
By Adrian Pennington
Who doesn't love an historical epic? says Polly Morgan, BSC, ASC. Especially one wrapped up in so much action and drama and heart and in an environment we know so little about.
Who doesn't love an historical epic indeed. Modern classics Gladiator and Braveheart laid the template for action drama where the audience roots for the heroic underdog against an imperial oppressor.
The Woman King does this and a whole lot more. It's a slice of our past that until recently would have been confined to the history books and, if retold by Hollywood at all, handed to the only gender it believed could handle action spectacle.
Instead, Sony Pictures' historical epic about female warriors living and warring in the west African kingdom of Dahomey in the early 19th century is directed by Gina Prince-Bythewood (The Old Guard) and filmed with her handpicked team of mostly female heads of departments.
Morgan was in Louisiana shooting the Netflix drama Where the Crawdads Sing when Prince-Bythewood invited her to join the team. She put together a pitch deck of color, light and camera references drawing on the Golden Age of Dutch and Flemish painters for inspiration. She used travel photography out of Africa to help convey atmospheric elements like smoke, flame and water and discussed the options with her director.
Shooting on Arri Alexa 65 we wanted to light the movie with firelight and ambient daylight, to draw people into the environment in a way that Braveheart and Gladiator did, she says. It had to be visceral and textural with a painterly quality, not sharp, glossy and digital. For me, looking at those masters of art evoked the kind of filmic feeling we were after.
On location in South Africa
They shot principally in and around Cape Town, supplemented by scenes in KwaZulu-Natal in the north of South Africa. This region is dry, especially in the summer, at odds with the tropical and lush climate of Western Africa. With production designer Akin McKenzie Morgan worked hard to ensure that both locales would be a fine substitute for Benin (formerly Dahomey).
In Cape Town this meant masking everything that said South African', making sure each frame leant into the fact that it wasn't dry or too dusty, that we gave it a tropical feel. Shooting exteriors are always a challenge in trying to match colors and control the light in a changing environment.
The remarkable vistas of KwaZulu-Natal helped contextualise the movie but put the production in a remote location that required taking all crew, generators and equipment. The film's opening night-time battle is shot here and showcases the athleticism of the actors who had intensively trained to perform many of the stunts themselves.
We conceived this action sequence in longer takes to be able to move from one performer to another, so the camera had to move 360 degrees, Morgan explains. As the camera does this dance with the action I had to do the same with lighting by dimming lights up and down with the movement so that nothing became flat or over lit. I had to make sure I had enough depth in the negative so I could see everything I needed to see in front of camera. It took a lot of rehearsal to get right.
Another challenge was to light the many night scenes for a period when there were no electric light sources. I wanted to make sure I really exposed the faces of our Black actors well. I don't want to over light or flat light them or take away the mood. I wanted to lean into the contrast, between the daylight and the fire or the moonlight and fire, and to do it in a way that retains darkness and shape.
Lighting for skin tonalities
With a majority Black cast, Morgan was conscious of making sure every actor was given due attention to the way they were lit. Historically some [filmmakers] haven't done the best job in lighting properly for dark skin, she says. In our movie you have super rich dark skin such as Sheila Atim ranging to lighter dark skin like Thuso Mbedu's. For me it was about figuring out how to capture these tonalities in a way that would highlight the beauty of Black skin.
She was intrigued to discover ongoing research on the issue being made by Cape Town based company Digital Melanin. From them she learned that photography has been technologically biased toward Caucasian skins.
From a light meter to a camera sensor every exposure tool is based on 18% middle grey, she explains. This harks back to a decades' old photographic tool used by American masters like Ansel Adams for exposing landscape prints. Eighteen per cent grey is matched with lighter skin tones so when you are exposing everything is related to Caucasian skin. The aim of Digital Melanin is to help cinematographers everywhere to light dark skin with accurate tonality. It's not one size fits all.
Ideally, this approach encompasses a production-wide embrace of wanting to see people correctly on screen. Make-up artists, for example, have a role to play in learning about the best application for different skin tones. Other notable cinematographers like Tommy Maddox-Upshaw, ASC are making vocal and visual statements about this approach to tonality.
It is important for everybody to have this conversation and not be shy of shooting Black skin or nervous about broaching this topic, Morgan urges. Filmmaking is blossoming in its diversity and that adds to the richness of the stories we are telling.
Diversity and richness
The Woman King also makes a powerful statement about the role of women behind the camera. For Morgan, who began her career over twenty years ago, it's a sign of significant change but also of progress yet to come.
When I started out, I desperately wanted to be a DOP and there were very few women I could see who represented that career choice and showed me that tha
More from Hollywood Post Alliance
30/04/2025
By Joyce JC Cataldo
The media and entertainment industry is evolving faster than ever. Technology is shifting the way we create, distribute, and experience c...
29/04/2025
Today's tentpole VFX pipelines are labor-intensive, time-consuming and expensive, while AI promises to produce the same but much cheaper and quicker with a ...
27/03/2025
The California Production Coalition (CPC) is bringing together businesses and organizations from across the entertainment industry to protect and strengthen fil...
27/03/2025
Creating not just a whole new fantasy adventure world but one fantasy adventure world per episode was the herculean task set by Taika Waititi, Iain Morris and J...
28/02/2025
The 30th anniversary of the HPA Tech Retreat may have just concluded, but the co...
28/02/2025
Since its inception by the Women in Post committee in 2016, the YEP program has spotlighted rising talent in media and entertainment. Each year, a select group ...
03/02/2025
As it heads to its estimable 30th anniversary, the HPA Tech Retreat continues to add one-of-a-kind programming to its schedule. The HPA Tech Retreat committee h...
