Meet Filmmaker Michael Henry - Being color blind in a visual industry

Welcome to the Color Timer
Podcast. I am your host, Vincent Taylor.

This is a show where we speak
to professionals who work with color.

Today, we're speaking to a
very old friend of mine, Michael Henry.

Michael is a filmmaker, a writer.
He's been in the industry for 20 plus years.

Made an incredible feature film called
Blame that was in the Toronto Film Festival.

I was chatting to Michael about the show,

saying it's all about
color, and then made some kind of

nasty remark that only
friends can make, saying, "Oh, I

assume you can't come on the
show because you're color blind."

And then when I heard that,
I went, "Wait a second. No, no, no.

You have to come on the show. I want to
chat to you about what it's like to be color blind.

Being a creative in this
industry, what can you see? What can't you see?"

So that's what we're
going to do. We're going to use the

15 minute sand timer as per
usual to keep the conversation contained,

keep it focused, and yeah, let's go.

Take your seats because
the hourglass is about to turn.

We are entering the world of the micro podcast.

Explore the craft, creativity, and science
of professionals who use color to tell stories.

Welcome to the Color Timer with Vincent Taylor.

Michael, hi. Thank you for joining me.

Good to be here,
Vincent. Good to see you as always.

It makes us sound all kind of
official when we speak to each other like that.

When I was chatting to you originally, and I
was just telling you that I was doing this podcast,

and it was a podcast talking
to professionals who work with color,

and then I said some
kind of remark about going, "Oh,

shame you can't come on
because you're color blind."

And then I went, "Actually,
no, no, you should come on the show,

and we should talk about what it's like
to be color blind, especially you're a director,

you're a filmmaker, and how that impacts you."

And then the more I thought about it, I
thought back to the old days of film school,

and I was still a DP, and
I was shooting something for you,

and I remember my little anecdote of, and
I think this is true, I don't think I made it up.

I was putting a gel up on the light, and you
came over to me, and I guess you were shy about it,

I don't know, but you said quietly, "Oh, is
that green? Is that a green gel you're putting up?"

But I went, "Yeah, yeah, it's like..."

But look, thank you for talking to me about this.

No worries. I mean, you're always sensitive as a

director with color, like
on sets or in the grading room.

I just feel like when you're
color blind, you're just confused.

It's like color confusion,
color deficiency more than color blindness.

So yeah, I'm just like,
I'm never certain, never sure.

So hence, "Is that green?
Is this..." You know? Anyway, so...

Oh, before I jump into that first
question, because I've made this mistake before,

I've got to remember to stop my color timer.

- Please. - All right? Yeah, yeah. So here we go.

- I can see it in
there. - Here we go. It's official.

- Awesome. - So, I mean, how did you
find out you were color blind? How old were you?

I was in grade one. We
were learning colors, and magenta,

the color magenta, was
something I just couldn't understand.

It was like my... I think it's the opposite
of my safety word. It's like my fear words, magenta.

And I thought it was an alright kid, pretty
smart, could pick up things, but colors, I was just like,

"What the hell is this? It's
brown, right?" And then no, it's sort of...

I still don't know, so
I'm guessing, right? Magenta's

like "ready brown," right?
Or something like that, or it's...

I don't f***ing know. It's
part of my language. I just don't know.

So I just remember in
grade one going, "I can't... No

matter how many times you
try to teach me this, I can't...

get it! I just can't understand it." So I
remember my dad took me to the I&E hospital in Melbourne,

got a day off school, which was always awesome.

That's good. That's good.

And I just remember
having a whole bunch of tests done.

My dad giving me one of
these invisible pens, sort of

cool books to do on the
way home just to soften the blow.

But yeah, found out
that I was severely color-blind.

Right.

Yeah, and that was at seven,
and nothing's changed. I'm still...

Did you, as a little kid, did you
feel... How did it make you feel? Or you didn't...

There's not very often, other than
if someone says, "What color is this?"

You don't walk around the world going, "That's red,

that's green, that's blue.
Oh, look at the sky. It's awesome."

