Interview with a Hollywood legend.
John J. Connor was a cinematographer and camera op on movies like Top Gun, ET, Indiana Jones and The Temple Of Doom, Short Circuit, Mission Impossible 3, and many many more.
“Tony Scott, the director, told me, ‘Hey Jonny, go up on the deck and get some shots'”
Quote -John Connor
…And thats where the opening scenes of Top Gun came from. Whoa…
I had this amazing opportunity because his grandson Cole is my production assistant. In addition to hearing many of his war stories from the film industry, I got to film the special connection between a grandfather and grandson. We spent the night at John’s home and filmed him in his own living room.
There were so many wonderful quotes from this experience, but one of my favorites was:
“I never thought I’d see a C-stand in my living room.”
This was entirely lit with just 2 unmodified Pavotubes and window light. While filming in his home office, we placed one pavotube behind the monitors on his desk and set it to splash teal colored light against the wall with his movie posters. Then we keyed from frame left with another Pavotube set to 4800K.
In the living room, we placed both Pavotubes on C stands. One behind for top/backlight and one frame right. Both at 4800K. I set the camera to 3800K to cool down the room ambient light and create color separation between skin tone and background.
We have about 4 hrs of interview material… There was no plan before we filmed these scenes so we don’t know where this project will go at this point, but we have some big ideas.
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