And it's an ongoing thing. Istill am figuring that out and I
have you know, I turn fiftynext year and I think, okay,
well I've got another I don't know, fifteen years of this in me.
Can I realistically do this for thatlong at the level that I want to
do it at? And I thinkthe answer is I have to do less.

(44:15):
I have to work a bit lessand to survive that because it is
it is a thing I think aboutof like mentally, how do I maintain
that and not not burn out,not become jaded. I mean, I
pride myself in being being not ayeller and collaborative with people and kind.

(44:35):
I mean I really you know,our film set floors really need that.
And I mean I have to bethe leader in that way because I run
all those departments and so many people. So if I am, if I'm
a bad person in that way,it affects everybody else. So I have
to be the I have to gothat extra mile of like not wearing anything
on my sleeve that is bothering me, you know, which takes It means
you end up kind of bottling stuffup. Even if you're not having a

(44:55):
good day, you still have togo in and smile and be positive and
not as you're with people, andthat's that's that can be hard, Like
you're you know, you have tofind you have to find a way to
like deal with that, you know. And I and I've I've seen a
therapy. I've seen a therapist abunch of times who understands my industry,
you know. And there's all allthe insecurities that come with our industry too,

(45:15):
of like you know, am Igood enough? You say you self
doubt yourself all the time, Likeit's it breeds insecurity on top of all
the other stuff of the long hoursand everything else and the creative energy you
talked about the struggle of keeping itall in balance, uh, being a

(45:36):
being somebody on set that uh,you know, doesn't yell, trying to
make this schedule work for your partner, trying to make it work for you
creatively, uh, but without gettingburnout. But not everybody on the set
is like that. And Uh.The I think a big topic where where
I don't know if I'm ever goingto see it fall in my lifetime,

(46:00):
is that a lot of people comefrom trauma and then they end up in
these if they end up in thesevery very intense stressful work situations twelve fourteen,
sixteen hour days, despite them maybebeing great at their job, it
leads to not just burnout, butmelt down or a reliance on amphetamines or

(46:28):
other drugs to get them through it. I mean, are you are you?
Are you seeing this and are youseeing to grow? I think?
I mean on a positive side ofthat I've seen. I think there's a
lot more healthy choices being made.I see people the drug and alcohol thing
I see less of now. Imean, earlier in my career, I

(46:49):
was aware of a lot of peoplewho who drank heavily and would come to
work smelling like booze or hungover.Like it was a constant culture in our
business. And I see a lotless of that now. I think the
pandemic taught like gave us all areset in a good way. I think
people started to appreciate their personalize more. There's certainly a lot more talk of
people taking you know, like Isee it on my crew where where like

(47:12):
the grips and lighting and camera department, where one of the heads of those
departments say, oh so and soisn't coming in tomorrow because they need they
need to take some time or they'vegot a thing going on, so and
I and of course they come tome, is that okay? Or one
of my keys will say, hey, I need a date to where I
got to go. I have disappointmentor I got to deal with my kids
thing or whatever, And of courseI say yeah, of course, Like

(47:34):
I never say no to that becauseI know what it's like being and I
don't because I don't have that luxuryas the DP, I can't do that
really very easily to say, hey, I'm going to take the day off
tomorrow. So when someone in myone of my departments ask for that,
I say, of course, likeI understand, you know, so I
think it's got They ask for agood reason. They have a good reason.
If they're hell tell me like,yeah, like my kid has a

(47:54):
thing, or I've got to goto this like my dance recital, whatever
some important thing with their kid orthey have whatever. I always say yeah,
I mean, of course, Imean I understand what it takes to
be in this business and I don'twant to keep people from those kind of
things. And I think it's gottenbetter. There's less there's a lot more
awareness of mental health. It's moreopenly discussed. I think even with the

(48:16):
sort of the more macho departments,like the grips and stuff like that.
You mean, there's I can seethat those people, and there's a lot
more and there's a lot of womenin those departments now too. It's become
a lot more diverse, that there'smore of an awareness of your mental state.
You know. It's it's not perfectby any means, but certainly compared
to what it was twenty years ago, it's a lot better. That's great.

