En
Fr
Two Pictures a Day in Peru - 1
First Week : July 29 - August 5, 2024
Gilles Porte, AFC, is currently shooting Lady Nazca in Peru, a film directed by Damien Dorsaz. As he did previously in 2014 with Mai Nasri’s 3000 Night and in 2015 with Safe Nebbou’s Dans les forêts de Sibérie, Gilles once again offers us two images a day, photos that he has taken himself (unless mention to the contrary), with a comment. A sort of journal of things seen or felt, instants captured with the camera or smartphone.
Here is the journal from the first week… From July 28 - August 5.
Here is the journal from the first week… From July 28 - August 5.
July 28, 2024 / Photo by Miggel Schwickerath, Line Producer (Nikon D750)
At the end of a day of technical scouting, Damien showed the crew the little hill on which we will shoot what will become the film’s final shot. SEQ 118 : “Maria climbs a hill, her theodolite on her shoulders. She is seen as a shadow puppet, cutting through the starry vault behind her (…)” I tried to pull it off without exactly following what was written in the screenplay…
July 28, 2024 / Photo by Gilles Porte (iPhone)
Three years earlier, Damien and I went to the desert on our own. We had woken up very early to witness the first beam of sunlight on this same hill (prior photo). When we shot at this location on 14 August 2024, it wasn’t dawn, but dusk, right before nightfall, choosing the other side of the hill.
July 29, 2024 - Photo by Gilles Porte (iPhone)
Lima… 3 days before shooting. First day of preflight with my grip and gaffer crew… / From top to bottom and left to right : Jhoishy, Angelo, Vima, Rafo aka “Gato” (key grip), Loco (gaffer), Chalace, August aka “Chatio” and Adilson.
July 29, 2024 - Photo by Gilles Porte (Nikon D750 and Nikkor 50mm)
Devrim Lingnau (Maria) and Olivia Ross (Amy), actresses. This photo will always be the first one I directed that will be in the film itself. The shot was improvised on a beach in Lima, a few days prior to shooting, so that Blanca (set designer) could put this image in a frame on a wall of Amy’s apartment.
July 30, 2024 / Photo by Gilles Porte (iPhone)
That evening, I ran into Micaela Cajahuaringa, a great Peruvian cinematographer whom people have spoken so highly of and who is the current president of the DFP (Peruvian Cinematographers’ Association). Micaela came to meet me to lend me her Sekonic L-758C light meter, because my own wasn’t working properly : it was giving me good measurements for incidental light but was giving nonsense readings for reflected light. We discussed film school, transmission, associations, “women behind the camera”, production, lenses, connection… How lovely the world of cinematographers can be when deontology and the associative spirit allow for meetings beyond the simple ray of light.
July 30, 2024 / Photo by Gilles Porte (iPhone)
These shutters were the start of a long discussion between Damien (director), Blanca (set designer), Loco (gaffer) and myself… They are an integral part of Paul d’Harcourt’s hacienda, which is supposed to be located in the Nazca desert. Several sequences inside of the hacienda were shot in Lima. In order to underscore the difference in lighting between Nazca and Lima, we discussed building other shutters that let in more light. After thinking about it, we decided that people who actually live in the desert protect themselves from the sunlight, and so we decided to keep the original shutters (see photo)… I did have some other wooden shutters built anyway, modifying the direction of the wooden slats so that more light could come in…
July 31, 2024 / Author unknown
Day off… This photo is framed in a little restaurant in Palpa, a few kilometers away from the town of Nazca, and it seemed fortuitous the day before the technicians were about to get involved in our film, Lady Nazca… All of the names on this photo (I’ve surely forgotten someone) will have to push and pull in the same direction, always having the film’s best interest in mind, to make the film that we are lucky to be embarking on and that will always be Damien’s first.