You see it, you think it, but you don't... I
don't know. You don't verbalise it or process it too much.

And I've been like this since I
was born. It's the way I've seen the world.

And it's still very colorful for anyone that
doesn't understand what color-blindness actually is.

It's actually for a minute percentage of the

color-blind population.
It's black and white color-blindness.

For the rest of us, it's
just tonally... We probably see 5,000

colors where you see whatever
it is, one to two million, whatever.

I don't know what number it is.

I've got no idea.

We only see, yeah, a restricted amount, I guess.

Do you... And it's okay if you don't, but do you

know anything about the
science behind color-blindness?

It's to do with the cones in your eyes, supposedly.

And there's the three colors, or the three
colors of light, which is what, green, red and blue.

But that's kind of my
knowledge of it, is that there's something

actually physically wrong
with the color cones in your retina.

Right.

That don't process the light properly.

Do you happen to know if
it's hereditary, or... It is.

Well, so for anyone... I mean,
it's a pretty easy way to explain it.

It's a recessive gene that
gets carried on through a mother.

Right.

And a mother will give it to her
sons, as in the actual color-blindness.

Yeah.

If she passes it on to
me, then I, as a color-blind

person, pass it on through
my daughter, through her genes.

So if I had a daughter, she
would be 50% chance of being color-blind.

Right.

Which was leading on to my other
question, because I was wondering if it

was like hemophilia, where it's
just male or female, but it's not, right?

It's like 90... 95% males, or some huge amount.

The only way you will get a
color-blind female, I'm pretty sure, is

if you have a color-blind
mother and a color-blind father, I think.

The mother is carrying the color-blind
gene, recessively, and she marries a male who's got the

color... who is
actually color-blind, so therefore...

And they've...

It's an X, Y thing.

And they have met at a color-blind club.

Absolutely.

The color-blind club.

Yeah.

Which you don't know about, but I told you about.

That was really fun.

I can only imagine.

You've kind of touched on this, but could
you try to describe to me how you do see color?

The best... I just think it's like...

So I'm looking out here
and I can see a tree, right?

Where you would see all the colour
differentiation in the green in that tree, in the leaves.

It's like, imagine
taking 15 different shades of green,

or very close, and
grouping together in one block color.

That's kind of more what I see.

I don't see the differentiation.

That's where I think color-blind people get lost.

Primary colors are a lot easier to differentiate.

Show me a yellow and a red.

I can pick that up.

Show me a dark green
and a light brown, and my brain

starts going, "I don't know."

Where it fits.

What it is.

So right now, when I see a tree,
I see it as very vibrant and colorful.

It's green.

It's a super green tree out there.

But I'm not seeing those color differentiations
in there, but I'm still seeing tonal differentiations.

I can see the underside of the
leaf is dark, the top of the leaf is bright.

But I'm not seeing color
differentiation like a non-color-blind person would say.

And again, I think you did
actually already touch on this.

But is there any way that
it affects your day-to-day life?

No, apart from my driving test,
which I can't talk about, but I passed.

So there you go.

I'm not color-blind at all.

No, it doesn't.

It doesn't affect.

I really...

It would affect your life ridiculously.

I mean, as a color
grader, it's like everything you do.

But for most of us, color doesn't...

I guess assessing color
isn't an integral part of our life.

It's just something that happens in
the background and very often, you know...

Very rarely, sorry, no one ever stops me to
go, "Hey, what color is that shirt you're wearing?"

The closest...

And it's far away, but
the closest I can possibly get.

When I was working in China...

And I'd only been wearing glasses a
couple of years, and I got a new prescription.

And I started work that day, and it was great.

It was really good.

Next day, great, it was good.

And I think the third day, I kept the
glasses on as I went to go outside, and I took them off.

And I think there was quite a colorful sign
there, and I went, "Why does that look different?"

And I realised that they'd put a
blue blocker or a color thing on the glasses.

And I freaked out, because I went, "Oh
my God, I've just been grading for two days."

And it's interesting, because I went...

Of course, I put my old glasses back on, and I went

back, and it was subtly
different, but it was all relative.

