Stephen Nakamura Adds Soft Touch to Thriller Law Abiding Citizen
SANTA MONICA, Calif. – November 12, 2009 – Company 3 Colorist Stephen Nakamura fine-tuned the look of Overture Films’ action thriller Law Abiding Citizen, working closely with director F. Gary Gray and cinematographer Jonathan Sela to set the visuals for the feature starring Jamie Foxx and Gerard Butler. Nakamura, whom Gray refers to as a “master” in the field, worked on a DaVinci Resolve system to help realize the soft, muted look—unusual for this kind of tough thriller—that the filmmakers wanted.
Gray and Sela wanted to give the powerful and sometimes bloody film a subdued color palette as a counterpoint. “It’s really a very desaturated looking movie,” says Nakamura, adding that the color scheme tends to go a lot in the direction blues, greens and cyans. “We didn’t go with heavy blacks or saturated colors. There’s a nice elegance to it.”
To begin with, Sela shot Fujifilm’s soft-contrast Eterna 400T. Company 3 scanned the material using ARRISCAN technology to the form of 2K DPX files. Nakamura enhanced and evened out the soft, and cold blue/cyan look that Gray and Sela were going for.
“There are a lot of scenes in prison cells and judges chambers and offices that are meant to look like they’re lit by fluorescent fixtures,” Nakamura explains. “We went with that look and took it even a little further.
“The trick,” the colorist adds, “is to make sure the actors’ faces don’t go green or yellow when you’re affecting the room overall. So I would often build windows around faces to have more control over the individual parts of the frame.
In order to keep a consistent look, Visual Effects Supervisor Raymond Gieringer had Nakamura provide a pre-grade to all the visual plates, providing a visual reference for the various visual effects houses that would work on the film. Though this is not a step that every film with visual effects takes, it is something Nakamura feels is essential to creating a consistent look. “A film can go out to eight visual effects vendors and often there are ten people working on it at each location,” he explains. “That’s 80 different monitors on the same film. With a pre-grade, everybody has a reference for what the final film is supposed to look like.”
Law Abiding Citizen opened in the number one box office position and has grossed more than $63 million domestically to date.
About Company 3:
Company 3 revolutionized the post production industry a decade ago when it took the art and craft of color correction into a boutique environment. Today, focused on high-quality creative results, Company 3 is synonymous with many of today’s award-winning commercials, music videos and feature films. Currently, Company 3 is translating its finely tuned expertise in feature film DI (digital intermediate), color correction, and final finishing to commercials and advertising.
In addition to Stefan Sonnenfeld, Company 3’s incredible talent roster includes John Bonta, Sean Coleman, Siggy Ferstl, Billy Gabor, Dave Hussey, Tim Masick, Victor Mulholland, Stephen Nakamura, Mike Pethel, Tom Poole, Rob Sciarratta and Matt Turner. Recent commercial projects are campaigns for Apple, BMW, Heineken, Nike and Travelers Insurance. Recent feature film credits include GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra, Public Enemies, Star Trek, The Taking of Pelham One Two Three and Watchmen. Company 3 is an Ascent Media company.