(48:38):
Don Yeah, I want to goback and ask you a question because
you brought up like the creative impulsesand you mentioned Discovery and like the Expanse
was pre volume filming, right,and yes, if Discovery leans very heavily
on that. So I'm curious anyexperience on filming a volume sort of if
that feels like stifling a little bit, you know, just any thoughts on

(48:59):
that front. I mean, Idon't have a ton of experience with it.
I've done a little bit. I'veshot a couple of small things on
a volume stage and we actually lookedinto it in the last season of Expanse
you did and volume we could usethis, Yeah, just for people listening.
It's basically large curved led wall.So instead of doing months of post
production afterwards, all the pre productionhappens earlier. You stick up a sun

(49:21):
there, the sun stays up thereand the light plays on the roughly.
Yeah, it's the Mandalorian thing thatpeople are most familiar with, you know,
and it's that's so I yeah,we looked. We looked into that,
and it didn't work for Expanse onlybecause the workflow was backwards. Everything
had to happen up front and theshow. When you know, when you're
on a show that's already the trainis already moving like that, it's very
difficult to change your schedule, like, oh, now we need three months

(49:43):
before we shoot to build all theall the the the assets for the wall.
And you know, there are there'scertain things that's really great for in
my experience, and it definitely willbecome more and more used, but it
does have limitations. It's like thatsome people like, oh, it's the
Holy Girl, like we can doeverything in there. I don't have to
go anywhere anymore. But you can'tyou can't interact with it in the sense

(50:07):
of like it's great for like bigvistas or like you're building a piece of
a landscape and that's like the vistabeyond, or you're in a you're in
like a ship or a or likea boat or something, and it's the
ocean and the sky beyond. Butforeground elements. You still need the floor
and you still need the foreground things. And the trick is like if it's
certain kinds of spaces, like actorscan't like walk into it. You know,
you can't go down a hallway andit around a corner or move big

(50:30):
distance because because you're still constrained withinthat like floor space that that's around the
wall. So it's great for certainthings, but it also does there are
a lot of costs and you alsocan't you can't currently you can't focus on
it directly. When you get certainangles you can, but if you focus
directly on it, you start seeingthe pixels. Yeah, So it's it's
kind of like it has limits andit and it's it's not cheap. It's

(50:52):
very expensive. So it's it's theamount of time you have to build the
assets. And I just watching ashow and you like that. You see
the actors they're walking certain steps thatcut because they're they hit Yeah, they
can do yeah, yeah, andalso correct me if I'm wrong. And
and this is something that I don'tknow for sure, but doesn't it depending
on the size of the screen,doesn't it kind of limit your focal lengths

(51:15):
and certain camera moves and stuff likethat. So you're just stuck in a
certain very limited range of focal lengths. And and I mean that has to
be difficult. No, it's tricky. Well you can't, you know,
it's it's tricky to look straight likevery steep like looking down or very low
looking up because you start seeing offthe wall and then you're getting into like
the effects anyways, to extend what'sthere. I mean, all those a

(51:37):
lot of those those not all,but there's certainly a great deal of v
effects clean up that happens with thosewith those wall shots anyways, it's not
entirely, it doesn't eliminate post entirely. Yeah, what you see is what
you get, and that's it.Yeah, you still hasn't clean up to
do, and not not to gettoo in the weeds here, But what
about you know, full on greenscreen but with unreal is that something?

(52:00):
I mean, that's the explorer.I'm basically here just on the you know,
on the commercial corporate side of whatI do. But like, no,
it's it's a thing. I mean, yeah, well, I mean
we looked at that too. There'sa company in Toronto called Mavericks Visual Effects
and they they did a lot ofwork on Handmad's tail and Brendan Taylor is
the guy who runs the company andhe's very much been developing that and other
companies are doing it too. ButI've gone into their shop a few times

(52:22):
and seen what they're doing and thewhole notion of having real time comping of
the background. So if you're ona blue screen or green screen set with
an extension piece, the ability tohave like, to me, that's actually
a very an even more interesting oror a universal application of that technology where

(52:43):
you're you're using it to augment inreal time the extension of what you're going
to be putting into the shot thatyou're shooting of Like you've got half of
a set and then green screen beyondthat, you can put the asset that
doesn't have to be fully done becauseyou're not actually photographing it, but you
can have it on the monitor asa preview, and so when you move
the camera and you're lighting it.You leave to have the thing that's going
to be there on the monitor askind of a reference of like, this

