“French Herald” by Wes Anderson: analysis of lighting schemes and techniques. | Articles | Photo, video, optics

Last Octo­ber, the pre­miere of The French Mes­sen­ger, the next cre­ation of Wes Ander­son, took place. The film is already up for sev­er­al Oscar nom­i­na­tions. We, how­ev­er, will ana­lyze it into its com­po­nents and see what col­or schemes the direc­tor used in it. And at the same time, what shots are worth peep­ing with a pen­cil in hand and take note for film­ing.

The French Her­ald is one of Ander­son­’s most intri­cate, ‘toy’ films, and is lit­er­al­ly a sto­ry­teller for the way he works with sto­ry­telling, col­or­ing and shots. In Vest­nik, he jug­gles clas­sic for­mats, black and white, ani­ma­tion, paint, and his trade­mark atten­tion to detail.

Color

Source: French Her­ald, still from the film

With­out exag­ger­a­tion, the main col­or leit­mo­tif of the Her­ald is the har­mo­ny of turquoise and yel­low. The pop­u­lar com­bi­na­tion has been used many times: look­ing close­ly, you could observe it in the paint­ings of dif­fer­ent direc­tors, in pho­tographs and in paint­ing. How­ev­er, Wes does­n’t just play with match­ing hues for a read­able visu­al, he uses the palette as a leit­mo­tif.

Source: French Her­ald, still from the film

In dif­fer­ent episodes of the film, the direc­tor resorts to more sat­u­rat­ed tones, where the blue appears neon-turquoise, then moves away to lighter, pas­tel, almost weight­less shades of this com­bi­na­tion. Col­or com­bi­na­tions are always built not only on col­ors that are com­pat­i­ble with each oth­er, but also on their shades. Art the­o­rist Johannes Itten wrote about this. Bright blue can­not be in har­mo­ny with fad­ed, pas­tel yel­low. And vice ver­sa.

Source: French Her­ald, still from the film

In moments, the col­or bal­ance goes into acidic shades. Giv­en the cir­cum­stances of the plot, it is worth mak­ing a hypoth­e­sis: this is how the direc­tor, mak­ing the col­ors more aggres­sive, but remain­ing with­in the cho­sen palette, empha­sizes the impor­tance, the strength of the moment. It is not dif­fi­cult to guess what exact­ly is shown in the frame, but we will not write spoil­ers.

Source: French Her­ald, still from the film

In oth­er frames, the com­bi­na­tion of blue and yel­low becomes exces­sive­ly con­trast­ing, and even played out due to the char­ac­ter’s cos­tume in the frame.

Source: French Her­ald, still from the film

Despite a sin­gle col­or line that con­nects the entire film, there are branch­es. So, Wes Ander­son makes a num­ber of episodes of the Her­ald in black and white. With soft con­trast and gray under­tones. It is dif­fi­cult to draw unam­bigu­ous con­clu­sions why the direc­tor used this visu­al tech­nique and switched the pic­ture. Per­haps the author had good rea­sons for this, or per­haps it was just a visu­al move for the sake of a visu­al move. One thing is for sure: in most of the black-and-white scenes of The Her­ald, the action flows smooth­ly. There is lit­tle expres­sion, dynam­ics and a cer­tain ‘vio­lence’ in it — the feel­ings and expe­ri­ences of the char­ac­ters are rather inside. They man­i­fest them­selves in looks, ges­tures, their speech. Per­haps by omit­ting all the col­ors, Wes want­ed to empha­size this?

Source: French Her­ald, still from the film

In addi­tion, in sev­er­al moments the direc­tor uses anoth­er sta­ble com­bi­na­tion — red + blue. Pay atten­tion to the glass, clear of paint, which casts a cold turquoise or red, which is present in one of the frames only in the for­mat of a bright bar sign.

Red is gen­er­al­ly the most vis­i­ble and ‘aggres­sive’ col­or. A col­or with which you can addi­tion­al­ly empha­size a bright emo­tion, action or char­ac­ter (if he has red clothes). So, in the first frame, red can empha­size the dynam­ics of what is hap­pen­ing in the plot, in the sec­ond frame — the expres­sion of feel­ings and the dynam­ics of the char­ac­ter-artist in his work. In the lat­ter case, a red sign can be regard­ed as a mark­er empha­siz­ing the impor­tance of the estab­lish­ment itself. No won­der, because this bar serves an entire edi­to­r­i­al office with rather whim­si­cal tastes for drinks (as the very first shots of the film indi­cate).

Source: French Her­ald, still from the film

For anoth­er scene, the author choos­es a rare com­bi­na­tion of pink and green. Take a clos­er look, it’s not just about the plants: the win­dow and walls in the fore­ground are slight­ly tint­ed in a light green hue.

Source: French Her­ald, still from the film

Personnel

We have already said that Wes Ander­son has a unique approach to work­ing with a pic­ture. You should def­i­nite­ly not expect clas­si­cal com­po­si­tion­al tech­niques from him. One of those that he uses in his films is the effect of pres­ence.

Source: French Her­ald, still from the film

The cam­era focus­es on the long shot, leav­ing the per­son (or part of the per­son, such as a hand) in the fore­ground just a lit­tle bit in the frame. This cre­ates a visu­al sen­sa­tion, as if the view­er is involved in what is hap­pen­ing. The shots with the cyclist and the char­ac­ters in the edi­to­r­i­al office deserve spe­cial atten­tion, where the gaze of the char­ac­ters is turned for­ward, as if at the view­er him­self.

