Sony Pixel Power calrec Sony

Cinematographer Rachel Morrison, ASC on the feature Seberg

06/09/2024

Cinema, the most voyeuristic of mediums, is uniquely placed to convey both the act of surveillance and the psychology of the surveilled. In Seberg, director Benedict Andrews and cinematographer Rachel Morrison, ASC draw upon the great conspiracy thrillers of the 1970s for an unconventional biopic that examines the disturbing, real-life experience of actress and activist Jean Seberg.

This narrative begged to be shot on celluloid, Morrison explains. It is the story of a Hollywood starlet and the dark undercurrent of government, and the invasion of privacy. I think there are lots of parallels between what happened to Jean and what is happening now which made this film both exciting and relevant.

In the late 1960s, having made her name as the star of A Bout De Souffle, Seberg (played by Kristen Stewart) moved to Los Angeles and became involved with the Black Panther movement bringing her to the attention of the FBI. Andrews' film weaves together facts and historical incidents into a kind of speculative fiction that explores her subjective experience.

Andrews drew on references from stills by photographers including Stephen Shore, William Eggleston and George Rodriguez, as well as inspiration from the political thrillers of the era like The Parallax View and Klute.

Choosing 35mm inherently calls back to those films, Morrison says.

The film's relatively low budget worked in their favor. When every other film is digital and pushing resolution, the use of analogue stands out, the DP espouses. The feel of it binds you emotionally to the story, plus its appearance is inherently of a certain time period, so I felt it could be an asset especially when we don't have the budget to populate the picture with cars and others detail that might otherwise be used to sell the period.

Morrison chose the Panavision Millennium XL2, a decision reverse engineered from her first choice of C Series anamorphic lenses.

I fell in love with Panavision's C Series on Mudbound (for which Morrison was Oscar nominated). I love their organic nature, the quality of the fall off, the fact that no two lenses are the same, and that some of the focal lengths flare warm. I have tested every other anamorphic lens and can't find any I like as much, especially for a period film.

Part of the reason I love film in general and anamorphic in particular are the inherent imperfections, Morrison continues. Life is imperfect and unpredictable. So, the lenses came first, and since we were going to shoot a lot of this film handheld, the XL2 was the right choice because it is ergonomic and light.

For Seberg, Morrison explains she liked the erratic nature to the light as captured though the lens, especially the flaring on the corner of the lens which questions the sanity of her perspective.

She adds, The softness around the edges helps to focus the viewer's eye on the subject in moments when she senses she is being spied on. The fact that we were using older glass with tiny nicks on the back or front elements only added to the irregularities and the overall aesthetic.

With the C Series in high demand, she and first AC Simon England worked with Panavision to pull together a set of lenses, including some PVZ and SP Primes, which were customized under the supervision of Panavision's lens guru Dan Sasaki to match the C Series.

We are a C Series film, so the customization of glass was just to blend in, rather than look entirely different, Morrison notes. All the glass performed incredibly well.

Morrison also took a set of spherical lenses, mainly as a safety net for night sequences. For some sequences we were exposing 500 ASA or 320 ASA and lighting by streetlight. It's not the kind of movie that could afford to change out every single LED streetlight and replace with old cobra heads, so I switched to spherical at these points. I'd mixed both spherical and anamorphic on Mudbound and felt comfortable with combining formats seamlessly.

The main Los Angeles action, with production design by Jahmin Assa, is depicted as an idyll of sparkling light. Morrison's camera plays with the glass of Seberg's stylish Coldwater Canyon home, and the aquamarine water of its swimming pool.

The first half of the film is very aspirational, she says. It's the look of old Hollywood beautiful and magical. We leaned into saturated colors and sun-kissed highlights. It's vibrant and warm. As the narrative twists and Jean becomes trapped in her own reality, she starts to question the world around her and the colors start to drain away. We're not making a sharp transition to black and white; the tonal shift is made in subtle ways to more muted palettes. The light, which was once soft and aspirational, becomes harsh and mysterious.

Morrison's look design and lens choice also spoke to the contrast between subjective and objective reality and what it's like to experience the world versus observe someone else's experience.

I chose close and wide shots and opted for longer takes when we were in sync with Jean's perspective as opposed to longer lenses and more fragmented coverage when Jack [an FBI agent played by Jack O'Connell] is watching her. It helps blur the lines between reality and perception.

Both points-of-view can be seen on the screen in Seberg currently in theaters. Cinema, the most voyeuristic of mediums, is uniquely placed to convey both the act of surveillance and the psychology of the surveilled. In Seberg, director Benedict Andrews and cinematographer Rachel Morrison, ASC draw upon the great conspiracy thrillers of the 1970s for an unconventional biopic that examines the disturbing, real-life experience of actress and activist Jean Seberg.
LINK: https://www.panavision.com/highlights/highlights-detail/visualizing-tw...
See more stories from panavision

Most recent headlines

21/11/2025

FCC Votes to Clear at Least 100MHz of Upper C-Band Spectrum

WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission by a 3-0 vote adopted a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) to advance Congress's mandate to clear a minim...