(53:04):
is what it will be, knowingthat, of course it's going to get
rendered better and more later, butat least you have a you have a
good high quality preview of it.And that to me is really useful because
now you're not having to guess,you know, looking at it and you
may have like a piece of conceptart and then the visual effects person's there
and you're looking at this shaw witha giant piece of blue in it,
and you're like, well, whatyou know, what exactly is back to

(53:25):
where? How is the light comingfrom there? And you're trying to like
make that work with what's really infront of the camera. But if you
could see it on a monitor,you're like, oh, well now you
can really you can really tune itin. Yeah. In the days of
film, they relied on, youknow, color timing in the uh in
the wash of the film. Nowa lot of UH cinematography Not no,

(53:50):
that's not the case, but somepart of the cinematography is done in post
and the color correction. Do youhave do you have a lot? Is
your voice involved in that process?Too or or is it left out and
you're frustrated if somebody you know completelychanges you know, shooting and raw.
They can change the they can changeall sorts of things. Sure, well,

(54:14):
I'm I make sure that I'm involved. I contractually make sure that I'm
involved. I mean with the Expanse, I was involved with every episode's color
timing. So to me, it'sit's as important as the shooting part.
Like it's it's like a photographer whodoesn't go into the dark room, you
know, and and let somebody elseprint the picture for them. It's like
there's there's so much influence on whatthat final thing will be that's also as

(54:37):
tied into what you intended when youshot it. So you kind of need
to be there because there's certain thingsthat you know when you're shooting it that
you're going to time it a certainway that you have to be there to
make sure that it's that part isdone, because it's you're oftentimes you're thinking
of the final color as you're shooting, knowing you're going to make it cooler
or you're gonna you know, darkena certain thing that oh, you know,

(54:57):
we're not going to spend time flaggingoff that wall. We know we
can just darken that one little thing, So you need to be there to
make sure the colorists knows that andthat you can do it how you want.
So I always make sure that I'mthere. I think it's I mean,
and most of my DP colleagues likeit's it's something we make sure we're
there. What about shots that arecompletely CG, like the way the you
know, the distant sun the lightmight hit a ship. Are you involved

(55:21):
even in that part of it?Yeah, I mean, because we still
color grade those shots and we'll oftensee previews of them and chime in on
what it should be like, youknow, if the sun isn't bright enough.
Like we went through a lot ofthat with Expanse because there were so
many visual effects vendors. I thinkthat we have like six or seven vendors,
and the creation of the ships andset extensions and things was split up

(55:45):
amongst different vendors, so you know, it was a trick to get everyone
to be consistent with how they littheir ships in space, and some were
darker than others, some were brighter, and we ended up as we got
through it, and you and therain was very specific with that stuff too.
He had very specific notes with howthe space shots looked. Is that

(56:05):
we started to have to create likea almost like a bible of like how
do you expose for the ships?So when the vendors are making these things
and they're lighting it virtually, likewe would say, make sure you give
us this stop range of like theshadows of the ship should be this many
stops under the brightest part because wedon't, you know, because sometimes it'd
be like the highlights were too brightand there was too much there wasn't enough
in the shadows, so we couldn'tcompress it. And then so we would

(56:27):
send the shots back and say youhave to redo this. Yeah, And
that's so that once we got intothat rhythm, it became kind of a
of a of a pattern of thisis how you expose for ships. When
people think about a cinematographer, whatthey're probably not thinking about is fully and
sound right of an interest. So, in a very strange pivot, this

(56:52):
is one of the things that youand I've talked. You know, you've
sent me something in the past,and this is how we've communicated. But
like, you know, talk tous, what is fully that's for you,
Trevor, because I know you wentto film school and I don't know
what at school, but you know, and you know your interest in it,
and you know, going back toTrack Stars, I know. And
it seems odd because usually most youknow, at least to hear in Boston,

(57:13):
all the dps that I know,if anything related to sound is near
them, they just push them tothe side and say sure. Yeah.
I mean that came from sort ofa childhood interest in sound. I mean
I was interested in pictures and soundas a kid, and I think if
I hadn't gone into photography, Iwould have ended up in the sound world
in some way, whether it's insound design or music production, I would

