new filmmakers Rafa Martínez and Manuel Castañeda: Alfredo Guerrero

Rafa Martínez y Manuel CastañedaAlfredo Guerrero de
the new filmmaker: What ‘s the story of your film?
Rafa Martínez: There’s no story. I only wanted to reflect Guerrero’s artwork and his creative process as honestly and truthfully as possible… I only wanted to be a observer in his atelier.
the new filmmaker: What inspired you?

Rafa Martínez: I know Alfredo Guerrero as long as I can remember. I’ve grown up seeing his paintings even in my house. So, from that point we had a few meetings and talked about his main sources of inspiration; Velázquez, Rembrandt, Durero, Rubens, and Ingres, among others.

Manuel Castañeda: Everything is about the painter Alfredo Guerrero. We wanted to reflect in the video his colour palette made cinematography without leaving the colour from the Caribbean. It was filmed in Cartagena with the classical tone of his paintings.

the new filmmaker: Your shooting equipment?

Manuel Castañeda: The equipment of this video was very light. We worked with a Red One camera and Hi-speed prime lenses. We used natural light in order to keep the atmosphere of the Studio of Master Guerrero. We supported the lighting with a 400W and a 200W HMI of K5600.

Rafa Martínez: I only would add some close up shoots that I did before with a Canon 7D.

the new filmmaker: Your post production?

Rafa Martínez: I tried to do a three act structure, where the first act was more focused on self portraits, the second act on his sketches, and the third I wanted to show a brief view of his artwork since his beginnings until the present. In parallel to that, Alfredo paints in slow motion to emphasize how carefully he works.

The post-production was very easy. The workflow was done all in Final Cut Pro in 2K format and the colour correction was very basic, the image was made warmer, but no more. The composition was made in After Effects.

the new filmmaker: Film school or learning by doing?

Manuel Castañeda: I studied in a cinema school but I never got to finish the career. I started working since I was in first year of my Studies and sometime later I just didn’t have enough time to do both things, then I took the decision to keep learning from work and from the many photographers which I worked with. What I can tell is that I have a little bit of both: I had some school education and some learning-by-doing.

Rafa Martínez: My case is pretty similar, but I am still taking workshops every time I can.

the new filmmaker: Who influenced your way of filmmaking?

Rafa Martínez: My dad. He used to paint and his studio was my bedroom, so I received a lot of pictorial influence since my youth. And there is also a long list of filmmakers who inspired and influenced me. To mention a few; Julio Medem, Woody Allen, Lars Von Trier, Martin Scorsese, Jean Luc Godard…

Manuel Castañeda: I believe that influences and inspiration come from many places. In this state-of-the-art signaling a single influence is very difficult. We are bombarded through TV, movies and Internet where we find images constantly which are nourishing us and are a challenge to reach audio-visual results according with each product.

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