Food video February 24, 2022

Witnesses

The film about the war by Constantine Fama reminds us of the terrible events of the Second World War, when one state began to extol itself above others. It tried to impose on its own and foreign citizens the ideas of the greatness of itself over others, their special path and “traditional” values, replacing concepts with vile propaganda.

The entire anthology consists of three short stories, each of which has a separate film connected to the other two. In the latter, the DOP was Sasha Aleinikov. In the script, based on a story by Yossi Tavor, events unfold around one violin, which over time falls into different hands and situations. The film itself was nominated for an Oscar.

Task

To remind people of the horrors of the Second World War, which were carried out by some people over others. Such things should not even appear in people’s thoughts, so this film is a reminder of the mistakes that humanity sometimes makes more than once in a row.

Crew

Alex Aleinikov, Sasha Poddubsky
Equipment

ARRI, Astera, DJI, Zeiss

The film Witnesses consists of three short stories, one of which was filmed by our production operator Alexander Aleinikov. Do you want to make a movie like this? Write to us in telegram @yourproduction

Alexander Aleinikov filmed the short story Violin from the triptych film Witnesses. Do you want to make a film about war? Write to us in telegram @yourproduction

⬤ 01. Challenge

A film about war are never simple, because of the inner deal the author makes with himself.

A film about war is always something large-scale and grandiose. Now, and even before, it is simply impossible to film something military without a big budget. In Soviet times, huge amounts of money were allocated for these purposes, the army and police were involved. Now they are also trying to finance such work from the budget and involve the army for technical assistance. Without this, it is simply impossible to make a film about war; some scenes with heavy equipment with inexpensive graphics will look unrealistic. And good graphics can cost a lot of money, so it’s easier and cheaper to replace them with real technology.

When you make a feature film with a complex story about important historical events, you take on a huge responsibility. On the one hand, you shouldn’t deliberately distort history if your film is based on real events. On the other hand, you cannot deviate too much from historical events, even if you really want to.

The video production company used two camera units during the filming of the film, who simultaneously filmed some complex scenes with two cameras. A lot of filming was done at night with a large number of extras, and it was necessary to shoot the frame in a minimum number of takes.

⬤ 02. Production and post

The team needed to combine three different films about the war, shot at different times, during color grading.

A film about war always reflects the pain and sorrow of that era or modern times. No one could have thought that after so many years, an offended dictator who had gone crazy would be able to start it. Of course, creativity cannot and has no right to ignore this topic. In our case, a film about the 1945 war is a reminder that everything can happen again at any moment. To do this, you don’t even have to put stupid “we can repeat” stickers on your car windows. Karma will answer everyone, because cars with such stickers can also get hit by someone else’s drone.

Since the film consists of three short stories and each of them was filmed at a different time and by different people, they all look different. The goal of the cameraman and lighting crew was to create the closest possible bow with similar grain sizes.

The film combined events that took place during the war and in the current time. During editing, the director needed to maintain a balance between them so that the differences were small.

Moodboard

/ Color palette

Brown #3D1F0F	SCSS brown	◯
R 61 G 31 B 15

Chavez skin

Beige #66423b	SCSS beige	◯
R 102 G 66 B 59

Soft beige

Skinton #7E6F58	SCSS skin	◯
R 126 G 111 B 88

Dirty skin

Green #4D5D49	SCSS green	◯
R 77 G 93 B 73

Dull green

Color correction solved the problem of bringing three films to a close picture to each other, as well as recreating the effects of the film with its grain, spots and color. Cool tones predominate, green, aquamarine, as well as sepia and orange-brown.

The cinematographer managed to give the image realism, natural smoke added depth, and the softness and grain of post-processing eliminated the harsh and modern look of digital cameras.

⬤ 03. Equipment

To shoot any film about war with a budget, you need to choose the most reliable setup.

A war film is often shot on location, simply because it is impossible to do it in a studio. In some countries there are huge pavilions where you can try to recreate fights, but only local scenes. Remember the film 1917, which was shot (more edited) in one shot. Most of it was filmed outdoors. Of course, part of this setting was a designated territory, which was prepared in advance, buildings were completed, and so on. But a film about war should show its scale, and if you are thinking of making it, check out the Instagram of our production company YOPRST.