On the latest Go Creative Show podcast, Mandy Walker ASC ACS talks to host Ben Consoli about the cinematography of Mulan.
Mandy is an outstanding cinematographer and has worked on movies such as Hidden Figures, The Mountain Between Us, Truth, and Australia. Mandy is also the DP for an untitled Elvis Presely project with director Baz Luhrmann.
Mandy breaks down Mulan’s epic battle scenes, gender roles in cinematography, the perfect camera, and lens combination for the film. Mandy also talks about how they utilized custom specialty lenses to create the look they were after.
If you want to just listen to the audio podcast you can above.
Topics Covered
- Having this version be different from the animated classic (02:18)
- Visual inspiration from Chinese culture and films (07:51)
- Filming the great battle avalanche scene (13:41)
- Filming Mulan differently as a man vs woman (22:28)
- Filming the locked-down tracking shots (26:51)
- Prep to film battle scenes (30:41)
- Crafting and testing custom lenses (31:39)
- Lighting in a quick but effective way (36:14)
- Benefits of using a base LUT (44:11)
- Challenge of lighting for moonlight (47:24)
- Returning to work during the pandemic (50:12)
