Matt Reeves on How Thrilling It Was to Shoot THE BATMAN in The Volume with THE MANDALORIAN Filmmaking Tech
It turns out that director Matt Reeves shot parts of The Batman in The Volume, using the same filmmaking tech that Lucasfilm is using to shoot its live-action Star Wars shows like The Mandalorian. This tech is still in its infancy, but it’s the future of filmmaking.
Until this film, Reeves had not had the opportunity to play about with this VFX filmmaking tech, and it allowed him to incorporate an impressive amount of practical, in-camera elements.
Back in 2010, Reeves worked with cinematographer Greig Fraser on Let Me In, and he’s been wanting to work with him again ever since. The Batman was the first opportunity that came along between then and now because their schedules just didn’t align until finally, the opportunity presented itself.
During that time apart, Fraser ended up working on projects such as Rogue One: A Star Wars Story and The Mandalorian, both of which utilized The Volume tech, a floor-to-ceiling screen that provides a virtual background on set, eliminating the need for imagination from actors. It also eliminates the use blue and green screens in the filmmaking process, and it’s much easier to get the lighting right on the actors.
In an interview with CB, Reeves shared, "I was really thrilled because I love him and he had through Rogue One and The Mandalorian started using that Volume. And we started saying, he'd used it for a very, very different kind of landscape, the idea like when you're on the planet scape and you're out in a kind of desert vista that of thing. And so we started talking about the idea, 'Well, gee could we do something?' We talked to ILM, 'Could we with our amazing production designer, James Chinlund design our own Gotham? And then in certain environments bring that and have it around our actors so that we could not only have it there for the actors, but it would be the source of the light.'"
From that moment on, Reeves and his team took advantage of the tech. Reeves went on to say, "There's almost always that moment where you're doing the blue screen scene, and trying to get that light so that it comes off of that space that doesn't yet exist in such a way that you believe that what you're seeing in the foreground is connected to what you're seeing in the distance. Greg and I talked about how much we hated that and how hard it is to try and do that. So, on [The Batman] we were able to do is James was able to design with ILM, a very extensive Gotham."
Reeves went on to talk about the meeting place for Batman and how it was inspired by a certain element in the film All The President’s Men, "I saw a version of where that Bat Signal would be sort of living. So, [Chinlund is] the one who comes up with this idea but it isn't even on top of the GCPD. I thought, 'Well, what if we do this on an abandoned skyscraper that's part of the renewal program that was never finished. And they just keep meeting really like Woodward and Bernstein in meeting Deep Throat in All the President's Men. They meet to discuss this crazy conspiracy in this abandoned and unfinished skyscraper and so that meant we could have the city that they were talking about all around them. And then later Batman meets Selena there at sunset. And if I had to shoot that scene at sunset we never could have done it, because we basically are able to keep the sun where it needed to be in the sky throughout the course of the three days that it took to shoot that scene. So working in the Volume was thrilling."
It’s pretty cool that Reeves had the opportunity to utilize The Volume technology while shooting The Batman. It was obviously a great experience for him and something he’ll most likely continue to use as he moves forward with his other film and TV projects.