And basically, I just shifted the
green hue out of everything, and it was fine.

I mean, that's my... Talking
about green hue and stuff, when we're

thinking about working as a director
and working with color grading and this...

The worst thing for me is
green tinges on skin and stuff.

Like, if they're under a fluoro or
something, you would spot it like that.

I would still look at someone and
think tonally, their skin looks alright.

It just doesn't scream out, like,
"Oh my God, they've got a green face."

And there's so many times where, you know, I'm
doing an edit, or I'm just running through, and then I

show someone something,
and then they come back and go,

"Why is that person got
a green tinge on their face?"

"Oh, it hasn't been
graded yet!" Or whatever, you know?

Because, you know, everyone uses LUTs now, and
just quick little things to present an edit to someone.

- It's true

- So often, man, so often!

That sort of thing is my,
you know... Kryptonite, I guess.

No, Kryptonite's green, by the way.

See? Can't see it.

Yeah, sorry.

Now, we have a mutual
friend, a mutual close friend of

ours, and when I said to
him that I was speaking to you...

And so he's given me a question to ask you.

The Matrix...

The red pill and the blue
pill, you know? Did that lose any value?

No, no. Because again, primary
colors. I could see the red and the blue.

If it was a red and a
brown pill, yeah, I'd be screwed,

man. That film would take a
whole new meaning for me, I think.

But no, no.

It's fine.

It's fine.

And I think you were initially talking
too about, like, the red jacket in Schindler's ...

You know? I could spot that.

In Schinder's List?

I could spot that. Like, you know.

Yeah.

I think that's... I think colorblind people
probably have, like, an innate strength with tone.

I think maybe I
mentioned this to you as well. I think

tonally we must just,
like, black and white and just...

Well, I was going to ask
you about that. I was going to

ask you about the world
of black and white photography.

Like, if you watch a black and white
film, I don't know. Does it have any impact or...?

It's equivalent to you. I mean, I imagine
you guys watching a black as you guys, you know.

You go.

You color sights.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I know. Fine.

When you see something and it's like a mid-grey
in a black and white film, it could be a grey shirt.

It could be a red shirt. It could be a
bunch of different colours. Do you know what I mean?

But tonally it's sitting in the same spot.

That's kind of, like, what I would say.

So, I guess that's why I'm saying
tonally is the thing that I pick up on more.

Like, if you showed me
two browns, you're picking up the

colour where I'm looking
straight away for the tonal differences.

One will be darker than the other.

Yeah.

And sometimes I would just pick
the darker one as brown, I guess, because

generally brown is a darker colour
than green, like primary sort of stuff.

So...

It's a constant guessing.

But it's interesting that thing about, I
remember when I was, you know, a budding cinematographer

and just learning and a mentor of mine
had said, you know, one of the best things you

can do to develop your eye as a
cinematographer is to shoot black and white. And same with

photography. Because you're not getting
distracted by the colors, you're focusing on those tones.

Yeah. Well, I mean, that's probably
that's very, very similar to what I would say from

my point of view. I've always been
really interested in a color is just something I

defer to my cinematographer and my
grader for but I can still the person that I was

reading about recently, Nicholas
Winding Refn, Drive Director and a few. Oh, yes. He uses

color in such a like amazing punchy
way. He's supposedly colorblind as well. Is that

right? And I think that's that's part of
him stepping out of his safety zone and just saying

screw it, I'm gonna over push this, you
know, and the way he uses colored light so often,

you know, where it's not even needed,
but he's using it as a stylistic choice. Yeah.

I see that now. And I go as a colorblind
director, I kind of go I get what you're doing. I get

you're just pushing it, you're having a
bit more fun. Yeah, you're breaking a bit of those

boundaries, I guess that, you know,
normal color sighted people might not do. And going

back, you know, to that analogy of you and
I on set from, oh my god, 20 years ago, whenever

it was, where where where I interpreted
the way you were saying it was a bit of shyness.

I mean, do you have a shyness still about it or?

