Week 40: Film Noir (Metropolis)

Back in high school, I was in one of the first Film as Literature classes offered. We watched some really great movies that I probably would never have been exposed to. Das Boot and October Sky come to mind. But I was most influenced by the classic silent film Metropolis. (Thanks, Mr. Fawcett!)

Filmed in 1927, Metropolis speaks of love and the division between classes. It is a very artistic movie, with great visuals and great design. It was made during a time of revolution in typography and design, and it shows. The style of the architecture, machinery and typography are all very art deco and very beautiful.

Anyways, while scrolling through Netflix, we came across Metropolis and decided to give it another watch. It’s still just as good as it was in my memory. Perhaps inspired by the very cool overlaid film effects, or the constantly wavering heavy vignetting, I was compelled enough to create a Metropolis-themed photo this week.

I started out by researching photos of Maria, the main female in the movie. She is portrayed as a warm, friendly figure, and always has soft light and a glow on her face. In the film, her character is kidnapped and her likeness used to skin the human robot. There are some really great dissolve scenes as she makes the transition from robot face to human face. Below, you’ll see the photos from which I drew my inspiration.

I set up my lights as best as I could to recreate that glowing light. One flash, high camera-left, shoot-thru umbrella. I made my own “flag” to keep the light off the backdrop as much as possible. Second flash, very low light, from the ceiling, softened, to light the top of my hair. Third flash, very low light, from directly behind me, softened, to create the rim light and separate me from the background. All three flashes fired with Pocket Wizards. The backdrop itself is my intentionally wrinkled fabric, which I hung to look like an old theater curtain.

Now.. hair and makeup! The hair style was actually a little tricky, but a pack of bobby pins seemed to do the trick. Makeup was very fun.. Realizing that makeup looks very different in a black and white or sepia image, it didn’t really matter what colors I used, as long as they were the right shades. I used a dark brown eyeliner, a dark brown eyeshadow on my eyelids, and a medium brown eyeshadow all the way to my eyebrows. My lips are much more full than the actress I was trying to portray, so I used my brown eyeliner and created smaller lips for myself.

Finally, it was time to put it all together. I made some adjustments to the image in Lightroom, then brought it in to Photoshop for the texturing, grain, vignetting and overlays.

thanks for looking!
dani

P.S. Here are my inspiration photos:

2 comments on “Week 40: Film Noir (Metropolis)”

  1. 22 Nov 2010 at 5:31 am Kyle
    reply

    Wow, as soon as the picture came up I was thinking “What? Metropolis?” Then I read the text and saw that it was. I think this is a really impressive shot, particularly to evoke memories of a movie I was like 3 years ago. Which is practically forever with my memory.

  2. 22 Nov 2010 at 4:47 pm dani photography
    reply

    Awesome, that’s really good to hear! Thanks for the feedback Kyle.


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