No Loss // No Gain Uses Cooke Mini S4/i Prime Lenses to Bring a Specific Look to All Second Unit Photography
Brie Clayton June 29, 2021
0 Comments
With a story of two different worlds, being able to highlight the differences visually enhances the story.
When writer/director Christian Rousseau envisioned the look of No Loss // No Gain (NLNG), he knew that the two worlds the film would portray would need to be photographed differently, but the idea of using completely different lenses from two different manufacturers was not part of the initial plan - until cinematographers John Sedlack and Kate Steinhebel had to switch which unit each would photograph.
Originally, Kate Steinhebel was slated to shoot the first unit, while John Sedlack would shoot second unit. That all changed when Steinhebel found herself with a scheduling conflict and switched duties with Sedlack. That would prove to be serendipitous for NLNG, and give Steinhebel the opportunity to pitch using Cooke Optics miniS4/i primes for everything she would shoot, as the story takes place within a small town bank (first unit) and the larger outside world with offices of corporations and government (second unit).
Some contents or functionalities here are not available due to your cookie preferences!
This happens because the functionality/content marked as Google Youtube uses cookies that you choosed to keep disabled. In order to view this content or use this functionality, please enable cookies: click here to open your cookie preferences.
The story of a mysterious modern-day Robin Hood giving the victims of a bank robbery a million-dollar opportunity takes place primarily in a bank - where a real bank was used in San Marcos, Texas during the weekends - in both the bank lobby and then a conference room throughout one day and night. While the second unit opens up the rest of the world to viewers.
The bank was a tight environment and we wanted that kind of look using our RED Epic Dragon (6K) as our A camera and our RED Scarlet (4K) as our B cameras for the main unit, said Sedlack. While our lens choice was to be the same for both primary and second unit photography, Kate had a great idea because she's a great DP.
I knew that the more sophisticated - and expensive - look that I could get out of Cooke miniS4/i primes teamed with an 8K RED Helium would really enhance the project and give Christian room to move around the frame, said Steinhebel. It was just a matter of a little convincing. The world I would be shooting is entirely different from the small bank and the tight confines of the conference room. I would be shooting bank executives, government officials a high-end hacker's office, plus mansion exteriors and in parks - that's an entirely different look and feel.
Steinhebel has her own set of Cooke miniS4/i primes, consisting of the 18, 25, 32, 50, 75 and 100mm (with swappable coated and uncoated front elements) and with her experience seeing what Cookes are capable of, knew that they would be perfect. I've always had a natural affinity for Cookes; looking at that bokeh or the falloff. I would be reading American Cinematographer magazine, and at end of articles it would say Cooke and the films that I thought were shot beautifully, I would go on shotonwhat.com and discover that they were shot with Cookes.
To convince Rousseau and Sedlack to use Cooke miniS4/i primes, Steinhebel
shot screen tests in LA while the first unit was filming in Texas. I had just bought the lenses and shot tests in 6K on the RED HELIUM and in 8K on a RED DRAGON. I sent Christian and John some stills, and then sent a second batch with colouring showing them what they could get from the Cooke lenses versus what they were using on the first unit.
The look of Cooke's really wowed us, said Sedlack. It doesn't take away from the story by shooting on two different lenses, it adds to it with the two different worlds. The Cooke's shot clean and opened everything up with no gritty feel like in the bank.
Deciding on Cooke primes for the second unit would give NLNG an entirely new look with a variety of looks from the different DPs that complement each other. Kate amplified what we were going for, said Sedlack. In fact, it enhanced everything. It really took me back a minute when we saw what she was proposing and why she was first pick for the first unit.
What sets the second unit story apart from the first unit's blue collar bank robbery story is that it deals with white collar crime. The Cooke lenses gave us a nice and softer appearance with great falloff. The main unit lenses were more reality driven, while we had a definite cinematic look, plus using the /i technology on-set for monitoring helped a lot, said Steinhebel.
