A number of the car shots involved real driving or a process trailer out on location. “We were old school in our approach to that,” remarks Crawley. “There was quite a lot of visual effects for clean-up and blood splatter work. We had one scene in the Wooden Spoon Diner early on when Willard Russell [Bill Skarsgård] meets Charlotte Russell [Haley Bennett] that was all greenscreen outside. We did the plates shots for that. That was our biggest greenscreen element.” A pivotal moment has Willard coming across a crucified fellow soldier on a World War II battlefield. “We found an area where they had chopped the trees down and burned the landscape; it was perfect for our scene on the Solomon Islands and was enhanced later with palm trees. The grade gave it a hotter and scorched feel to the landscape.”
Violence is an integral part of the storytelling. “Our approach was not to have pre-emptive camera positions for the violence, so you don’t suddenly cut to this low angle shot to sell the punches,” explains Crawley. “Antonio and I had this idea that the violence should have the same visual language, so it comes out of nowhere and feels real, visceral, and honest.” Key crew members were 1st AC Kali Riley, camera operators Sam Ellison and Erin Henning, 2nd AC Brock Byrd, film loader Will Whittenburg, camera PA Elizabeth Bailey, gaffer Jerad Molkenthin, best boy electric Oren Jones, rigging gaffer Sean Feehan, key grip Mike L. Germaine, best boy grip Earl Perque Jr. and second unit DP Zach Galler. Kodak made significant contributions in particular Michael Brown; Robert Wales, Tony Bifano, John Woodson, and Ben Cooper at Kodak Film Lab Atlanta; and Jeremiah Drueke, David ‘DC’ Cardinali and Ian Macdonald at Kodak Atlanta Post. “The biggest challenge was to hold that continuity of lighting throughout. I’m proud of the entire project.”
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