28/01/2025
The countdown to the 30th anniversary of the HPA Tech Retreat is on. In just a few weeks, from February 16-20, 2025, the media and entertainment industry's ...
28/01/2025
As we go to press on this newsletter, two weeks have passed since Los Angeles experienced one of the worst natural disasters in its history-impacting lives an...
07/01/2025
The HPA Tech Retreat Supersession committee has announced that the highly antici...
20/12/2024
HPA Award Committee co-founder Carolyn Giardina was in New Zealand recently and had the opportunity present the Outstanding Visual Effects - Live Action Feature...
20/12/2024
On its 30th anniversary this year, one constant of the HPA Tech Retreat is its unique and consistently engaging programming that goes hand in hand with unparall...
20/12/2024
Seth Hallen had been on the board for seven years before being named president i...
18/12/2024
The Hollywood Professional Association (HPA) has released additional programming details for the highly anticipated 2025 HPA Tech Retreat in Rancho Mirage, Cali...
05/12/2024
The highly-anticipated 2025 Hollywood Professional Association (HPA) Tech Retrea...
21/11/2024
The HPA Awards exist to honor and recognize the accomplishments of the talented HPA community and to support their efforts with increased awareness and celebrat...
21/11/2024
Joyce JC Cataldo joined the HPA team as a full-time member in 2020, following a successful collaborative stint at SMPTE - HPA that began in 2017. From the ou...
20/11/2024
The Hollywood Professional Association (HPA) has announced that Joyce JC Catal...
07/11/2024
The HPA Awards honored trailblazing talent in the post production industry, celebrating standout achievements in color grading, sound, editing, restoration, and...
29/10/2024
In an industry that thrives on creativity, technology, and collaboration, emergi...
29/10/2024
Byline: E.L. Hall
It's that time of year and Rotten Tomatoes has just posted its 10 Scariest Horror Films list. Have any favorites or notice any omissions?...
29/10/2024
Recognizing outstanding editing in film and television,
the 75th Annual ACE Edd...
03/10/2024
The HPA Awards Committee today announced the nominees for the Creative Categorie...
26/09/2024
The Hollywood Professional Association (HPA) has announced that Kari Grubin will take over as president on January 1, 2025. Grubin will be the first woman to le...
26/09/2024
IBC (International Broadcasting Convention) is one of the world's leading events for the media, entertainment, and technology sectors, bringing together pro...
25/09/2024
The Hollywood Professional Association (HPA) Board of Directors has announced th...
29/08/2024
As previously announced, FotoKem is set to receive the prestigious Charles S. Swartz Award from the Hollywood Professional Association (HPA) this year at the an...
29/08/2024
By Adrian Pennington
During the spectacular Opening Ceremony of the 2024 Olympics in Paris, before the performances of Celine Dion and after Lady Gaga, ten sup...
29/08/2024
Perifery , a division of DataCore, has today announced the launch of its comprehensive workflow solution that seamlessly integrates storage, asset management, a...
22/08/2024
The Hollywood Professional Association (HPA) Awards committee has announced this year's recipients of the coveted HPA Award for Engineering Excellence. The ...
01/08/2024
The Hollywood Professional Association (HPA) Awards Committee has announced that FotoKem will receive HPA's prized Charles S. Swartz Award at the 19th HPA A...
30/07/2024
The traditional approach to filming chimpanzees in the rainforest is to use a relatively large camera and a very long lens, but Oscar-winning director James Ree...
29/07/2024
By Adrian Pennington
The potency of AI has swept our industry into a riptide of uncertainty. Instead of letting inevitable change wash over us, we have the cha...
27/06/2024
By Alyssa Heater
Sarah McGrail is a powerhouse in visual effects, with over twe...
03/06/2024
The Hollywood Professional Association (HPA) and the HPA Awards Committee are excited to announce that submissions for the 2024 HPA Awards are now open. Entries...
23/05/2024
As the 2023 HPA Awards were taking shape last year, in the aftermath of the pand...
23/05/2024
By HPA Staff
The call for submissions for the HPA Engineering Excellence Awards is already open, and closes soon on June 14; but the submission period for crea...
23/05/2024
By Christine Purse
One of the most compelling discussions at the 2024 HPA Tech Retreat happened off stage with no audience present. After hours, while the room...
01/05/2024
QTAKE, the leading video assist and on-set collaboration software trusted by professional filmmakers worldwide, launched a new cutting-edge feature at NAB 2024....
01/05/2024
In HPA's ongoing focus on providing input and insight from city and county g...
01/05/2024
HPA Newsline had the opportunity to speak with Caleb and Shelby Ward, founders of Curious Refuge. Caleb and Shelby were participants in the 2024 HPA Tech Retrea...
23/04/2024
Submissions for the 2024 HPA Engineering Excellence Awards are now being accepted. This renowned accolade recognizes and celebrates innovation and outstanding t...
29/03/2024
QTAKE, the leading video assist software trusted by professional filmmakers worldwide, is proud to announce the release of its latest software update, introduci...
29/03/2024
By: Alyssa Heater
The 2024 HPA Tech Retreat, now in its 29th year, showcased a program chock full of presentations, panels, and roundtables spanning a wealth o...
29/03/2024
Launched in 2006, the HPA Awards were designed to honor the creative and technical genius that power our industry. At that time, the behind-the-scenes talent th...
05/03/2024
SMPTE , the home of media professionals, technologists, and engineers, has joined forces with the Interoperable Master Format (IMF) User Group (UG), a worldwide...
29/02/2024
Colorfront (colorfront.com), the multi-award-winning pioneer in high-performance...
29/02/2024
The industry is at breaking point in the midst of seismic change but it can survive if stakeholders act collectively starting now, urged Jeff Rosica, Presiden...
29/02/2024
This year, I believe we are starting a new chapter, actually an entirely new pla...