astronomicstudiosltd

- THE EQUIPMENT OF THE DWELLING -
One of my biggest challenges with The Dwelling is to approach the production as if we were making this movie in 1998.

The story takes place in 1998, so I don’t want to use modern equipment and manufacture a 1990s aesthetic around it. I want the cameras, sound, lighting and accessories to be equipment an independent production could realistically have used.

The primary cameras will be Canon XL1 MiniDV cameras. The XL1 was released in February 1998, making it available during the exact year of the story. We’ll be shooting 4:3 standard-definition MiniDV.

The XL1 was also used in feature films. 28 Days Later (2002) and The GWARnage Campaign (2002) both used Canon XL1 cameras. Witchhunter (2002), a straight-to-video horror film starring Gunnar Hansen, was directed and shot by John Vincent on a Canon XL1 and released by Dead Alive Productions. Chronicle (2012) also features an XL1 within the story.

Production sound follows the same philosophy. We’ll use a Sennheiser ME66/K6 system documented by 1996, a Shure FP33 field mixer from the mid-1990s, Sony MDR-7506 headphones introduced in 1991, and DAT, introduced in **1987. Boom and microphone suspension will be period-appropriate.

Lighting will use ARRI 300 Plus and 650 Plus tungsten Fresnels with traditional stands, flags, scrims, diffusion, barn doors and tungsten gels.

For BTS, I’ll use a Sony DCR-VX1000, introduced in 1995. I’ll also hand out Fujifilm disposable cameras to the cast and crew. They’ll actually be developed afterward, and those photographs will be used for BTS and marketing material.

There will be no generative AI used in the movie, creature, artwork, promotional material or photography. I want this project to come from actual people making actual things, which is why I assembled a cast and crew of some of the most creatively talented people in indie film.

I’m not trying to make The Dwelling merely look like 1998. I want the production itself built around the technology and limitations of 1998 as closely as possible.