2022.06.21

X-H2S: "Child of Light" x Luciano Gaudenzio

CHILD OF LIGHT 

Project by Luciano Gaudenzio
Cinematography by Luciano Gaudenzio, Fortunato Gatto e Alessandro Petrini
“Through our eyes, we can find our greatest heritage”.

This is a generational story told through the eyes full of wonder of a child growing up to embrace the marvel of the mountains: silence and beauty are part of our shared essential values.

The child becomes a girl, now surrounded by quietness and solitude, whilst she discovers that her resilience and efforts, necessary to fulfill her freedom, lead her to explore the places where she intimately belongs.

Which then becomes a way of life and communion with her surroundings.

Our small and tight, yet efficient crew of professionals, consisting of a party of three – Fortunato Gatto, Alessandro Petrini and I – were able to capture the essence of this story, face tough elements, freezing conditions and explore the imposing and breath-taking mountains of Trentino, ranging from the Brenta Dolomites to Pale di San Martino, like no other team before. 

The new Fujifilm Mirrorless X-H2S, which we were honoured to test first-hand before its official release, was key to tell, through awe-provoking images and impactful videos, the story and emotions of a child who becomes a woman and lives and loves her mountains.

More than twenty days were spent on the field, surrounded by the ever so white and majestic Dolomites’ “walls” of Trentino, looking for the most suggestive atmospheres, in the dark, with only our headlights to lead us where we would film at dawn and then waiting until sunset, when the Dolomites’ colours are on fire, making them unique in the world.

The shootings were carried out in extreme conditions, with temperatures reaching as low as -25 ° where, however, the new Fujifilm mirrorless camera proved to maintain its optimal working excellence and delivered superior performance. 

In such conditions and long hours, we all gave our best, each of us working on specific sections of the project, each of us harmoniously complementing each other with the priceless support of the cameras, both on the tripod, for a balanced and razor-sharp definition of landscapes and actors’ portraits, but also hand-held to allow us to capture the real essence of the skiing, the adventure, the action.

And it is precisely in those moments, in scenes of movement and action, that we have appreciated the new X-H2S the most: for being capable of reaching 120 fps in 4K, with an incredible dynamic range of almost 14 stops, and the F-log 2 feature activated.

This feature allowed us for a greater flexibility in colour-grading thanks to the “look-up table” (LUT), specially introduced by the Fujifilm developers, that is an excellent starting point for working with colours in the post-production phase.

On the other hand, for what photography is concerned, we were able to take advantage of the camera’s ability to shoot up to 40 frames/images per second, thanks to its high memory-buffer capacity.

Such a performing camera, able to chase and look out for the moving protagonists, with an autofocus, that has always met our requirements, consistently holding its focus on the subjects, without missing a beat, both while filming and also whilst taking pictures.

Finally, a key feature that allowed us to obtain what we believe an inspiring short movie, is definitely the FUJIFILM X-H2S’ incredible image stabilization, of more than 7 stops, which allowed us to tell a more immersive story, closer to the action.

These are reliable, performing and safe working cameras which have undoubtedly exceeded all of our high expectations and allowed us to “connect” with such extraordinary places, and share a story, rich in emotions and experiences, with all viewers.

In essence, beyond the purely technical yet crucial aspects, it was fundamental to experience amongst us the alchemy and connection important to capture values such as beauty, respect for Nature and the mountains and to be able to narrate every smallest detail, through an attentive composition aimed at framing the story and the atmosphere created by the light.

In conclusion, we would like to give special thanks to all the people we met during this exciting experience, who helped us and supported us in every way in the creation of this emotional visual storytelling.

BTS Footage