Today, Steinhebel is working on getting the rest of the Cooke miniS4/i range - the 21, 40, 65 and 135mm, all with coated and uncoated front elements. Having a set of both coated and uncoated gives you more options with flare. It's another tool brush in your kit.
The Cookes really expanded our world out of the bank, which is like 12 Angry Men or Dog Day Afternoon, said Sedlack. It made NLNG our own. And 80 years down the line, I hope that someone is referencing the film for what we were able to accomplish.
Most recent headlines
06/10/2025
France T l visions, France's leading broadcaster, has received the 2025 EBU ...
04/09/2025
Monumental Sports & Entertainment (MSE), in collaboration with Dalet, has been a...
30/08/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has adopted its FY 2025 Regulatory Fees Order that establishes the regulatory fee rates for the broadcast stati...
29/08/2025
Australian Red Cross and SBS launch training to help workplaces in the fight aga...
29/08/2025
The National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF), an agency of the Department of Sp...
29/08/2025
L3Harris Technologies has concentrated decades of expertise across the entire enterprise to develop affordable and reliable best-of-breed solutions to rapidly c...
29/08/2025
BURBANK, Calif. The CW Network and the Pac-12 Conference have announced a new media rights deal that will extend their broadcast partnership beginning with the ...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK Gracenote has released a new analysis of its global video dataset showing that the number of FAST channels grew nearly 14% from Q1 2025 and 76% since 2...
29/08/2025
SAN JOSE, Calif. Harmonic has announced a series of improvements to its live sports streaming solution that the company said will improve fan engagement, protec...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK and LOS ANGELES Fox Corp. and YouTube TV last night announced a renewal of the full portfolio of Fox networks, including Fox News Channel, Fox Business...
29/08/2025
Budapest, Hungary, August 2025 - The integration of Microsoft Teams Rooms (MTR) with Lightware's Taurus universal matrix switchers delivers a new level of f...
29/08/2025
Frequency, the engine behind many of the world's best-known streaming television channels, today announced it will launch Studio Live, a next-generation uni...
29/08/2025
In an era when AI and cyber resilience are essential, Scality will mark the 10th anniversary of Scality Day on October 16, 2025 in Paris. This flagship global e...
29/08/2025
Disguise's In-House Creative and Technical Teams Pre-Visualised, Programmed and Delivered Content for the Experience, All Powered by EX 3+
Technology solu...
29/08/2025
Disguise will be demonstrating the latest workflows for TV, film and live events on a number of partner booths at the show
Disguise, the industry-leading tech...
29/08/2025
STOCKHOLM, Sweden Accedo will showcase Accedo Compose, its AI agent-powered modular orchestration layer that assists streaming providers in transitioning client...
29/08/2025
LOS ANGELES Cineverse has announced that it is working with Xperi to bring four of its streaming channels to automobiles for the first time as part of the DTS A...
29/08/2025
DALLAS & ATLANTA Gray Media has announced an agreement with the sports streaming service Victory+ to simulcast 17 Dallas Stars NHL games in 15 television market...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK AND CULVER CITY Comcast NBCUniversal and Amazon have announced new and extended distribution agreements that will expand the content available on their...
29/08/2025
FOOTHILL RANCH, Calif. RED Digital Cinema will feature its Cine-Broadcast Module supporting live broadcast workflows during IBC2025, Sept. 12-15, at the RAI Ams...
29/08/2025
29 Aug 2025
Kyivstar Rings Opening Bell at Nasdaq Marking Landmark Listing and ...
29/08/2025
More than half of all NFL games live on Sky for the first timeFriday 29 August 2025
Sky Sports has announced a new three-year deal with the NFL, extending its ...
29/08/2025
Back to All News
RIV4LRIES: The Trailer of the New Series With Samuele Carrino ...
29/08/2025
Get ready for an inspiring and emotional insight into the world of competitive Irish dancing with My Story: Tomi Champion of the World airing on RT 2 this monda...
