Filmmaker Interview: Jon Chema - How Passion Crafted Lamento

Chema started as a cinematographer in Nashville over a decade ago, crafting country music videos and commercials before moving to LA to lens bigger projects. Contreras was a mainstay in the ad world, overseeing national spots for Apple and other big brands. 

"I've been a fan of Diego Contreras' work for quite some time now," Chema said. "He was always one of those directors that I looked up to. And I felt like he always aspired to do the visuals that I wanted to shoot."

Lamento would be the first project for Chema and Contreras, part short film narrative, part music video, for artist Gaby Moreno. Both natives of Guatemala, Moreno and Contreras chose a unique location to be their centerpiece—a surreal and haunting abandoned Guatemalan beach resort that was being slowly reclaimed by the sea.

"Both [Diego] and Gaby had vacationed at this old resort when they were kids," Chema said. "And when he came across that old resort town that was essentially in ruins, he took some initial scout photos and filed them away for an eventual project."

The resort itself was located on a small island, forcing the team to trek out twice per day, once in the morning and once in the afternoon. For Chema and Contreras, Lamento would not only be a passion project but also a test of creative filmmaking for the crew and camera package. 

"We're probably not going to have much support," Chema remembered Contreras saying. "[Gaby] was paying for it out of pocket, [Diego] and I contributed out of pocket, and the producer we were partnering with was going to contribute out of pocket. This was a total passion project."

"This resort that had been this escape for Guatemalans had eroded into the sea, and there was no real access. It was literally on an island levee that was only accessible by boat."

Filmmaker Interview: John Chema - What Made the Sony VENICE 2 the Right Camera for Lamento

Having never done a music video before, Contreras brought Chema on board to imbue his years of experience into Lamento. To support their tight budget and small crew, Chema needed the right camera to support their talents.

"I had started shooting on the original VENICE a few years prior. It was my favorite camera for a multitude of reasons," Chema said. "And knew I needed something like that for a project like this because it was literally just going to be me, my focus puller, James Teninty, and we were going to bring in a Steadicam operator. Everything else was going to be local."

“I've been in situations like that before where you don't have the support. So, you really need something that's just going to work and that you're going to be able to tweak stuff and change things very quickly.”

This is where Chema sought out the VENICE 2, which had recently been released. Knowing that he would be shooting in a wide variety of natural lighting scenarios, most often by himself, the cinematographer needed a camera that could handle the latitude, adapt quickly, and allow him to shoot solo. 

"I was really drawn towards the extra latitude I was going to get from the new sensor [of the VENICE 2] and also the resolution," Chema said. "And the fact that it was smaller. It had the internal recording instead of the [add-on] of the VENICE.”

"I needed all these things because I was downloading the footage myself and helping my assistant change lenses.”

Lamento would also require a sizable amount of VFX work, which Parliament VFX provided under the creative direction of James Mulholland and his leads: Siro Valente, Taner Besen, and Dan Fine. With the VENICE 2, Chema could also provide the VFX plates the post-team needed.

“The 8.6K resolution of the VENICE 2 was very beneficial for VFX as it gave them extra resolution in those shots to stabilize, slightly reframe, and extract textures, all while maintaining a 4K final deliverable resolution.”

While the VFX would pose a challenge in post-production, the lighting would be the main focus for Chema during production, as the team would often shoot during dusk and the early parts of the day. 

"We wanted to shoot during the first few hours of light and the last few hours of light," Chema said. "We wanted to avoid harsh noon sun because we felt like that wasn't really the vibe for this project."

"We wanted it to feel very ethereal and have some slight, heightened surrealism as well. It's a teleportation to this other world."

This visual language pushed Chema to utilize the VENICE 2 on the edge of visible light, capturing Moreno with only a hint of the sun beyond on the horizon. Something that Chema called "beyond blue hour."

"There was a moment where, and it's actually one of my favorite shots, where Gaby is against the building, there's like some spray from the waves crashing, and it was so dark, I thought there was no way we were going to get exposure on this," Chema said. "But I cranked up to 6400 ISO, and I was able to expose. We just used two Titan tubes and had [the gaffer] handhold, so at least I had an eye light."

"With the high sensitivity of the VENICE 2, we had the ability to literally light [Moreno] with a handheld LED panel and capture that last bit of light. It's beyond blue hour. It's this weird magenta cast in the sky but also really blue on one side."

"That's one of the things I love about the VENICE 2 color science," Chema added. "It captures so much more than the other cameras out there right now."

To further enhance the surrealism, Chema chose the Olympus OM prime lenses, rehoused by Zero Optik, which added character and softness to the high-resolution image of the VECINE 2. In addition, a drone team, with a heavy lifter drone that could carry the weight of the VENICE 2, joined the crew to capture an energetic, fast-moving shot through the resort location. 

This drone was also equipped with an LED lighting kit to capture incredible sci-fi imagery at night. 

"These were shots we wanted to shoot in-camera," Chema said. "So, there were moments when we would take that heavy lifter drone and repurpose it for the lighting drone and then shoot it with the VENICE 2."

With the VENICE 2 as his creative partner, Chema shot on the island levee where the resort stood, inside the abandoned buildings themselves, and even inside a small boat with just him and actor Tony Revolori. No matter the lighting conditions he encountered, the VENICE 2 allowed him to focus on creativity and composition, always delivering high-quality imagery.

Filmmaker Interview: John Chema - Lamento: Music Video, Short Film, Documentary

After Lamento wrapped, Chema realized that the project had become more than just a short film and a music video. The abandoned resort that had been the centerpiece is actively being eroded by the sea. In time, only memories of it will remain. 

But with Lamento, remnants of what it was once, and what it turned into before it finally disappeared, have been recorded for posterity.

"There was something sublime about the fact that this was a finite place that was eventually going to be gone," Chema said. "This resort, the structures, they're probably going to be gone in the next couple of years."

"And the fact that we were able to photograph that when it was still standing, is pretty incredible, because it's never again going to be photographable."

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