(57:35):
have. That's something I've always hadan interest in. And so because of
that as a kid, I rememberseeing on you know, our local like
kind of like our version of PBS, basically in Ontario, which was which
is TV Ontario. They used toshow they used to show like you know,
art films and like National Film Boardstuff. And there was a film

(57:57):
on there called track Stars, whichwas made in seventy nine I believe,
and it was Andy Malcolm, whowas one of the foremost folly artists in
the world made this film for funwith his friends in seventy nine, and
it kind of became this thing thatyou'd see on TV randomly at like you
know, late at night or whatever. And so I ember seeing that and

(58:20):
that's kind of what exposed me towhat. I didn't really know what foldy
was as a kid. And Ithink as soon as I saw that film,
I understood the concept of you makea movie and then you have to
replace certain sounds later, and youhave crafts people who go into a studio
and basically mimic the sound of footstepsand picking things up off a table and
closing doors and all that kind ofstuff. Whatever wasn't captured well on the
film set, you're replacing it alllater, but it has to be performed

(58:43):
by somebody to the picture in hisstudio. And that idea I didn't really
That was a new thing for meas a kid, and I always had
this interest in it, and myparents knew that, and when I was
sixteen, they surprised me. Andthis of course is way before the Internet.
Like I don't even know how theyfigured this out, but they they
somehow managed to figure out where Andyworked in Toronto, and they it was

(59:04):
a company that became Deluxe, butback then it was called Filmhouse Ye,
and it was downtown Toronto, andthey Andy worked there. That's where he
had his studio and they they've managedto figure that out. And they surprised
me from my sixteenth birthday that theywere going to take me to meet Andy.
And Andy was into it. AndI remember my dad drove me into
the city and dropped me off andhe said, well, if you're bored,
I'll come back and get you whatever. But I was dropped off at

(59:25):
like nine in the morning. Istayed there for the entire day and watched
them work and I ended up goingback several times and visiting with them and
watching various films that Andy was workingon. And it left like a huge
impression on me. And of courseI never went into that world, but
I always appreciated it and always hada love for it, even though it
ended up being not the thing Ipursued. And then years later I hadn't

(59:50):
you know that, probably like twentyfive years went by and I knew that
Andy was out there, but Ikind of lost touch with him. I
know, went off and did mything. And then I remember thinking like
oh, I wonder, I wonderwhat Any's up to these days. I
knew that he had moved out ofthe city, that he'd left that studio
in Toronto and he'd started his ownstudio north of the city, like an
hour outside of the city, ona farm property. I knew he'd done
that. I'd heard from the grapevine. So I tracked him down. I

(01:00:13):
looked online. I found his company, and I reached out and said,
hey, don't you remember me?I was that kid that came and visited
you. And he wrote back rightaway and said, of course I remember,
And you know, why do youcome out and like have a tour
and let's have lunch and all that. And that's when I had this idea
of like this story, like hisstory wasn't known, like it wasn't really
a known thing unless you were inthe industry. People knew, but outside

(01:00:35):
of that people didn't know. AndI thought, well, this is such
a great Canadian story, a Canadianinnovation story, because he's known internationally,
but just as an international film kindof story. So that's where the idea
came from. And I went andmet with them, and Goro was with
him, because Goro sort of hassort of been passed the torch in a
certain sense. And yeah, theidea began there. We spent the next

(01:00:57):
four years kind of making that filmFootsteps. Yeah. I mean, it
seems to me that whether it's lightingin camera or folly, it's all about,
you know, making this story seemreal to people, and you need
those things to work well together.And if one is totally and it's it's
not going to work right right.And if it's and when full and Andy
says this, you know, whenFoley is done, well, you shouldn't

(01:01:19):
even know that it's there. Andthat's the thing is that when people actually
see the process in the film thatwe made, is most people are who
don't know about it are surprised becausethey've never been aware of it. When
they watch a film. If whenit's done, well, you don't know
that it's happening. So when yousee the process, you're like, oh
wow, that's a lot of workthat goes into this. You don't realize
there's all these people that spend weekstoiling away in a dark room making all