29/08/2025
RT has today announced that David McCullagh is to be the new presenter of RT Radio 1's flagship Today programme, which airs every weekday at 10am, replaci...
28/08/2025
By Kristin Feeley, Director, Documentary Film & Artist Programs
If you want to tell untold stories, if you want to give voice to the voiceless, you've got ...
28/08/2025
Directed by Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert, Sundance Institute-supported Amer...
28/08/2025
Corridos have been a cornerstone of M sica Mexicana for generations, telling stories rooted in everyday life. Now, a new chapter is taking shape: motivational c...
28/08/2025
Los corridos han sido un pilar de la M sica Mexicana durante generaciones, contando historias enraizadas en la vida cotidiana. Ahora, un nuevo cap tulo est tom...
28/08/2025
Earlier this month, we promised our Verano Forever party would bring the heat, a...
28/08/2025
L3Harris will provide the Polish F-16V fleet with the Viper Shield electronic warfare system as part of an upgrade program....
28/08/2025
Bilbao, August 26, 2025 - AgileTV, an international television and video technol...
28/08/2025
Ken Wilkinson is an Emmy Awards nominated New York audio engineer who specialises in production sound mixing for film, commercial, episodic and documentary work...
28/08/2025
NEW YORK FuboTV today announced that it will launch Fubo Sports, a skinny bundle that focuses on sports with a subscription price of $56 monthly....
28/08/2025
NEVADA City, Calif. At IBC2025, Sept. 12-15 at the RAI Amsterdam, Telestream will debut its new Global Ingest strategy, introducing a next-generation ingest arc...
28/08/2025
Dr. Rhoda Bernard Releases Groundbreaking Debut Book on Accessible Arts Educatio...
28/08/2025
TAG Video Systems, the leader in software-based IP end-to-end workflow monitoring, deep probing, and real-time visualization, has named Oliver Gappa as Sales Di...
28/08/2025
AI-based voice enhancement will be among a series of innovations making their IBC 2025 debut on the DHD stand B46 in Hall 8 at the RAI Amsterdam Convention Cent...
28/08/2025
Telef nica Servicios Audiovisuales (TSA), the leading system integrator and service provider in the media sector in Spain, with the support of Appear, the globa...
28/08/2025
To fully immerse sailing fans in the world's biggest offshore yacht race, production company, Optical Media turned to LiveU's On-site Production solutio...
28/08/2025
Working with Calrec on its most recent overhaul, radio and television broadcaster, WNED has migrated to a fully IP infrastructure with multiple Type R consoles,...
28/08/2025
Cleeng, the Subscriber Retention Management (SRM ) inventor, has unveiled Cleeng Pro, the first-ever direct-to-consumer (D2C) subscription management platform t...
28/08/2025
Zixi, the industry leader in live broadcast-quality video over IP, today announced that French media distribution platform OKAST has selected Zixi to enable rel...
28/08/2025
Solution offers a streamlined, speaker-free architecture to optimize integration with premium external loudspeakers and advanced loudness metering
Nixer Pro Au...
28/08/2025
Cinegy, the premier provider of software-defined television technology, has announced a strategic partnership with Vision One Touch Film Production Services L.L...
28/08/2025
Telestream, a global leader in media workflow technologies, will debut its new Global Ingest strategy at IBC2025, introducing a next-generation ingest architect...
28/08/2025
Tier 1 operator selects Broadpeak to power high-performance, unified CDN solution across Norway, Sweden and Finland
Broadpeak, a leader in streaming and moneti...
28/08/2025
Leading video software provider, Synamedia, today announced that 24 Frames Digital, one of India's leading live event streaming service providers, has chose...
28/08/2025
Meet VisualOn at IBC2025: See What's Next in AI-Powered Video Streaming Join VisualOn at IBC2025 and discover how our AI-driven Optimizer and advanced media...
No Loss // No Gain Uses Cooke Mini S4/i Prime Lenses to Bring a Specific Look to All Second Unit Photography 