21/11/2025

Spectrum Expands 4K Content to Apple TV 4K and Roku Devices

STAMFORD, Conn. Charter's Spectrum has expanded the devices that can offer 4K content on the Spectrum TV app to compatible Apple TV 4K and Roku devices....

21/11/2025

Study: Salaries in Content, Connectivity Industries Continue To Grow

NAPERVILLE, Ill. Media industry employers are continuing their multiyear trend of increasing salaries for all worker segments but lag general industry raises, s...

21/11/2025

NAB Opens Nominations for 2026 Technology Awards

WASHINGTON The National Association of Broadcasters said it is accepting nominations for the 2026 NAB Technology Awards, honors that recognize excellence in bro...

21/11/2025

AAT Introduces Automated RF Line Analysis

American Amplifier Technologies has released a vector network analysis module....

21/11/2025

The Best Movie Musicals on Every Streaming Platform

The Best Movie Musicals on Every Streaming Platform From Wicked to The Sound of Music, heres where to stream all the classic movie musicals and recent hits on...

20/11/2025

MLB Media-Rights Shakeup: NBC's New Three-Year Deal Covers Sunday Night Baseball,' Peacock-Exclusive Games, and More

MLB Media-Rights Shakeup: NBC's New Three-Year Deal Covers Sunday Night Bas...

20/11/2025

MLB Media-Rights Shakeup: New Deal Will Bring 30 National Games to ESPN's Linear Platform, MLB.TV Exclusively to ESPN App

MLB Media-Rights Shakeup: New Deal Will Bring 30 National Games to ESPN's Li...

20/11/2025

MLB Media-Rights Shakeup: Netflix Lands Opening Night, Home Run Derby, Field of Dreams

MLB Media-Rights Shakeup: Netflix Lands Opening Night, Home Run Derby, Field of ...

20/11/2025

MLB Media-Rights Shakeup Overview: ESPN, NBCU, Netflix Ink Three-Year Deals

MLB Media-Rights Shakeup Overview: ESPN, NBCU, Netflix Ink Three-Year DealsESPN gets new 30-game package, MLB.TV; NBC extends Sunday nights; Netflix adds tentpo...

20/11/2025

SVG Students To Watch: Henry Thuss, Indiana University

SVG Students To Watch: Henry Thuss, Indiana UniversityThe Southern California product has his goals set on the front benchBy Brandon Costa, Director of Digital ...

20/11/2025

Done+Dusted's Guy Carrington on Creating the Spectacular League of Legends World Championship Opening Ceremony

Done+Dusted's Guy Carrington on Creating the Spectacular League of Legends W...

20/11/2025

FIA Extreme H World Cup Host Broadcaster Aurora Goes Inside the Production of the Hydrogen-Fuelled Motorsport

FIA Extreme H World Cup Host Broadcaster Aurora Goes Inside the Production of th...

20/11/2025

Platinum White Paper: Amagi Utilizes Cloud Production for Sports Events - Multi-Camera Live Workflow with Remote Commentary and Graphics

Platinum White Paper: Amagi Utilizes Cloud Production for Sports Events - Multi-...

20/11/2025

2025 Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame: Marc Herklotz, Steady Hand Behind the Scenes

2025 Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame: Marc Herklotz, Steady Hand Behind the Sce...

20/11/2025

NFL Deep Dive: How 32 Cameras at Each Stadium Drive Virtual Measurement, Boundary Replays, and Skeletal Tracking

NFL Deep Dive: How 32 Cameras at Each Stadium Drive Virtual Measurement, Boundar...

20/11/2025

Zodiac Killer Project Refuses to Kill Its Darlings With an Avant-Garde Essay Film

Charlie Shackleton attends the 2025 Sundance Film Festival premiere of Zodiac K...

20/11/2025

5 Ways to Get More out of Your Playlists on Spotify

Your playlists are personal. They're the soundtracks to your road trips, your quiet mornings, and your biggest celebrations; collections of memories and dis...

20/11/2025

Spotify, Trk mziinin efsanelerine sayg duruu niteliindeki ICON Trkiye'yi duyurdu

Spotify, uzun s redir zerine al t T rk m zik k lt r n n ikon haline gelmi ...

20/11/2025

Spotify and The Hollywood Reporter' Partner on the First-Ever Podcaster Roundtable

For the first time, Spotify has teamed up with The Hollywood Reporter to cohost ...

20/11/2025

Spotify and the ARIA Awards Mark a New Era for Australian Music

This year's ARIA Awards marked a turning point for Australian music, and Spotify was right at the heart of it. For the first time in the awards' nearly ...

20/11/2025

Cracking the Code for Resilient, Secure Space-based Communications

L3Harris has achieved NSA Cybersecurity Directorate certification for its KSV-650 space hub end cryptographic unit, ensuring secure, adaptable communications fo...

20/11/2025

Continued Commitment and Investment in Poland

L3Harris is strengthening its long-term partnership with Poland through the opening of a new facility in Warsaw to serve as a central business hub for regional ...