(01:01:40):
this stuff sound real. Yeah.I mean, I tell you, I
teach a couple of college courses parttime, and like my my intro class,
they're always blown away by it andseeing it and trying to do it.
It's just and I'm like, no, this is a this is a
profession, and it's hard and timeconsuming and you need resources and talent and
creative and it's not taught. It'snot a thing you can take a course

(01:02:00):
for. Yeah, it's not anacnual. It's like you can only go
and like if you want to doit, you apprentice with someone and you
figure that out on your own.But there's no there's no like course to
be a fully artist. Yeah.Yeah, I did a six track analog
mix and film school and like therewas no guidance, right for guidance,
And I didn't know, we didn'tknow. I didn't go to film school,

(01:02:20):
Trevor. I figured it was awaste. You talked about stresses on
the set. Now let's talk aboutstresses out outside the set right now?
With the strike, what what areyou seeing? It's very difficult, I
mean I I and of course everyonejust came out of like you know,
COVID was only so long ago.We all read of work for six months

(01:02:43):
and now we're basically in another periodof like it's going to be another six
months period where we're out of work, only this time there's no government subsidies
to help you. There's not,you know, because it's not it's not
a government created lockdown, right,it's a it's a you know, union
lockdown. So certainly there's lots ofpeople that I know that are out of
work. Thankfully there is there isactually a fairly busy commercial industry in Toronto,

(01:03:05):
So a lot of the crew thatare out of work right now,
not all, but some are makingdo with like the commercial work. It's
not fully supplementing the work they wouldhave had in long format, but I
think it's Yeah, that's one ofthe things like when we were talking about
in our first episode with Dave Blast, the production designer for Start Checking.
You work with him on The Boys, I believe you know, he's like,
we're just sitting here. It's like, I'll take the first mayonnaise commercial

(01:03:27):
that pops up, and I thinka lot of people who you know,
who listen to to our show,like don't like that's going to blow their
mind. That Like there's all thesepeople who had these big credits, big
names, great work, and they'rejust sitting around and like maybe there's some
commercial work that pops up and that'sit. There is somebody, But there
is also like you know, massivecompetition now because everyone's out of work.
So there is that commercial pool ofpeople, right you know. I mean

(01:03:50):
there are there are commercial dps,and and especially in Toronto, there are
there are crews that specifically just docommercials. But in terms of the dps,
there are dps that mainly just dobut now all the other dps that
do everything else are also now available, so it's kind of the pick of
the litter for ad agencies and stuff. They can kind of get the superstars
of dps and directors and stuff becausethey're all they're all not working right now.

(01:04:14):
And do you you know, andI saw an interview with you,
I think from a while ago whereyou're talking about ad agencies and how you
have anyone can have all these credits. But if you don't have that food
commercial or the car commercial, areyou past that? Are they still that
picky up there that they're like,if you don't, if you haven't done
this exact thing that we want,it's the same. It's the same,
hasn't changed. I mean, putit this way, like I, you
know, because I've been out ofcommercials for so long. In the time

(01:04:35):
that I've had off, I'm like, well, you know, I could.
I could do some commercials here andthere and it doesn't really affect my
summer break. I can work afew days here and there and it keeps
me in that world a little bit. But because I haven't been in commercials
for that long, and also becauseof the strike and there's everyone else is
available, I haven't done any commercialwork. I like, there's been nothing.
I've had like one or two holds, but They've all not happened because

(01:04:55):
I've lost the job to other peoplethat have more like recent commercial credits.
So I my my long form atwork doesn't matter like I like, I
don't have recent My commercial reel isold now, it's dated by the standards
of which people want to see,so I don't I can't get commercial work
right now. So so what doyou hope to do next? You know,
the film this filmwork on is done? I mean, do you have

(01:05:16):
something that you want, like apassion project down the road you want to
do? Is there a show orfilm or type of series that that is
dream show for you? Tever hateswhen I asked these questions, he says,
their solf. Oh, no Ihave. I'm generally curious. I
haven't even I have an even worsesoftball question coming, So I can't.
I mean, I know, Ican't judge. Well, I mean,

(01:05:39):
I was supposed to go back.I mean, I enjoyed working on the
first season. I'm accused and Iand I had a good break of relationship
with with the showrunner there, andand I enjoyed this. It was an
anthology show, so every episode isa different story, different people, and
I enjoyed that it was very fresh, hard to make on the schedule that
they had it because it's basically likea network television show, which I've never
worked on before, so it's it'sa smaller budget, even tighter time schedule

