News & Featurettes.
Long-form writing about the craft, recap essays from Salon events, and the occasional press piece on what the community is up to.
Newsletter No. 008: Stuart Dryburgh, ASC, NZCS: Lighting East of Eden by Oil Lamp and Candle
Stuart Dryburgh, ASC, NZCS read all seven of Zoe Kazan's scripts for East of Eden in an afternoon at the beach. He photographed episodes one through four for director Garth Davis, and Sam Chiplin photographed five, six and seven. He and Davis did not want a stylized period film. They chose the ARRI ALEXA 65 and DNA lenses, and took the crew to the high country of Central Otago, on New Zealand's South Island, for the Salinas Valley.
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Newsletter No. 007: Giorgio Scali, ASC: Light and Darkness in the Halls of Power on The Diplomat
Giorgio Scali, ASC had worked with Debora Cahn and Alex Graves on Homeland, and when The Diplomat moved to New York for its third season they called him. He is credited on four episodes of that season. Three are shared with Julian Court, who shot the England scenes, and Scali lit the New York work to match, with more fill than he would use by habit. The sixth episode, "Amagansett," is his alone. He asked Cahn if he could shoot it on K35 lenses, which the show had never used. "Do you think it'll look cool?" she asked, and then told him to do it.
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Newsletter No. 006: Xavier Dolléans, AFC: Building Baghdad in Cairo for High Value Target
Xavier Dolléans, AFC spent five to six months in Cairo photographing High Value Target: The Hunt for Saddam, the TNT limited series directed by Leslie Greif, with a local crew he met on arrival. He calls himself "a big anamorphic guy," but chose ARRI Signature Primes here. "We want almost the frame to be a window on the story," he tells host Jared Levy. Halation and grain came later, in the grade with colorist Karim El Katari.
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Newsletter No. 005: Doug Emmett: Lighting Emmy Rossum and Anya Taylor-Joy in Furious and Lucky
Doug Emmett made Lucky in Los Angeles through the spring of 2025, took three weeks off, and went straight to New York to prep Furious with Brian Kirk, who directed the first two episodes. He got the job after an interview at 4:45 in the morning from a trailer in the desert, where Kirk told him the deck he had built was the opposite of what he had in mind. Showrunner Liz Meriwether then had the department heads rehearse their studio pitch on group Zoom calls until it ran under a minute. The color rule came from the locations. The townhouse and the FBI office hold one color temperature, while the police station, the women's shelters and the street mix warm desk lamps, mismatched lampposts and flickering fluorescents. A green tube in a kitchen ceiling became a named color, Alice Green, and returned in episode six to turn the skin tones in a shower scene strange. After testing 20 lens sets, he remembered the fireworks behind Brad Pitt in Killing Them Softly and went to Panavision G series glass modified by Dan Sasaki. In a 60th-floor penthouse walled in glass, the question was "where do the lights go when you have mirrored walls everywhere?" Most went into the ceiling.
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Newsletter No. 004: One frame at a time.
Starting with this issue, newsletters will feature one frame from someone in the community, along with a few sentences from the person who shot it. Leon Forristal is first, with a frame from the short film “Not It”. If you want one featured, send us yours at cinematographysalon.com/frames.
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Newsletter No. 003: Everything we do is free
I started the Salon in 2015 as a way for a small group of peers to share info, tips and tricks about the craft. It occurred to me that between film school or early days on set, and progressing in your career to the point where you are joining unions and guilds, is a massive gap to traverse on your own.
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Newsletter No. 002: Three new episodes in three weeks, hope you're listening
The podcast is back, and there are three episodes up already.
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Newsletter No. 001: It's been a while.
Too long, honestly. But we've had a lot happening behind the scenes.
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Cinematography Salon Kicks Off Cinegear LA 2026
The night before Cinegear, the lot behind Freestyle Cinema Rentals in Silverlake filled the way it does every June, with the friends, cinematographers, and vendors who make this community what it is.
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Finding Community, Cultivating Resilience, and Embracing Creativity in Uncertain Times
Nov 7th, Los Angeles - a group of filmmakers gathered at Emmy-winning director Michael Barnett’s creative space Superfilms! for an evening that felt more like a heart-to-heart than a formal event. Titled “Cultivating Resilience in Life and Film,” the night wasn’t about showcasing accolades or networking in the usual sense. Instead, it was a chance to talk about the tough stuff: how to keep going in a freelance, unpredictable industry and what it means to stay grounded when everything feels uncertain.
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Recap: Austin Cinematography Group x Cinematography Salon SXSW Party
Last night was a blast! If you missed it, you definitely missed one of the biggest gatherings the Austin Cinematography Group (ACG) has seen so far. The party, hosted at High Noon, kicked off SXSW 2024 in style, bringing together an eclectic mix of DPs, directors, producers, reps, and a sprinkling of ASC cinematographers as well. Whether local or from out of town, everyone was there to geek out over filmmaking, share stories, and grab some drinks. What was supposed to be a quick meetup turned into a night where many stayed far longer than planned, simply because the energy and conversations were too good to leave.
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Recap: 2023 Cinematography Salon Holiday Party
As evening descended over Brooklyn on a crisp December day, a gathering of film industry professionals, sponsored by Fujifilm, Sony and Aputure, in collaboration with Brooklyn Lighting & Grip, Atlas Lens Co, TCS, New Life Cine and others, transformed a holiday party into a celebration of community.
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