On My Radar: Beau Leon

What’s the best ad campaign you’ve seen?

Made in Detroit with Eminem is one of my favourite ads. It has a great quality and feels like a film.

What website(s) do you use most regularly and why?

Inspired Eye. It mostly features street photography from all over the world.  I love the curating, I find it inspirational.

I also like to look at the Library of Congress for old photos from the 30s and 40s. I have some of the photos I’ve found there framed in my house and colour suite.

What’s the most recent piece of tech that you’ve bought and why?

I bought an adaptor for my 5D camera that can mount my old Mamiya film lenses for photographs. It gives a very filmic quality to the digital and when I bring it in to colour it, you can’t tell it was shot with a 5D.

Facebook, Instagram or Twitter?

I’m only on Facebook and people occasionally give me a hard time about it.

What’s your favourite app on your phone and why?

I like my Polaroid app the most. I like that it softens the highlights on iPhone photos to give them a more classic feel.

What’s your favourite TV show and why?

I’m a member of the SundanceNow Doc Club and that’s what I enjoy watching the most.

What film do you think everyone should have seen?

Do you have all day? There are too many to name!

Where were you when inspiration last struck?

Arcana: Book on the Arts in Los Angeles.

What’s the most significant change you’ve witnessed in the industry since you started working in it?

The move to digital cameras has been the most significant change but I think significant is a complicated word for that because it is not always in the industry’s best interest.

Digital cameras have really trained our eyes as an audience and they have changed as a result. I’m not sure that it is necessarily for the better - especially when it comes to cinematography.

I’ve adjusted to it, we all have, but what still irks me is that since our eyes have changed so much as an audience, I don’t know if we are as concerned with the way that things look anymore. Because of digital workflows, there is a visual similarity with most films. As a colourist, this is especially difficult because I am always striving to make something different.

What or who has most influenced your career and why?

Sam Bayer. The first seven years that I worked at 525, I did all of his videos and I think we really pushed each other. The videos we did back then felt ground breaking and changed the force of my career.

Tell us one thing about yourself that most people won’t know…

I have a lot of other creative endeavours outside of my colour bay: I cook and paint to name a few.