The Mandalorian: Working In Volume
Cinematographer Greig Fraser On Working In Star Wars With New Tech
File Under: Fascinating.
Matt Grobar, of Deadline, caught up with Greig Fraser, cinematographer, to talk about working on The Mandalorian; with a focus on the fabulous new technology available to the crew headed by Jon Favreau.
Grobar wrote:
The game-changing technology Fraser cultivated, along with the teams at Lucasfilm and ILM, was The Volume, a massive LED soundstage projecting virtual environments behind the series’ actors, the lighting and geography of which could be altered on set within milliseconds. Offering The Mandalorian team complete creative control over their visuals, The Volume allowed them to travel to a galaxy far, far away without leaving Los Angeles County, also serving as a remarkable lighting tool.
You can see the tech in the first moments of the trailer to Disney Gallery: The Mandalorian:
As well as this video from ILMVFX:
Obi-Wan On The Mandalorian
And even NON-Mandalorian actors are gushing about the tech. Recently, SyFy.com reported Ewan McGregor’s thoughts on the technology used to film The Mandalorian:
If you’ve seen any of the behind-the-scenes on The Mandalorian series, they employ that incredible screen… I don’t even begin to know how it works, but it’s pretty amazing. So if you’re on set, and you’re in a snowscape or something, well, when you look around, you see that. It makes you feel like you’re in the place. I think it’s going to feel realer [sic] for us. I think we’ll be using some of that technology on our show — which is untitled as yet.” Ewan McGregor
Greig Fraser Talks Volume
In any case, fans of the Emmy-nominated The Mandalorian, are excited to see what Favreau, Fraser et al can do in Season 2.
“We did a little test volume about six months before we started shooting, and it was a proof of concept,” said Fraser when asked by Deadline about a “breakthrough” moment. “We’d all decided that we wanted to do this particular methodology, but we really needed to test it, because it’s not a cheap process to build an LED volume.
“Most of the pressure comes from myself, of course, because this is Star Wars. I place Star Wars on such a pedestal, like many of my peers do, given that we all grew up with these stories… We wanted to build worlds that were as good, if not better.
“It was like a meeting of the minds, and every single department came together, and it exceeded my expectations. From there, I got really pumped about what the possibilities were.”
And the proof is in the Emmy-nominations, no?
While we all await Season 2 of The Mandalorian, you must read the full Q & A.