Pre-production for the next film in the re-booted Star Trek franchise is well underway, with changes happening every which way as Roberto Orci steps into the directors chair. The film will also be shot digitally, a first for the franchise.
With J.J. Abrams, director of the two latest Trek films, and his close collaborators going to a neighboring galaxy far, far away, Orci is forced to bring in new faces to surround him to make this film. Orci just named the person who will have a great impact on the look of the coming film, cinematographer Claudio Miranda.
Miranda is a well known digital cinematographer, most notably his Oscar-winning work on Life of Pi and also the films Tron Legacy, Curious Case of Benjamin Button, and, a film that might transition well to Trek, the Tom Cruise starring Oblivion.
Perhaps the most known and ridiculed part of the Abrams Trek films is the incessant use of lens flares. Many would argue, maybe even Abrams himself, that the use of the flares throughout the films, especially on the Enterprise, helps contribute to the future-like state of the film, but not every future setting in film follows that thinking. Miranda captured the world of Oblivion, in my opinion, wonderfully through many different techniques without flaring his shots to the max.
If the new team for Star Trek 3 depart from the Abrams-flare-method, I would consider that a wonderful step for the franchise.
Production for Star Trek 3 is ramping up with cameras ready to roll in February 2015 for a 2016 release date.