Yeah, it's not something I don't walk
around with my, "hi, I'm colorblind" t-shirt sort of thing

when especially when yeah, look, when you're
directing or working with someone, it's something

that you don't I mean, it doesn't come
up unless I'm talking to a colorist really or

a cinematographer, you know, yeah. Yeah.
Well, on that topic, then, I mean, how do you work

with like a colorist? How would you
work with a colorist during a in a suite?

Again, I would have to really trust them
and defer to them. But I would use references

from other films and things that I like
that that, you know, I would be very picky on tonal

decisions and things like that. I can
see consistency in color too, I guess, as well

in a way, maybe just, you know, I could I
could tell her something feels a little jarring.

But but there is a lot of trust like,
you know, I mean, I think the film industry in

general, you have to put a lot of trust
in everyone you work with, you know, you want

to work with the best cinematographers,
the best sound recorders, the best. It's true.

whatever. So I probably defer more to a
colorist and a cinematographer than I do, you know, other

other areas of filmmaking I think because I
need to. I just need to trust in them and know that

they've got my back.

This is not related to colorblindness,
it's related to you as a director, but who are

your, you know, who
inspires you as far as filmmakers go?

Well it was always, it was always, you
know, Lynch, people like that, just again, I like

things that were a little left field.

But you know, modern filmmakers
obviously - people like Fincher, he's been amazing.

I look, I was a big Italian cinema 70s,
60s, 70s, so Bertolucci, I mean, Conformist is one

of my favorite films at the time.

I'm a bit like everyone I think, the
more you get into film, you just deep dive into

so many eras and so many different, you
know, for five years I'm just into 60s cinema and

then for another five years, I mean
American cinema in the 70s is freaking phenomenal,

you know.

So I love it all, I really do.

I guess I'm finding it harder to say I love it now.

Korean cinema, that's my last five years for me.

But wait, wait, wait. But what do you
mean you're finding it harder to follow it now?

What does that mean?

I think to get overly excited. I
mean, television's doing it for a lot of us now.

More than cinema, I think.
That's what gets tricky, you know?

Interesting.

Like, it's the bigger films
that I'll go and see in the cinema

for the spectacle and the
impact. But there was a time 20 years ago

I'd go and see so many
independent films. Oh look, the time is running.

That's alright, that's alright.

You can see that the reel spin is...

See? I know, I know, I know.

It's definitely the year of television.
It's got to flip somewhere. It has to, I think.

And then just following up on
that point that I interrupted you on,

you said Korean cinema.
What is it about Korean cinema?

No. Just, it's ballsy. It's
balls to the wall crazy. I love it.

And again, coming from
someone who loves, you know, 20 years ago,

like I was a Lynch,
Lynch-file, like through and through,

to come and to watch some
of these just mad Korean directors.

I mean, Parasite has to be one of
the best films from the last five years.

I mean, I was a huge fan of his prior to that.

I mean, Memories of Murder from him
like 20 years ago, it's just phenomenal.

Again, there's just a bit
more risk taking in everything,

in storytelling and stylistic
choices, you know, things like that.

I just, I... Yeah. It got me excited
again, I think, which is what I'm waiting for again.

I think I'm waiting for
my next phase to get excited.

It's so, so true. And when you
have that moment where you, you know,

whether it's a bloody
painting or a film or whatever,

and you just go, "Oh!" You know, it's...

It just hits you

somewhere. Music does it to me as well
or something, right? There's something where

it just all of a sudden something left
of field just starts to just grabs you and then

you just go that's it. I'm
running with that for the next five years.

That's my thing, you know,
I sort of I sort of love it. So

well, I'm gonna be I'm gonna
be good and my timer has run out but

Michael, thank you.
Thank you so much it for me. It's

it's fascinating and and
it's and it's great to see you

Great to see you as well. Pleasure. Cheers, man

Michael, thank you so much. It
was great to see you mate. I miss you

Thank you to my executive producer MixingLight.com

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thank you to my friend of the show
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It's it's awesome and I appreciate it

Until next time keep
coloring outside the lines. Take care

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