July 31, 2024 / Photo by Gilles Porte (Sony Alpha 7S, Zeiss 50mm)
The day before my first day of shooting, I was rereading old notes, as I was afraid of forgetting things that Damien and I might have said when we met. That was such a long time ago ! Sometimes, I’ve noticed that with time, the difficulty of financing a film, the multiple edits, the various people involved, a director forgets things that seemed essential to him or her. A photo captured my attention. I imagined The Little Prince and his airplane crashing in the middle of the desert. As for us, we will already have straight lines traced for us in the Nazca desert. Tonight, before going to bed, I listen to Johnny Cash singing “I walk the line…” He had written that song when he began to go on tour and to spend less time with the woman he was married to. It was a message to her, to tell her that he would keep on the straight and narrow, even if he was far away… We know the rest of the story…
August 1, 2024 - Damien, back to the camera, center, facing his crew | Photo by Gilles Porte
In Peru, before starting a shoot, technicians, actors, producers, cafeteria staff and drivers gather to ask the gods for everything to go well. Damien takes the opportunity to publicly thank Maria Reiche who inspired this story. A few glasses of Pisco are poured on the ground while others are emptied in a more conventional way. In Siberia, before starting the film Dans les forêts de Sibérie and setting off on frozen Lake Baikal, our drivers had dug holes in the ice to pour vodka into them and it’s true that our caravan was able to continue without suffering any damage...
August 1, 2024 | Photo by Gilles Porte
Since this day began by summoning the gods, I am adding to the diptych of the day an image of Machu Picchu where I had gone to meditate in May 2021... Peru was plunged, like many other countries, under an immense wave of Covid. Tourism was prohibited there. But thanks to my work visa for the film Lady Nazca (already !), I was able to take a plane, go to Peru for the first time and have the immense privilege of visiting one of the most beautiful sites in the world... without any tourists as witnesses !
August 2, 2024 | Photo by Gilles Porte (iPhone)
We didn’t know each other at all at the start of shooting and yet, as always, we are forced to trust each other very quickly. Here, Devrim (actress), under Damien’s gaze and under a camera whose fall would be catastrophic.
August 2, 2024 - Cantine | Photo by Gilles Porte (Nikon D750, Nikkor 50mm f1.8)
“Hello everybody ! As we will be introducing “Veggie Tuesday” in the project due to project requirements. This applies to maintenance, lunches and dinners (only on Tuesday). I hope you understand and enjoy one day a week eating differently.” (Angela, Production coordinator)
August 3, 2024 | Photo by Gilles Porte (Nikon D750)
Some films have beautiful dressing rooms for the actors to dress, put on makeup and spend time by themselves. Others have more modest means.
August 3, 2024 - Camera crew | Photo by Paulo Orellana (Nikon D750)
From left to right : Victor (DIT), Sophie (2d camera assistant), Gilles (DoP), Loco (gaffer and Steadicam operator), Nicolas (1st camera assistant) and Arturo (Video Assist)
August 4, 2024 | Photos by Gilles Porte (iPhone)
Between two takes, Paulo, 1st assistant director, asks me to come and take a close look at Paul d’Harcourt’s car that Damien has chosen to take Maria on an 800km journey away from Lima. I am told that there is a problem : the shot that Damien wanted to take inside the car can no longer be done because of the narrowness of the passenger compartment. Rafo (my grip) then asks to open the trunk and makes another seat appear. As if by magic, part of the hood can be removed to allow the camera lens through. This will be shot #13B/1 of the film. Paul d’Harcourt’s car will come out of a tunnel into the Nazca desert.
August 4, 2024 - Maria Reiche | Based on Gilles Porte’s shooting journal
In my filming diary, which already contains over 500 pages, I chose to put at the top a black and white photo of the real Maria Reiche, with a camera in her hands, who published Mystery on the Desert in 1949.
August 5, 2024 | Photo by Sophie, 2d camera assistant (iPhone)
Today, Peruvian Alonso Corrrea faced Frenchman Kauli Vaast in the surfing semi-final at the Olympic Games. I had promised Paulo that I would bow down to him (and the entire team) if the Tahitian failed in the semi-final. My offer was obviously only valid if Paulo reciprocated my gesture in the other case. At the end shooting a sequence, Nicolas, one of my assistants, tells me that the Frenchman has won. The gate of our Arri Mini LF immediately took on the shape of a giant wave. Later, Paulo told me that Peru has not won a medal since the Barcelona Olympic Games in 1992 while Kauli Vaast offered France its 13th gold medal at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games.
- Read the presentation, in French with translation in English, of "Two Pictures a Day in Peru" by Gilles Porte
