Film Courage: Greig, you started your career working on the documentary pins
with Garth Davis. When he calls, do you give him first priority?
Greig Fraser, Cinematographer: Okay of course. Garth is one of my oldest friends so whenever
Garth calls I know that what he's gonna be working on he's gonna be very interesting and something
that would interest me so I've worked with Garth probably longer than I've worked with anybody
else in the world and I've known Garth probably longer than anybody else other than my family
so so I understand the way he works I understand his his methodology so he and I are quite in tune
when it comes to things we like so chances are if he's interested in something the chances are
I'll probably like it growing up how obsessed were you with photography cinematography I started my
career as a photographer so I studied photography at in Melbourne for four three or four years and
then became a photographer I was never really a true professional photographer I was definitely
making money from it but I was never a I'd it never reached the point where I was kind
of doing it full-time professionally because I never actually got a feel for it that was the
problem photographers generally tend to work the business of photography generally is quite until
I and quite singular and so I didn't really enjoy that aspect of it I'm a more of a social
being and I like to actually work in groups and so that's where filmmaking I think has the best
of both worlds you get the the best of being a photographer could you make pictures all day every
day but then you get the best of the group group work the look of Lyon is incredible especially
the opening shots I mean it really brings you into this like super natural feel how are you setting
the tone in the beginning knowing that there's various layers to the film parts of the story the
one thing that's beautiful about Lyon it's it's a very spiritual film the boy who becomes a man and
his essence is a spiritual being that that it's constantly striving to get home and one of the
the points that garth raised when we first started speaking about this opening sequence was the story
that that's who told Garth which was often when he was a child he would astra travel well what
he thought was that he would as he was going to bed he would leave his body he would float
across Australia float across the sea and then go home his body like this is how every every every
night he kind of imagined this would happen and it wasn't until he discovered Google Maps which
became the physical incarnation of what he was trying to do that he actually then realized he
was on to something but but that opening sequence was effectively his spirit going home his starts
in Tasmania and it travels across Australia it goes across an ocean lands in India goes across
India train tracks goes across landscapes and then down into him so it's him getting home so
in some ways you didn't believe it's it's his spirit beginning the movie and it's a really
lovely way to start the movie by by his spirit beginning the film yeah it's absolutely beautiful
the Train scenes can you talk about some of the technical aspects how you live the scene well film
in trends is very tricky because classically that very narrow carriages to walk in they don't give
you any more walk way than you need as a passenger so to try and move up and down them is very hard
with a camera it's very hard particularly when you're slightly larger than your average Indian
moving trains are difficult because they they definitely throw the camera around a lot so
keeping a steady image is quite hard we used a used to a gimbal for a lot of the moving camera
work in India so we had an airy REM on the gimbal so we had a great gimbal operator Brett from from
Melbourne come and join us in India and he would basically just just run run with the boy and the
good thing about that game was I could operate as well so I could he could hold the camera in
the right spot or move it and then I could with the wheels I could pan and tilt and follow him
so it was the closest thing to having like a remote head but on legs rather than a dully or
rather than a crane or or a Russian mmm how many of the shots were handheld versus uh I
don't know the ratio probably half I'd say but they were definite times that we wanted to stop
the camera from being handheld so there are different times where his story slows so the
camera needs to slow his story of stops he takes rest he he's taking taking in the world around
him so we need to make sure that the cameras load at that at that point as well so that was a often
used stereo camera long lens or or dolly so you filmed in two countries I believe so Tasmania
which is what an island in Australia is is the southernmost island off the bottom of Australia
okay and then in India was it Calcutta or but we also filmed in Ken watt which is where he's from
so the story takes place in two cities in India and two cities in Melbourne that's Kendra and
Calcutta and Hobart and Melbourne so we filmed in India between Calcutta and in Canberra and
then we also filmed between Hobart in Melbourne so each day when you're reporting to set how early is
this that you're getting there and what's that like that's a good question it's a very done
depending on the day because obviously there were some days that we needed to go into night time and
there were certain limits that you can only work with the with sunny of course because he's like
he's a young boy and not to mention us old-timers having to get to bed early and stuff like that so