(01:06:02):
than yes streaming show. But Istill enjoyed working on it, and I
wanted to go back to do thesecond season because I had such a great
I had such involvement with it,and in fact, like they they very
nicely offered me some co producer creditson that show because of my involvement,
and I thought, well, Iwant to continue to do that. So
I'm supposed to go back to thatshow, but of course, with the

(01:06:24):
strike happening, we don't really knowhow that affects the timing of it,
so that that is the next thingI'm intending to go back to. I
don't I don't have anything personally thatI'm working on right now because we've just
been so busy with our personal livesand like the stuff we're doing, the
focus has just been not film stuff. Would you would you consider ever just
going straight to producing full time downthe road or I don't. May I

(01:06:47):
mean, I don't, Maybe Imight. I mean I have produced some
of our own projects where I've justbeen the producer and I had no hand
in the dpeing of it. Imean, I like the idea of producing.
I've enjoyed producing the stuff that wehave done and or corporate using things,
so because to me, that's kindof like you get to set the
stage for telling the story and puttogether the teams and all that kind of
thing. So I do enjoy thatkind of work, and I think I've

(01:07:11):
discovered that I have a bit ofa knock for it, But as of
right now, I mean, it'sit's something I'm sort of slowly working on
as a side thing that maybe oneday it'll it'll become bigger. I mean,
who knows, all right, Trevor, I like, yeah, the
last word, You're welcome, Jeremy. I'm really sorry to do this to
you, but I've got to doit. Favorite cinematographer alive or did and

(01:07:31):
favorite or or or maybe and favoritecontemporary cinematographer. Okay, that is a
way more ridiculous question. Then,oh my god, I hate those questions.
A terrible question. Let me justthink for a second, because I
mean, there's so many o theobvious ones, but they all get set
all the time. And it's like, I mean, it's funny because I've
often contemporary cinematographers typically, I mean, I usually name the people that I

(01:07:58):
come up with because I look atthe work and I admire them, and
I they don't get shouted out veryoften, and I and we all came
from the same place. So forme, it's like, there's Boris Mazowski,
There's Brendan Stacey, There's Tiko PulaCaacus. Those are the people that
I came from. Adam Adam Marsdenis a good friend of mine and very
talented DP. Those are my currentcontemporary favorites because they're the people that we

(01:08:19):
all came from the same place,so I look at what they do.
It's different from my own work,but we came from the same place,
so I can relate to it morebecause we are of the same community,
but we all do different things.And I think, I really I have
a relationship with them, So forme, like there are others that I
don't know who I admire their work, but I don't know them, so
it's harder to kind of fully appreciatebecause you don't have a dialogue with them.

(01:08:42):
So I thought I would answer thethe I guess the current contemporary ones.
That's a great answer. You knowwhat. I'm not gonna let Trevor
end it. Let's end it withthis. If there is one thing that
you know now that you wish youknew when you started, what would it
be? God, that's terrible.I could end it on yours, Trevor.
Come on, that is such aterrible question. Well, what I
know what I wish I knew thenwhen I don't even know. He doesn't

(01:09:08):
even understand it because it's so stupid. Because I see a lot of students
starting out, they're like, whatdo I need to know. I'm like,
I'm just get lucky, do goodwork at Lucky. I mean,
I think it's funny because I thinkthe things that I know now that I
wish I knew then, I inretrospect, I already inherently knew those things.
I just didn't I wasn't aware thatthere was those were the keys to

(01:09:28):
success. But but now I lookback, it's like I already was doing
those things then, I just didn'tknow that those were the things that I
actually had to be doing to beto get where I wanted to go.
And that was like it's like,be like, don't give up on things,
you know, learn how to dealwith failure. That failure turns into
other opportunities because there's always going tobe failure in this business of not getting

(01:09:48):
the gig you wanted. And alsobe a good communicator and be kind and
respectful to people. That's like numberone. Like that that comes back to
you. You always you hear peoplesay, oh, like you're we've heard
you're really great to work with andyou're you're kind and collaborative and all that.
I mean, that is that's key. I mean, I that was
in my nature. I guess whenI started, and I wasn't really aware

