Fran Hitrec

And when my mom saw the pictures she decided to buy me that camera Sony Alpha 100 with Sony E 18-200mm f 3.5-6.5 zoom lens and a single battery and one 4 GB memory card and that was all of my gear till I got a new camera. In the fallowing years I workt on my drawing and photography.

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My first experience with the set was in 1995 where I was playing baby Matija in series Smogovci since the two fictional characters Mazalo and Dunja had a baby my mother who played Dunja took me so I can be with her on the set, so you could say that was my shot at the acting carrier. The second was in 2004 at the movie set ''Snivaj, zlato moje'' where I spent some time on the movie set watching my mother act as well the other actors and how cameraman works , the director ( my brother ) , the lightning and everyone involved and where I had my first movie set experience. The third was in 2006 in a film studio for the series ''Obični ljudi'' ( ''ordinary people'' ) where I was on multiple occasions watching how the series was created and watching and talking to the cameraman and on one occasion I was asked by producer if I wanted to film one scene where my mother was a character dr. Novosel so I happily and a little bit anxious said yes and the cameraman set everything up and I got behind the camera and shot my first scene that made in the series final cut but I was naturally uncredited since I didn't have credentials .. yet

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I have attended sketching , drawing , painting and linocut course for two years from 2008 to 2009 in Učilište za likovno obrazovanje, kreativnost i dizajn – Studio Tanay, which in turn helpt my photography and future cinematography since now I can create an image on almost all types of surfaces.

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In the year 2010 I was accepted in a School of Applied Arts and Crafts where for the first year I had lots of art classes like drawing and painting , technical drawings , history of art etc. In the year 2011 I was accepted in photography section of a school where I learned how to : develop analog film and pictures , use Photoshop , make black and white photos colourfull , use a studio , create business cards , posters , magazine covers etc.

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During my School years I have bought a tripod and an analog camera Canon Eos 50e with Sigma 28-200mm f 3.5-5.6 zoom lens and Canon Speedlite 420ez flash, so I photographed with the analog camera which I wasn't unfamiliar but this was my first professional SLR 35mm camera and I enjoyed taking pictures with it and then developing a film and then making my own picture which was magical for me since I did the whole process, from pressing the trigger to having that picture in my hands that I made myself.

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In the year 2012 I have participated in 3rd International exhibition Feeling of joy in digital photos of students aged 12 - 19 HRV-InSEA i Gradski muzej i galerija Jastrebarsko where I won 3rd place in High school / Art school students, 14/15 - 19 ys category with the very same picture I took at the family gathering which was my first accomplishment in photography.

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In the year 2014 I have finished School of Applied Arts and Crafts as a Photography Dizainer.

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Shortly thereafter I have begun to work Pro bono in the theatre Trešnja the same one I used to spend a lot of time as a kid and where my mom still worked and I begun to take pictures of costumes and makeup for the archive of the theatre which I have thought myself how to work with people in a stressful situations because I would take pictures in the middle of the play so the actors had so little time for posing and so I have become more adaptable and faster.

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In 2015 I have become member of Matica Hrvatska – Photography Art Section where I have for now in 2015 I 2016 had two joint exhibitions under the theme Masks for the occasion of carnival in Muzej Grada Samobora.

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In the meantime I was improving myself so I could be a better photographer and cinematographer by reading books and watching a lot of movies and series but now I was watching them differently not just solely for entertainment I was watching how they were made how did they set up the lightning where were the actors how did scenes flow at what angle was the camera and soon I began to notice that I viewed all of it differently; not only as a entertainment anymore but also as a profession where a dramatic scene I experienced as actors well played expression , perfectly balanced lightning and a great angle of a camera in which you can see what is really important and how all of it is beautiful no matter what the scene contains , it's simply beautiful when it all comes together and for me that is art ; art is that perfect moment that perfect detail perfect expression that is captured in photograph or a scene that is this little moment of pure joy or anger or harmony of elements that you can see , you can feel and even thou you cannot put it into words, you understand all of it.

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I the year 2016 I made my first short experimental film called ''Anegdota'' (''Anecdote'') which was ,as the name suggests , an anecdote of me and my father trying to start various lawnmowers after the winter and all of them braking down. The film was shot on my new camera Canon EOS 750D with Canon EF 50mm f 1.8 STM fixed lens and Canon EF-S 18-135mm f 3.5-5.6 IS STM zoom lens that I was still trying to adjust since I just got it so I didn't know all that I can do with it but I shot the film so I can experiment making a movie with various angles and shots.