we needed to with that change on a daily basis depending on what we what we were shooting so
that first shot of the day or night but but it's the first one that you've set up how is that in
terms of the last shot do you think that there's more fluidity toward the end and you feel more
comfortable or is it actually are you sharper in the beginning no I think you if it's the first
part of a sequence it's always slower because what you're trying to do is trying to work out
what the sequence how the sequence needs to take shape so if that happens at the start of the day
or happens at the end of the day or towards the end of the day I think they're pretty pretty even
evenly paced it's pretty traditional though for for the bulk of the work to be done later because
I think there's just something kicks in when you're filmmakers and you go well we're gonna
get four hours to go we should really put the put the put on the gas so I think your your level of
the amount that you achieve is a lot higher in the afternoon okay oh in the latter part the
day with the Google Earth shots were those actual shots that you're filming from a computer screen
at times yep yep at times we I think there was some I think there was some computer-generated
shots at times but I think for the most part we were trying to film off a computer screen because
it's just we wanted to give it texture I wanted to make sure there was texture reflections like
we wanted it not to be a flat kind of like info doc oh that okay they looked at this and then he
looks at here they looks here it wasn't about that it's about the emotions so trying to link
that with him was really important trying to see reflections trying to see his face through
reflections trying to see the screen changed light on his face in his eyes and his tears like it was
some beautiful moments where we we had some great reflections in a tear I remember watching it like
a close-up in his eyes the tear down I went I saw the map I saw the map it is - yeah yeah that
was great - yeah seeing him with the laptop and but how is that in terms of the technical that
the lens picking up the screen because I know maybe in the olden days you would definitely
see like this sort of hours yeah I think that's because there are different monitors CRT monitors
that refresh I think LCDs or LED monitors don't refresh anymore I think I'm not that techie when
it comes to that but I know that traditionally laptop monitors I've rarely had a problem with
how was it in India filming when it seemed like there were people that were really from the town
these weren't actual extras and how were they in terms of seeing this machine this this thing that
maybe they don't see every day or maybe they do well I don't know people generally a very
inquisitive in India it's a vast generalization some people couldn't care that we were there
but some people were absolutely like intrigued by this thing that we had everybody knows that
that the process of filmmaking I mean it India makes more films I think than any other country
in the planet I think they're there they're the most prolific when it comes to filmmaking
so to believe that people don't really know what's going on it's kind of quite wrong because everyone
knows what's happening exactly the process of filmmaking I think that's were part of
the entertainment they were on the streets we were part of the entertainment if somebody was at the
train station there it may be at the train station waiting for a train for hours what else did they
have to do like we were part of the part of the sideshow so trying to make sure that we weren't
we were giving everybody the entertainment that they needed but weren't they weren't getting in
the way was part of the challenge for us Greg can we talk about the lighting kit and how it
varied from the Train versus outdoors we one of the one of the the challenging things on this
movie which is also one of the great things was that we were quite limited in resources we went
to India we we didn't want to carry around with us truck loads of equipment because in the end it
never it wouldn't actually have helped us to have hundreds of lights and the ability to like that
would have actually slowed us down so what I tried to do is we try to find locations that had a had
a base level of natural light that looks really nice we did carry some H of mines because we had
a couple of scenes where we had actually mice come through windows but for the most part we used we
used LEDs we had one Pelican case with three LED heads in it and we lit predominantly most of India
with three small LED heads so we even the outdoor scenes not just I mean the outdoor scenes at night
yes but the outdoor scenes during the day I mean it's rare my style of lighting would really bring
out lights for outdoors I mean there's it'd be very rare for me to do that so no I wouldn't pull
LEDs out for the the daytime I'd go with natural light and then control the natural and going back
to when your beginnings was the documentary pins one of your first projects or do you eat did you
do a lot of short films I noticed that on your credits that whole period is have quite a blur
because I remember pins is a long long project it wasn't just like a two-month project like
pins was I think we shot that over 15 months or more and it wasn't full-time it was sort of spits
fits and starts and a classic documentary style it was like alright there's an event going on
alright cool let's let's go and watch Warwick get married we would go on film him getting married in