(01:10:10):
that those are kind of like thekey things you should be doing. But
certainly that's the advice I would give. It's those you'd have. You have
to make sure you have a goodgrasp on those things, and you've got
to be a good people person andwant to you want to be open to
collaborating with people in people's ideas,and you know, like basically be humble
enough to know that you're not alwaysgoing to know the answer to something and

(01:10:30):
that that some solution might require talkingto your gaffer or your grip or whoever
and say like, hey, likeI don't know how should we do this
thing? Like I'm thinking of this, but what like do you have you
know, do you have a suggestion? Or I'll tell them my idea and
they might come back and be like, well, actually you should probably like
maybe you consider it this because they'vedone it maybe differently with another DP or
on a bigger thing that I haven'thad that experience with. So it's like
just the best idea wins really great. Thank you, A good way for

(01:10:55):
people to follow you. I guessprobably right now, my website's kind of
a bit outdated. It needs tobe change, but it's there. I
mean, they can go to mywebsite. It has all the basic stuff.
I like the casebody like I'm theForest for the expanse. I thought
that was interesting. Yeah, Imean there's good stuff there. It's just
it's just I haven't updated it ina while. But I would say Instagram,
like, I'm not on any othersocial media platform really, so Instagram
has my current doings on there andthey can always reach out through that.

(01:11:18):
Amazing. All right, Well,thank you so much for your time.
Yeah, thank you, Jeremy,and I hope you have the best career.
You seem like a really great guy. Oh, thank you. I
appreciate it, and thanks for havingme on. Okay, welcome back everyone,
Trevor. I love talking to Jeremy, which you think. Yeah,
great, great interview. I reallyliked him a lot, the kind of

(01:11:42):
guests would love to have back anddiscuss more. We barely we barely skim
the surface with that one. Andbefore we sign off from this episode,
Trevor, I got to tell yousomething. Something has been really bothering me.
So my TikTok feed is blowing upwith all these people having emotional reactions
to episode five of Ahsoka and Iwatched it with my kid. She liked
it. I won't spoil it ifyou haven't seen it, but basically I

(01:12:10):
didn't have that reaction, and thatkind of annoys me and made me think
of you, and it got memore annoyed. I've seen all the movies
millions of times. I've seen allthe Disney shows. Fine, I have
not watched that much of the CloneWars or Rebels cartoons. I've seen a
little bit to know a little bit. But people who've watched Rebels completely love

(01:12:30):
Ahsoka. And as someone coming into see this live action first season show,
I keep waiting for something more andit's not there for me, and
I think you may be right.I'll be real quick. I only watched
the first fifteen minutes of the firstepisode. I stopped. I called a
buddy of mine and I asked himwhat was happening. I don't understand what's

(01:12:53):
going on, and he's like,oh, dude, you need to watch
Rebels. And that's when I waslike, I'm out now, Why is
that? Why didn't you why don'tyou want a Richard experience? I just
don't have the time right now andthat you know, you have to make
decisions. And again, this isthe problem with world building storytelling is that
you know a lot of things arepredicated on you watching something previous to it,

(01:13:17):
and that's something previous to it canbe ten thirty sixty. Yep,
I don't know, and I don'tI don't want to make that kind of
commitment. I'm sorry. I yeah, I mean this. I appreciate that
this is changing, this is thenew way of storytelling, and I support
it, and it's just not forme. It doesn't sound like you supported,

(01:13:38):
Trevor. But I do, Ireally do. I do believe that
things change, and some things changethat I'm not used to and I maybe
don't like, but I do feelit's my responsibility to understand it and to
let let the masses. I mean, this is really let them Matt,
but like this is apparently what's popand they love it, and you know,

(01:14:02):
let them meet Cake is what you'resaying, let them meet Cake is
that you're just you know, whywhy fight over this stuff? Well,
here here's the thing, you know, I mean, we're exactly why fight
over it? Why have a podcastand fight over things? Trevor, Well,
it's you and I fighting. WhenI go onto message boards and I
just see fight like ten thousand strangersfighting over an episode of television, I'm

