First man: shoot the moon in IMAX for Neil Armstrong's Journey

For Damien Chazelle, the challenge of dramatizing the historic lunar landing led us to where we had never been before – in the mind of Neil Armstrong (Ryan Gosling) as he walked in the serenity on the surface of abroad. The decision, therefore, to turn the decisive sequence in IMAX (see the video below) was not obvious, as the large-format brand has long been associated with the documentary Space.

However, the director and his cinematographer, Linus Sandgren ("The Land"), have taken a new turn: to make it a ghostly and subjective experience so that we can live with Armstrong on the moon. "Damien wanted to travel to the planet of the dead so he could say goodbye to his daughter," Sandgren said. "It was an opportunity to think about life … a story of humanity that matters most, as well as losses and costs to achieve it."

Read more:First man ": Ryan Gosling has recreated Neil Armstrong's" A Little Step "so perfectly that viewers can not tell the difference

"First man"

Universal Pictures and DreamWorks Pictures

NASA's mission to the moon in the 60's receives from Chazelle and Sandgren an authentic, in-camera, doc-like treatment. Seen through the eyes of the taciturn Armstrong, torn by grief, is like watching a personal film, hot or cold, alternating Kodak film 16 mm and 35 mm. To express Armstrong's troubled state of mind, the stunning handheld camera handles the instability of NASA's dreaded spinning machine.

But when Armstrong arrives on the moon, everything stabilizes and he becomes serene. This is where IMAX comes into action. They even planned it as "The Wizard of Oz". By opening the door of the lunar module to exit, it goes from 16 mm to IMAX using a VFX plate. Production designer Nathan Crowley ("Dunkirk", "Interstellar") built an extensive set of the Vulcan Gray Rock Quarry in Atlanta to serve as a lunar surface and Sandgren filmed the sequence at night.

"First man"

Universal Pictures and DreamWorks Pictures

"It's a nice format," Sandgren said of his first IMAX experiment. "The surface of the moon is monochromatic, but you see it in the clearest format. You see colors in the sand, reflections of the crystals. What's fun for us is that it's totally surreal. You are out of this world and the picture is a lot [bigger]. You are on a crane and you float. And it's not Neil, it's more like you.

But the biggest challenge was to light it with a single source, 500 feet high and 150 feet high. Sandgren tested two SoftSun 100K lamps, but the double shadows were annoying and too blurry. "I asked the inventor. David Pringle, he could make two or three thousand lamps. His company made two bulbs. Thanks to these prototypes, we were able to photograph this lunar surface in this vast and vast environment. "

"First man"

Universal Pictures and DreamWorks Pictures

Another great asset of IMAX was the capture of 180 degree reflections on the Armstgrong visor. It was strange, almost alien and completed by Justin Hurwitz's use of the theramin of another world in his score. "It looked very lonely. We shot this with all these practical elements, "said Sandgren. "The crew had to hide."

The visual poetry of the IMAX moon sequence was the culmination of Armstrong's personal journey: to broaden his horizon to face death. "With the metaphors in the movie for that sort of thing, that was also a big part of our visual language," said Sandgren.

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