Stuart Hammill in THE CHESTER KIDS

Writer/Director Travis Ainley contacted me in May 2009 with an incredibly bold script called THE CHESTER KIDS. He told me he wanted to shoot it documentary style- improvised, handheld, available light and minimal film lighting- and on a shoestring budget. We would be shooting the feature film north of Toronto on Georgian Bay. Travis began talking references with me- Buffalo ’66, Dancer in the Dark, The Squid and the Whale, The Wrestler, Larry Clark’s photography- and I knew that his project was something I wanted to be a part of.

THE CHESTER KIDS, shot on the Red One over the course of 20 days, tells the story of two young men, Stu and Harry, best friends since high school who are now clinging to whatever remains of their disintegrating friendship in the years following Stu’s move from Chester.

Travis requested one thing of me from the get-go: “Don’t make the film too pretty.” It was great to reconnect with a rougher, more instinctual shooting style and not only feel free to experiment but actually be encouraged to do so by the director. The film was shot entirely handheld (by far my favourite way to operate) and the shallow depth of field in many of our scenes made for some beautiful improvised focus pulling by 1st AC Joshua Fraiman, allowing Travis and the actors immense flexibility in their blocking. Montreal-based Gaffer Simon Lamarre-Ledoux and I came up with some inventive ways of using our small lighting package (HMIs, Red Heads, small Arri fresnels), and most of the film’s night interiors were lit using only practical fixtures running 100W  and 150W bulbs. I stuck with ISO 250 for the majority of the day scenes and dialed in ISO 500 for night scenes.

Among the production convoy touring our many great locations in the small town of Stayner, Ontario and nearby Collingwood was a Winnebago equipped with a Baselight colour correction suite set up for our dailies and data management. Watching the film unfold on location helped us tremendously by enabling us to sift through the material we were getting on our tight shooting schedule.

The loose aesthetic combined with a sensational cast and courageous script make this one of the most exciting projects I have worked on so far. I’m incredibly excited to see the film once the cut is locked, and I can’t wait to revisit this project in the final colour grade.

SEE A TRAILER I CUT TOGETHER BY CLICKING HERE!

See an article in The Enterprise Bulletin about the shooting of The Chester Kids, including an insightful interview with our amazing producer Chris Agoston.