Broken Arrow photographer inspires Ron Howard short film with winning “Project Imagin8ion” photo
"Yea, Though I Walk," by Broken Arrow photographer Chris Wehner, is among the eight winning images chosen by Oscar-winning Oklahoma-born director Ron Howard in his "Project Imagin8ion" contest. Wehner's photo of a decorative gate at Tulsa's Memorial Park Cemetery will inspire the obstacle in a short film directed by Howard's daughter, actress Bryce Dallas Howard.
From Friday’s Weekend Look section of The Oklahoman.
Broken Arrow photographer’s image selected to inspire Ron Howard short film
Chris Wehner’s photo of a decorative gate and Tulsa’s Memorial Park Cemetery is one of eight winners in the Oscar-winning filmmaker’s groundbreaking “Project Imagin8ion” contest.
TULSA — On a cloudy day late last year, Chris Wehner stopped traffic so he could snap pictures of a towering decorative gate at a local cemetery.
“I’ve driven by it a thousand times, and it never really jumped out of me,” he said. “But this one particular day it really did because the sky was really ominous and the whole scene just kind of fit that gate. So I just pulled over right there on 51st Street — and I always have my camera gear with me — and I blocked traffic and took the shot.
“It was one of those lucky, once-in-a-lifetime photo ops.”
The dramatic image has presented the Broken Arrow photographer with another once-in-a-lifetime opportunity: to inspire Oscar-winning filmmaker Ron Howard and his daughter, actress and aspiring director Bryce Dallas Howard.
Titled “Yea, Though I Walk,” Wehner’s striking photo of a gate at Tulsa’s Memorial Park Cemetery has been named one of the winners of the groundbreaking “Project Imagin8ion” contest.
In May, Ron Howard, who was born in Duncan, and Canon U.S.A. launched “Project Imagin8ion,” inviting photographers of all skill and age levels to submit their most imaginative pictures in eight different categories, each representing a core tenet of storytelling.
More than 96,300 photos were submitted. The winning images in each category — setting, character, mood, time, goal, relationship, obstacle and the unknown — came from across the country and will be used to inspire a forthcoming short film that Ron Howard will produce and his daughter will direct.
Wehner’s striking photo of “Our final obstacle — the entry gate to the hereafter,” as he described it, won the obstacle category and lavish praise from the Academy Award-winning helmer of “A Beautiful Mind.”
Actress Bryce Dallas Howard, left, and her father director Ron Howard attend the Glamour Reel Moments event held at the Directors Guild of America on Monday, Oct. 16, 2006, in Los Angeles. Father and daughter are collaborating on a short film through "Project Imagin8ion," a groundbreaking photo contest. (AP file photo)
“It’s a very powerful, evocative and graphic frame of a cemetery and a cemetery gate with a powerfully dramatic sky,” Ron Howard said in a YouTube video. “I will admit that in the early, formative stages of the story that is beginning to take shape that this image helped stimulate an unusual direction for the story. It’s both beautiful (and) eerie, mysterious and very, very cinematic.”
Wehner, 40, entered the “Project Imagin8ion” competition after seeing TV commercials for it. He submitted four photos in various categories but thought his cemetery gate image was ideal for the obstacle division.
“Looking through the thousands of amazing photos that were uploaded from people all over the country, it was kind of daunting trying to figure out where your pictures fit in,” he said. “I felt pretty good about that one, but honestly not so good that I thought I’d win.”
Wehner drives past Memorial Park Cemetery, near 51 and Memorial, every day on his way to his commercial and automobile window-tinting business. Photography is his passion and side business.
On the fateful fall day he took his winning picture, he used high dynamic range imagery to capture the entire scene’s gothic look with startling, almost three-dimensional clarity.
“That shot really wouldn’t have worked with puffy clouds and the sun … and the sky really pulled that whole scene together,” he said “That shot was probably nine different exposures and I kind of layer them into Photoshop and then blend them so that I can deal with that much dynamic light. Just one single shot off a camera could not do that shot.”
He was satisfied when the “Project Imagin8ion” judges placed his image in the top 30 among the obstacle entries. He was excited when the public vote put his picture in the top 10. But knowing that Ron Howard personally selected his photo “is the most stunning part about the whole thing.”
Ron Howard, Bryce Dallas Howard and Freestyle Productions are working with the eight winning photos to craft the story, develop the script and produce the short film, which goes into production in September. It will premiere later this year in New York City, where the winners will be invited to a red carpet event and get to meet Ron Howard.
“With Ron Howard, who knows, he’s such a creative talent, there’s no telling what they’ve got written up,” Wehner said. “They’re just amazing photos and it’s a real honor to be amongst those.”
“And I’ll be one degree of Ron Howard, and now we’re gonna be two degrees of Kevin Bacon since Ron Howard directed Kevin Bacon in ‘Apollo 13.’ So that’s pretty cool.”
To know more
See all eight winning photos from Ron Howard and Canon U.S.A.’s “Project Imagin8ion” contest at www.youtube.com/imagination. To see a video of the Oscar-winning director, who was born in Duncan, talking about Broken Arrow photographer Chris Wehner’s winning image in the obstacle category click here.
-BAM
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