Source: French Her­ald, still from the film

Source: French Her­ald, still from the film

tricks

One can admire and even dis­as­sem­ble the skill­ful approach of the mas­ter, but there is also some­thing to learn from the direc­tor. We have found and marked 12 inter­est­ing tricks from the French Her­ald that you can use for pho­tog­ra­phy.

Source: French Her­ald, still from the film

one.Play­ing with the envi­ron­ment. First of all, this applies to urban finds in the city, which can be organ­i­cal­ly fit into your frame, cre­at­ing an unusu­al pic­ture. The direc­tor does this with a cam­era win­dow and a grille, but giv­en the real­i­ty, lamp­posts (as if divid­ing the frame), fences that can give a beau­ti­ful defo­cus and oth­er geom­e­try of urban objects are quite suit­able. Do not be afraid of such struc­tures in the frame, because they can be cor­rect­ly entered togeth­er with the mod­el.

Source: French Her­ald, still from the film

2. Use the back­ground. This is the sec­ond les­son. Recep­tion is suit­able for street or por­trait shoot­ing. A frame with details or even indi­vid­ual scenes in the back­ground will look visu­al­ly stronger. When shoot­ing in a room where there is a win­dow, try to wait for move­ment out­side the win­dow: a pass­er-by, a cyclist. So, you will get not only a per­son in the fore­ground in front of this win­dow, but also some addi­tion­al plot that is not imme­di­ate­ly obvi­ous. This will make the image more cin­e­mat­ic and visu­al­ly enhance it.

Source: French Her­ald, still from the film

3. Per­spec­tive. The tech­nique is well known and often used by many authors. When pho­tograph­ing a per­son in a suit­able inte­ri­or, frame the frame sym­met­ri­cal­ly. Then the lines of per­spec­tive that go beyond the sub­ject will make the por­trait stronger and more dynam­ic.

Source: French Her­ald, still from the film

4. Details. This mae­stro is def­i­nite­ly worth learn­ing from. Look at the shots above and imag­ine both shots with­out the details that cre­ate asym­me­try. With­out a pho­to on the wall and a char­ac­ter in the back­ground. If you remove them, the pic­ture imme­di­ate­ly becomes flat and bor­ing. The main thing is to know when to stop and not to over­do it.

Source: French Her­ald, still from the film

5. Asym­met­ri­cal loca­tion of the char­ac­ter in the frame. Yes, every­one knows about the axes and points on which it is best to place a per­son. How­ev­er, some rules are there to be bro­ken. By posi­tion­ing the mod­el clos­er to the edge of the frame, you can enhance the frame by mak­ing it more dynam­ic. But it is impor­tant that the back­ground is worth tak­ing up most of the pho­to and in har­mo­ny with the fore­ground.

Source: French Her­ald, still from the film

6. Gold­en sec­tion. The point seems to con­tra­dict the pre­vi­ous one, but wait with the con­clu­sions. Rules should be learned first before break­ing them. Imag­ine each of the three frames above laid out on a thirds grid. If you draw a con­di­tion­al line, then the fore­ground walls and the con­tour of the three men will divide the frame exact­ly by one third / two thirds. This is the clas­sic well-known gold­en ratio or the rule of thirds. Of course, this law was not invent­ed by Wes Ander­son, but you should not doubt the pow­er of such a divi­sion of the frame and work with space. The gold­en ratio rule has been around for cen­turies.

Source: French Her­ald, still from the film

7. FROMwhen tak­ing a por­trait on a black back­ground, choose pre­dom­i­nant­ly light, plain clothes for the mod­el. This tech­nique will make a per­son even more con­trast­ing. And if you shoot in BW, then the por­trait will become as accent as pos­si­ble. Select­ed footage from the “Bul­letin” only con­firms this.

eight. Shoot­ing in cars, espe­cial­ly retro cars — it’s at least beau­ti­ful! And also not worn out by many loca­tions and an option for film­ing. It’s no secret that glass refracts light, scat­ter­ing it and mak­ing it a lit­tle soft­er. First of all, this applies to cloudy weath­er, or rain. With con­trast­ing direct light, you are unlike­ly to get this.

Source: French Her­ald, still from the film

9. Shot from the back can also be beau­ti­ful and reveal your hero. The main thing is to ade­quate­ly under­stand where it is appro­pri­ate.

Source: French Her­ald, still from the film

ten. Two love sto­ry ideas from a visu­al mae­stro. First — shoot a pair of angles from above head to head. Do not for­get about the details that reveal the image. Sec­ond — use a long shot in a beau­ti­ful loca­tion that is suit­able for lovers. With aes­thet­ic archi­tec­ture and details in the frame. So, they will har­mo­nious­ly fit into the land­scape, and the out­put will be almost a post­card.

Source: French Her­ald, still from the film

11. Shoul­der por­trait in the bath­room Wes has almost a frame from The Dream­ers. It will not be dif­fi­cult to repeat this at home. Get the details you want in the frame (and maybe even make a few can­dles the only light sources) and press the shut­ter but­ton.

Source: French Her­ald, still from the film

12. Of course, Wes Ander­son is not the first to come up with the idea of ​​doing close-up por­trait with half face. How­ev­er, it is still a strong and immor­tal move. Take note.