(01:14:24):
just I'm like, yeah, Itoo much. It's too much. I
will say. There is a showthat I think does it well. Is
that you know. Lower Decks Okay, Lower Decks for those who don't know,
is a sort of PG thirteen takeon an extension of the Star Trek
the Next Generation World. It's alittle raunchy cartoon. There's a ton of

(01:14:45):
inside jokes and references, but youdon't need to know them to enjoy the
show. I watch it with mykids. She doesn't know half the references.
It doesn't matter because the show isn'tthe whole story isn't predicated on you
watching seven seasons of Next Generation inDeep Space nine to understand what's happening or
what the relationships are with the characters. There's just little easter eggs that might

(01:15:09):
be there that enriches the experience,but it's not what the story's about.
Whereas I'm feeling like with a Soka, you really needed to have an emotional
connection to these cartoon characters to havethis look from one character to another,
who in the narrative of this nowfive episode show, you haven't gotten anything.
You've gotten one line of dialogue,you know, with these characters,

(01:15:30):
and that's it. So you know, I'm sure plenty of people feel the
exact opposite because it adds so muchand they love every second of it.
But it's a little too exclusive forme. Fair enough, so I will
give you your point on this elisode. I will take my point and gloat

(01:15:51):
about it because this is the onlytime you're going to give me anything.
It is the only time at theend of a very long hour, hour
and a half episod, so thatI will give you some credit. Trevor.
Thank you. I really appreciate it. I know how difficult that was
for you. I feel like thisshould be the holiday episode where everyone's happy
at the end. If you listenerscould just see us right now, both

(01:16:13):
of us are exhausted, ed ed, We're tired. Why you tired,
Trevor. I am tired because,uh, work has been very, very,
very hectic recently, and I screwedup yesterday big time. And I
pride myself on not screwing up.And I completely missed a deadline, not

(01:16:41):
by hours, not by a day, but by nearly two weeks. I
have no idea how. I don'tknow. It just s lit my mind
and I had to go and makethe Apology tour, and you know,
kind of bummed out about it.And then I went to a concert last
night that I had tickets four monthsago, and that just wiped me out.
So I'm exhausted for our listeners.The concert that Trevor's referring to is

(01:17:05):
the Taylor Swift Errors Tour. Heis a front rower. Following Taylor Swift
from state to state, is myunderstanding. I live that Swifty life.
What can I say? Well,on that note, I think it's time
to let everyone go, so Ido not go see Taylor Swift. Who'd

(01:17:26):
you see that? Yeah, it'sto some of you it might be.
I saw a band called baby Metal. It features threebies baby three beat metal
babies, three Japanese women who dancelike anime characters, and they sing songs

(01:17:53):
about food while one of the mosttalented death metal bands I've ever seen in
my life plays in the background,and I think it's I I love it.
It's my second time seeing them.They're great. Go on YouTube look
up baby Metal give me chocolate andyou'll see exactly what I'm talking about.

(01:18:15):
And they're fantastic and they're not someflash in the pan. They get people
like Tom Morello from Raised Against theMachine and Rob Halford from Judas Priest,
touring with them and working with them, coming on stage, and a lot
of people love them, and they'rea really I swear they're a really talented
group. Trevor, mm hmm.It is amazing and unbelievable to me that

(01:18:38):
you are not taken. So,ladies, if this sounds like a good
night out, were you a goodnight out with you? Trevor's available.
I'm not available. He comes highlyrecommended. I highly recommend him if you're
in it. If you're well,we'll talk about another time. Thanks everyone

(01:19:00):
for listening. Don't forget to sendus your comments and new questions. We'll
try to get to some fanmail oneof these days. At No Win Scenario
Podcast at gmail dot com. That'sNo Winscenario Podcast at gmail dot com.
You can go to our website,No Win Scenario Podcast dot com, and
you can subscribe to our podcast onall your favorite platforms, Apple Podcasts,

(01:19:23):
Spotify, iHeartRadio, and a dozenothers. Thanks so much, Trevor,
thank you, Don,

All Episodes

104 - The Expanse Cinematographer Jeremy Benning

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

24/7 News: The Latest

Dateline NBC

The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show

.css-15opob5{left:0;position:absolute;top:0.8rem;} All Episodes

.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}104 - The Expanse Cinematographer Jeremy Benning