Interview:Nate Goodman

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On January 8, 2008, Ryan Gibson Stewart conducted a phone interview with Heroes cinematographer Nate Goodman.

Ryan Stewart: I want to thank you for taking some time to talk about your role on Heroes. You're the director of photography, correct?

Nate Goodman: I'm one of the directors of photography. We have two and we alternate.

Who is the other director of photography?

This year it's Charlie Lieberman.

Could you tell everyone what the difference is between a director of photography and a cinematographer?

Nothing. [laughs] They're basically the same thing. I mean, sometimes we'll call ourselves cinematographers, other times we'll call ourselves directors of photography. For example, I'll be listed as the director of photography for Heroes in the credits, but I might refer to myself as a cinematographer. Basically, there are other people who call themselves cinematographers who might be camera operators or assistants. But in general, cinematographers and directors of photography are interchangeable.

So as one of the directors of photography, can you tell me what you do for Heroes? What does your job entail?

From a practical production point of view in terms of the overall look of the show, and the creative aspect of the show in terms of getting it to the screen, there are certain people on the set who are consistent on the set from episode to episode--primarily the directors of photography and the production designer. The directors of each of the episodes come and go; they're basically hired on an episode-by-episode basis. Television is primarily a writers' medium, so that the main creative force of the show would be Tim Kring. The other writer-producers would also be major creative forces of the show. Then the director-producers (of which there are two: Allan Arkush and Greg Beeman) are all working together from the macro-creative side to make sure that the show has an overall consistency.

With regard to actually executing that, that's where the director of photography would come in, to make sure that on a practice, day-by-day basis, the directors are directing the episodes maintaining the basic creative conceptions of the show. So from a more practical point of view, I do things like the lighting and help the directors block the action and shoot the action. But it's all bearing mind what the style of the show is and what we are basically trying to go for and what we look for. So with regard to what the directors of photography do, they're basically the on-set interfaces between the creators and creative producers of the show, and the directors of the show. So from an episode-by-episode basis, the show maintains an overall look.

So when a new director comes on board, your are the main person who helps him make sure that his episode has a similar look and feel from episode to episode?

Yes, exactly. I mean, Heroes is a little different from other television shows in the sense that there's no overarching specific dogmatic style to the show. The show has to look good, and there are certain things we do consistently with the show--low angles, push-ins, moving the camera, all of these kind of things. But with regard to the lighting and the design of the show, we can sort of treat the design of the different scenes as a feature in that regard, and just be able to interpret the scenes and the different stories that we're telling on a case-by-case basis. Bear in mind that there are certain minor kinds of things we will do on the show consistently.

So what I'll do is I'll work in prep usually (hopefully!) with the directors to analyze the script and go through location scouting--which there are a lot of locations on the show, as you know--and figure out strategies by which to shoot so we can actually prepare which equipment we need on the day. Also, we troubleshoot things in the script that might be complicated or overly complicated for production, based on what we can do in the schedule we're shooting for television. What I'll also do is help the directors, if necessary, with interfacing between them and Stargate, which is the company which does the visual effects. A lot of the directors who come on don't necessarily have the same amount of experience doing visual effects as they're going from television series to television series. Some of them have quite a bit of experience; others have none. So with that regard, I'll help guide them through the process so they don't actually have to get hung up on that sort of thing.

Okay, so tell me a little bit about shooting for visual effects, especially since Heroes uses visual effects to a greater extent than most television shows. What kind of challenges does shooting for effects present to you?

Basically, what I hope is that all of the effects of the show don't stand out as effects. It's very important to Tim to make sure that the show is a human show, and not a show that's about the special effects. When the effects happen, hopefully they're well-integrated into the story, to the point where you're really only concerned with what's happening with the characters. You're not just concerned with what's happening with the effect. With regard to that, we try to design effects so that the characters come first, and the effects somewhat take a background or real narrative role. In a certain way, what we're trying to do is have the effects be somewhat seamless with regard to the action, and really further what the action is and further what the emotion content of the story is.

Stargate is very interested in doing that as well. With regard to doing a particular effect, we'll all sit down and talk about what's required to do that effect, from both a production design aspect and from a photography aspect, in addition to what Stargate will talk about, which is what they can do for a certain budget and what they can't do for a certain budget, and how much time it will take. There are a lot of details that have to be gone into when talking about what the effects are going to be, since they they don't necessarily have to be gone into on a feature, for example, where they might have more time to actually do an effect. It'll go into picking the locations, it'll go into designing what the camera movements are going to be like, how many of them are there going to be, whether we're going to do it with a green screen or a blue screen to lay in backgrounds? Obviously for anybody who watches the show, they understand that oftentimes we'll have two characters in the same frame, coming and going, invisibility, the same characters in the same frame as another character, like with Hiro and Future Hiro. Basically, how we'll go about doing that will be determined by what we want it to look like, what we want to get out of it, how many of the shots do want want to have to actually sell the effect, and then what equipment is necessary in order to achieve it.

Were there any particular shots that were more challenging to you, or that you were perhaps more excited about?

Yeah. I think when we did the Hiro and Future Hiro in episode twenty last year, that was quite challenging. It was really the only time we used motion control. The effects world has become so sophisticated nowadays. Oftentimes we have shots that we used to have to do with motion control, which is a dolly and camera that is controlled by motors, and the computer can replicate exact movements.