Ashwin Sanghi Quotes

It's always a challenge to shoot a period film and not have it look like you hit the tea stain button in post.

I don't like to watch playback. But being on the set, watching the way the camera is being moved and the way the light is being used, you do get an idea of it.

Period recreation is very difficult unless you make a black-and-white movie.

I find that with period pieces, you're sort of able to really take advantage of what's around you because prop-wise, wardrobe-wise and location-wise, it's all so specific due to that time.

Visual elements are, of course, the director's job.

A period film is a gift for a cinematographer.

As a director, I start with the visual.

I never think about it much, the visual aspect of it, until we start making the movie. I don't really think about it when we write. When we finish, and I start putting the film together, and we pick the locations, I do think about that a lot.

My directors of photography light my films, but the colours of the sets, furnishings, clothes, hairstyles - that's me. Everything that's in front of the camera, I bring you.

Usually when I'm making a movie, what I have in mind first, for the visuals, is how we can stage the scenes to bring them more to life in the most interesting way, and then how we can make a world for the story that the audience hasn't quite been in before.

As a director, you're looking for ways to tell the story with the whole image and not primarily dialogue.

Anybody can direct a picture once they know the fundamentals. Directing is not a mystery, it's not an art. The main thing about directing is: photograph the people's eyes.

When I was in pre-production for Trees Lounge, I was hearing the cinematographer talking with the production designer about colours and this and that, and feeling like I was losing control.

I'm not very aware of styles. We never talk about styles before we start shooting, or even during shooting, because I think the film will bring you there.

I think you cannot make films without choosing everything.

Any adaptation - and I've done three in my career. I did 'Sweeney Todd' and 'Hugo' and 'Coriolanus.' It's important to find what makes it a movie as opposed to just a film presentation of a stage play.

I think the composer and production staff of an opera have a real responsibility to use visual elements of all kinds to make clear to the American audience, at any rate, exactly what is going on.

I was very glad later when I was directing that I wasn't in the hands of a cinematographer and hoping that he would do it well. I would know what he was doing, and we could discuss how that scene would look.

It's more interesting because you get to research the history of the period, and all the different aesthetic elements that make a film, particularly this film, so stunning.

Film is limitless, but some stage presentations on film can look too theatrical.

When I am shooting a film I never think of how I want to shoot something; I simply shoot it.

I think we've shot scenes from every angle directors can think of to make it look like different villages. I've directed a couple shows on that set and believe me, it's impossible not to duplicate some camera angles.

As I began making my feature films, it was a great adventure. It was about constructing something I saw in my head or I had designed on storyboards and capturing that on film.

And finding the hat, I always like to find the hat. And then props just dress the set. It's all fabulous.

I watched a couple of really bad directors work, and I saw how they completely botched it up and missed the visual opportunities of the scene when we had put things in front of them as opportunities. Set pieces, props and so on.