Lab Man
A docu-portrait about Arturo Arnold, a master of emulsion who processes all the 8mm and 16mm motion picture film for a busy lab in North Hollywood.
4 minutes, 10 seconds
16mm B&W, Festival Screener Available
A portrait by Neil Howard Butler of Arturo Arnold at work
Gaffer - Gavin Lee
Sound Mixer - Jason McDaniel
Music composed and performed by Gamble Cosmos
with Rene Otero, Dave Wasson and Kris Kolp
Images originated on Kodak 7219 16mm film stock
Special Thanks to Kyle Provencio Reingold, Doug Thomas and Spectra Film & Video
A Hubcap House Production in association with
The Huntington
CAPT 200
FILMMAKER STATEMENT
The entire process for this project was supremely intuitive at every interval - just me trusting my process and following the prompts wherever they seemed to lead. It started with the music, an instrumental mix of a song Jason Chimonides had recorded a couple of years prior. That song with its nocturnal mood and hypnotic groove put me in mind of the film lab where we have all of our 16mm film processed. From there, I started to craft a piece that presented itself as equal parts instructional film about the chemical processes of the lab crossbred with a character study of Arturo Arnold, Spectra Film & Video's resident lab man.