At the recent Cine Gear Expo in Los Angeles, he spoke about shooting on the Sony F65, using anamorphic lenses with lots of character, and lighting with only Tungsten sources for 360 degrees. First, if you haven't heard it, check out the terrific podcast Hardy did with Ben Consoli's Go Creative that dives into a little more detail about some of these subjects:

And here's the talk from Cine Gear:

And here's the trailer if you haven't seen the film:

He tested a few different cameras before deciding on the F65, but his lens choice may have had an even more significant effect on the look of the film. As he says above, with film, he's always tried to use very sharp lenses to get the most out of that format, but with digital already being so sharp, he wanted lenses with more character that took a bit of the edge off. By going with Cooke Xtal Express anamorphics, he got a far more unique look, and because the lenses aren't totally consistent across the range, was able to use the character of each individual lens to his advantage when he needed it.

Another interesting note about the way the film was shot is that they mostly lit the film for 360 degrees of shooting, meaning they could easily flip around and shoot in whatever direction they needed to. It's not always something that can work for every film, but it can certainly make shooting faster in many situations. One of the big things about this film was working with production design and pre-rigging so that the walls could be pre-lit before shooting, which proved to be quite the power management issue since they weren't just using efficient LEDs — only Tungsten fixtures. 

If you haven't seen the film, it's certainly worth checking out, especially since it's a movie that asks plenty of interesting questions about artificial intelligence and what makes us human.

exmachinarobhardyf65Sony
Cinematography & Cameras