20/11/2025

Cinegy wins the Swedish Hockey League

15 March 2012 SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email Cinegy and Vericom are pleased to announce the recent deployment of Cinegy Archive for production and as...

20/11/2025

2012

6 September 2012 SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email FIC Turkey supplies media content to Pay TV under Fox TV Channel brands in Turkey. At the start of s...

20/11/2025

VIVA Indonesia broadcasting the World Cup Brazil 2014 with Cinegy

25 June 2014 SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email Last month VIVA finalized its Cinegy installation in order to produce and broadcast the World Cup Brazil ...

20/11/2025

2014

1 October 2014 SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email With 5 locations spread out around Baden-W rttemberg, Schw bisch Media required a scalable end to end s...

20/11/2025

Strictly Come Dancing Goes with a Cinegy Workflow

27 April 2015 SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email Cinegy, which develops and produces media asset management products that are used in flagship production...

20/11/2025

Cinegy announces new Latin America partnership

12 August 2015 SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email Munich, Germany, 26 October 2015 - Cinegy, which develops and produces software technology for digital ...

20/11/2025

2015

5 November 2015 SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email Munich, Germany 3 November 2015 - Cinegy, which develops and produces software technology for digital ...

20/11/2025

Cinegy launches Cinegy Open' initiative

12 February 2016 SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email Munich, Germany 9 February 2016 - Cinegy, which develops and produces software technology for digital...

20/11/2025

2016

22 June 2016 SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email Munich, Germany 21 June 2016 - Cinegy today announced that ABS BROADCAST, one of the largest independentl...

20/11/2025

Cinegy News - nominee of NewBay Media Awards 2016

10 January 2017 SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email Find us on page 12 of the Program Guide 2016 Tags NewBay Media Awards , Program Guide 2016 , broadc...

20/11/2025

Freeview Thailand deploys Cinegy Air PRO Bundles for multi-channel playout

15 March 2017 SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email Munich, Germany 15 March 2017 - Cinegy today announced that Thailand's Next Step direct-to-home Free...

20/11/2025

2017

12 December 2017 SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email Munich, Germany 13 December 2017 - Cinegy today announced that it is making its Cinegy Air Cloud Pack...

20/11/2025

2018

25 June 2018 SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email Munich 25th June 2018 - Cinegy today announced that Canada-based Accessible Media Inc. (AMI) has implemen...

20/11/2025

2019

27 May 2019 SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email The best quality live video from the worst networks - Haivision Although DVB and the World Wide Web are...

20/11/2025

2020

24 November 2020 SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email ATV Expand and Increase their Playout and Editing Capabilities using Cinegy Software Munich, Germany...

20/11/2025

Cinegy further commits to Eastern European market with new appointment

1 September 2021 SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email Munich, Germany, 1st September 2021: Cinegy GmbH, the premier provider of software technology for di...

20/11/2025

2021

20 September 2021 SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email ElectronicVerve continues a strong history of supporting Cinegy customers in India Munich, Germany,...

20/11/2025

2022

1 November 2022 SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email Munich, Germany, 01 November 2022: Cinegy, a premier provider of software technology for digital video...

20/11/2025

Britt Broadcast implements Cinegy Air PRO at TBC (Tanzanian Broadcasting Corporation]

31 October 2023 SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email Britt Broadcast at TBC...

20/11/2025

Oklahoma Community Television Overcomes ATSC 3.0 Translator Challenge

CINCINNATI Oklahoma Community Television (OCT) has selected GatesAir and Triveni Digital as key technology partners in an ATSC 3.0 deployment that establishes a...

20/11/2025

FCC Launches Wide-Ranging Examination of Network Affiliate Relations

WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has opened a wide-ranging inquiry into the relations between broadcast networks and their affiliates that could...

20/11/2025

IAB: Creator Economy Ad Spend Now Dwarfs Ad Spend for Total Media Industry

NEW YORK Ad spend in the creator economy has more than doubled since 2021 from $13.9B to $29.5B in 2024 and that amount is projected to reach $37 billion in 202...

20/11/2025

Graduate Spotlight: Krysta Mirsik DePuy

Graduate Spotlight: Krysta Mirsik DePuy The educator from Hackettstown, New Jersey, shares how it took her 11 years to find the right graduate program for her...

20/11/2025

Rise Awards 2025 Celebrate the Industry's Best

LONDON The winners of the Rise Awards 2025, which recognize women and companies whose achievements have stood out in the media technology industry, have been an...

20/11/2025

Lionsgate, Debmar-Mercury Launch MovieSphere Gold Diginet

SANTA MONICA & NEW YORK Lionsgate's Worldwide Television Distribution Group and Debmar-Mercury have launched MovieSphere Gold in more than 30 million homes....

20/11/2025

Clear-Com Unveils New 4-Channel HelixNet Beltpack

ALAMEDA, Calif. Clear-Com has introduced its four-channel HelixNet beltpack, a next-generation advancement of its widely used two-channel model, and anticipates...