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In 2017 I made second short film called ''Put Kući'' (''Journey Home'') which is about a men traveling from some house to his home where he is all alone and unhappy until he comes home and sits by his piano and started playing ,where he smiles for the first time in a movie , just a little smile of happiness. I have experimented with this movie also by making the entire film without any light source except the sun , where every scene was shot 1 hour later so there is a whole spectre of light, and existing room light in few scenes where I experimented with various types of scenes which were made with same equipment as the first movie plus new Canon EF-S 10-18 mm f 4.5-5.6 IS STM wide lens and tripod witch in my opinion was a slight improvement then the first film.

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As for my style ,well, I am still developing and modifying it but I suppose that will never stop .

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In photography I look for details mostly, but I love to take pictures of the architecture , animals , patterns , counter light , black and white and now and again other things I see a great photo. As for my style I like a little desaturated look ,but like I said, I am still in developing process but what I know for sure is that I do not make all of my pictures in that one style since I don’t see all of the pictures as the same because every single picture has it's own soul , it's own personality , it's own purpose so when I look at the street for example and I see a picture I see how it should be how it should look like before I make a picture and when I got that picture that I imagined in my head on my camera so that others see what I see and how I saw it I edit it just a little bit so that it is in a colour that I saw it .

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In cinematography I look for coordination’s of the movement, little expression’s , space in which the scene is placed and beautiful continuation of a movement for example : the girl sits in a chair an looks up with her green eyes and sees her husband , the eyes become narrow , skin around the eyes wrinkles , her cheeks lift up , jaw opens ever so slightly and the mouth widens as she begins to smile upon seeing her beloved husband ... that is the example of a beautiful expression of joy in it's purest form in those little details that pass in a moment but are the perfect moment  that can only be captured on the film to see the real beauty of it ; the perfection.

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As for style I love still shots , steady cam shots , trolley shots, crane shots , slow motion , fast motion , details , wide shots , close ups etc. But I really really dislike shaky cam , scenes that are supposed to be still but are taken from the shoulder mounted camera that moves the picture ever so slightly , fast cuts ( example: Resident Evil : The Final Chapter ) but there are exceptions where I like those effects  like for example running scenes where the camera fallows the movement of the runner  bouncing left to right following the footsteps or for example : Saving Private Ryan the opening scene where the camera is anxious just like the soldiers or when the camera falls with the soldiers or when American soldiers are behind the bunker trying to take out the machinegun nest and as the Capitan peeks behind cover at the machinegun nest , camera peeks with him, fallows him, Germans open fire and Capitan jerks back into cover and the camera jerks back also but not something like Jason Bourne fight scenes that makes scene uncomfortable and unclear , that I don't like so I do not do that as for why I don’t like it well that probably has something to do with me growing up in the theatre.

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As for my inspirations for film making I have two : The Grand Budapest Hotel and series Peaky Blinders.

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The Grand Budapest Hotel is my ideal of a photographer making a movie ; every scene is a moving photo picture where you can stop every scene at any moment and have a wonderful photograph , every scene is colourific , actors with interesting faces , theatrical expression’s , sometimes theatrical scenes , interesting characters who look interesting as their characters are , changing of the movie formats with the period of the movie that the formats were popular in that period, compositions ,camera angles , lenses... everything is perfect so much in fact that it looks strange because it's so perfect.

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Peaky Blinders for me is a type of filming I would hope I will someday be that good of a cameraman because 95% percent of the scenes are exactly how I would set the scenes if I could choose how to film those scenes because every scene in the series is , at the same time , a perfect picture and perfect movies scene that you can just stop anywhere and have breath-taking picture  that you can look for an hour and it will be still so beautiful that you can put on a wall. Combination of the close ups and wide shots etc. , little desaturated colours , movement of the camera it is all what you could say is my style when you combine styles of my photography with my cinematography and I hope I would someday make a film in style like the Peaky Blinder series are.

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In 2018 i got my first job on the movie ''The Match'' and a week after that my second job on the movie ''Slice Of Life'' and on the movie sets i realised i belong there because i felt right at home.

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In 2022-2023 i was a photographer for the movie Dnevnik Pauline P and i was very proud of that.

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Currently i'm working on my freelance jobs doing events , weddings ,engagement's etc.

 

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