his wedding and it would put three cameras on it and so there were times yeah I was also shooting
short films and music videos and and all sorts of other test shoots and all sorts of things so
that's a good thing about cinematography I find is that versus versus say directing where when
you direct something you direct something for a long period of time and you can't really get your
brain into something else very easily whereas cinematography you can flip between different
styles and documentary or a short film or and like right now I've just finished a film with
Garth and I'm about to do a commercial next week I mean fantastic how much funds that I could do
a completely different style next week than I did last week how is the relationship with the subject
whether it's a documentary subject or an actor and a narrative and the lens especially in an
intimate story like line but then there's a lot of also wide shots but how is that when you're trying
to let's say get a teardrop what is that like well as a cinematographer or as a cameraman you try to
run the risk of you run the risk of the camera impeding what's going on now in a documentary
definitely because you don't ever want to stop something from happening that should happen but
you also don't want to be the cause or something to happen so good documentary making is kind of
writing that fine line between but observing and not creating but at the same time where the line
is is a is a blur sometimes with filmmaking it's not dissimilar like I was watching we were at Q&A
last night and I was actually with dev in the green room and we're watching the scene where
he goes back and finds his mom in India and I hadn't seen dev for least yeah year and a half
actually and I was like dude remember that it was like yesterday but it felt so long ago it
was like yesterday like I remember exactly as he's walking I'm walking with him I'm walking
back with him oh I couldn't see his mum that was a big camera another camera but I couldn't see
him I wanted to get more into his eyes but I don't wanna block his his view of his mum so it's just
writing the fine line between being a passive observer but also giving the audience what they
need which is seen into his eyes seeing the scene seeing everything unfold so trying to try to make
trying to try to play that role is is quite quite hard but fun I mean it's fantastic I just shot
something with Garth and we were in Italy and I don't know I remember as a camera operator just
just being completely magnetized why these actors like the camera couldn't not be on them if it was
on my shoulder or on my hip it just just like it was like literally it was a homing beacon just
like Paul following them everywhere they went I know you're too young to have really worked
with film but in terms of a lot of film yeah or on film the digital okay so so they know what to say
so I can talk for hours okay working with film versus digital so many people feel that in some
sense digital so much easier to use but do you really feel that and and what is your preference
I don't have a preference I think that it's both are tools that are extraordinary relevant I think
people some people have been trying to put nail in the coffin of film for a long time and some people
have been trying to put the nail in the well when to the coffin of digital but people have
been trying to keep digital down I don't think it is fair because both have intrinsically their
own their own behavior and their own value yeah I can't go into exactly the value of each right now
because it's all very specific and very particular and if I talk to a director then I'll tell them my
experience of a film and how it made me feel well my experience at digital there are certain times I
shot digital that I've been a bit underwhelmed at the image quality or the the quality of the
inherent depth of the of the image but also I've been shot on film where I've been underwhelmed at
the at the quality coming back from the lab has been scratched or like there there's been issues
with both so it's about choosing the right format for the right project at the right time and so I
don't have a strong opinion about either it's about what's right for the job and I love the
fact that film still exists right now I love it it's because it's a done tool now I love the fact
that the Ariel X's existence I love the fact that red is making a new camera I love the fact that
air is making you I just love all these tools it's like a kid in a candy store lastly just wrapping
up you got into photography when you were younger who was one of your idols like a Richard Avedon
or David Moore Australian photographer it was incredibly incredibly inspirational bill Henson
I think he's an amazing bill Henson's a Australian photographer as well who if you get an opportunity
to look up his work I mean its controversial but it's stunning beautiful value in the shadows and
stuff nan goldin then golden is incredible is an amazing documentary photographer one aspires
to create images as natural and as as kind of immediate as chic as she can yeah Richard ever
done incredible does incredible logical network I mean there's a lot of amazing photographers out
there and I think I can can very safely say that I've taken or been inspired by a lot of them in a
lot of instances that's good thing about doing films too is that I can reference Bill Henson
for a film or I can reference evident for a film but that I'd have to be just an avid uninspired
film it could be the entire it could be just a scene or a shot or something something smaller.