Written and Photographed by Nicola De Prato

In such an uncertain moment in contemporary history almost without a real identity, we look out for something that past times have given us, something with a great “personality” like FILM

Artist

My name is Nicola De Prato and I'm an Italian Cinematographer based both in LA and Italy. Since I moved to LA about 2 and a half years ago I came across film photography and very curiously started experimenting with the medium. You can find my pictures on Instagram @nicoladeprato or my videos on Vimeo vimeo.com/nicoladeprato.

Gear and Film Stock

I shot the project with my Contax G2 and Cinestill 800T. I love that film stock: the grainy look, the halo effect, the tungsten-based stock and the ability to shoot in low-light situations led me to choose it for this particular project. Technically speaking I was very curious to see the dynamic range of the stock and how it handles a very contrasty situation, deep blacks, and very bright highlights. Dev+Scan was done by an incredibly small lab about 50km from Udine.

Method and Process

Coming from the digital world, at the beginning it wasn't that easy learning how to shoot film and managing different film stocks (especially how to properly expose film at night) and I think the learning curve improves with time! Interesting that right now, in such an uncertain moment in contemporary history almost without a real identity, we look out for something that past times have given us, something with a great “personality” like FILM.

I used two 650w Arri tungsten based lights to recreate the “God's ray” spreading into the darkness, an LED torch with a red gel and a couple of bouncers for the fill. A generator helped us to provide electricity and a smoke machine definitely gave that obscure look that I was looking for.

Project Thesis

The set I am presenting is taken from a very personal project called "Mysterious Things". Nicolò Di Ronco is the protagonist of these pictures and with him we had fun experimenting with lighting, creating a mystical scenario. Mysterious Things is inspired both by the TV Series “Stranger Things”, I love the locations and the look of it and “The Wraith”, a cult movie from the 80s.

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