In the supernatural romance The Age of Adeline title character (Blake Lively), a young woman in the early 20th century, has an accident that stops her from aging. As time passes to WWII, the postwar era and right up to today, she suffers a lonely existence as she watches everyone around her grow old and die. Colorist Stephen Nakamura worked with director Lee Toland Krieger and cinematographer David Lanzenberg to bring different looks to each time period in this epic story.

Toland had sought out Nakamura in part because of the colorist’s work on David Fincher’s The Game (shot by Harris Savides, ASC), which had a look the cinematographer really responded to. Nakamura touches on the various looks the filmmakers wanted for Adeline. “The early part was a bit like old photographs,” he says, “not that colorful. Then we go into a very colorful period for the ’40s and ’50s, with a lot of vibrant exteriors and tremendously blue skies. The contemporary parts aren’t so full of saturated colors. Things look more ‘silvery;’ there’s not as much chroma.

“It was definitely a fun project to work on,” Nakamura sums up. “It’s always great to work with filmmakers who really think a lot about how the use of color helps contribute to the story they’re telling.”