Movie lights

East Aurora native Shane Hurlbut was working in Hollywood as a grip truck driver on “Phantasm 2,” a modestly budgeted horror film, when a colleague made an inquiry that would illuminate Hurlbut's true calling.

“We were on a crematorium set and he asked me if I would be scared to walk in there, but every nook and cranny of the place was lit. From that point on, everything I looked at was light,” Hurlbut said.

There may indeed be no better way of describing Hurlbut's career choice than a light bulb metaphor. As a director of photography, Hurlbut has managed the arrangements of color and light in music videos, commercials and major motion pictures for more than ten years.