If your name is Adam, and you have dominion over the birds of the air and the beasts of the field, people look at you with respect. And you're likely to be on hand when an Old Testament-style apocalypse blows up out of nowhere.

So it was with the film "Take Shelter," which opened in Charlotte last weekend after critical respect at festivals (including the Critics Week Grand Prize at Cannes).

Michael Shannon plays a construction foreman in Ohio who sees horrible visions that he takes to be predictions of a dire disaster. Nobody believes him, and he questions his own sanity.

Cinematographer Adam Stone, who still officially lives in Charlotte, was in charge of his nightmares: towering storms, fearsome lightning, flocks of black birds that wheel menacingly and thud to the ground in death. Stone, director Jeff Nichols and visual effects supervisor Chris Wells created a world that was alternately sunny and scary, benevolent and brutal.

His last film to play here, the 2007 "Great World of Sound," was a low-key satire of music industry practices directed by Craig Zobel. His next movie, which stars Reese Witherspoon and Matthew McConaughey, is his first with A-list actors: It is Nichols' "Mud," a drama about two teenage boys who vow to help a fugitive escape from a Mississippi River island. (Stone calls this "a coming-of-age movie that has undertones of 'Huckleberry Finn.' ")

Stone, who graduated from UNC School of the Arts in 1999, has now made nine of his 12 features with UNCSA classmates: three with Nichols, three with Zobel, three as second unit director of photography for David Gordon Green.

He still maintains Mortimer Jones, his Charlotte production company, and says he still lives in Charlotte, though he's not here often. In fact, he was stuck so deeply in "Mud" that he could only send email answers this time around.

Q: A lot of "Take Shelter" reviews singled out the cinematography for praise. Are you at the point now where a director treats you like a collaborator?

"Cinematography is a collaborative endeavor. It takes a great director, gaffer and crew to bring amazing visuals to the screen. A cinematographer can't take full credit for a film's visuals."

Q: Many extraordinary shots were created by the visual effects department. Is it less challenging to work with effects, because you don't have control over all the labor? Or is it more challenging, because shots have to fit into the overall look of the film?

"The VFX shots seemed very daunting when I first read the script, especially the storms that haunted (Shannon's character). If the storms looked fake or were shot wrong, the film would fall flat on its face.

"We were fortunate to have an outstanding VFX house on board, Hydraulx, which worked on 'Avatar' and 'The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.' They did a fabulous job leading our production team through the process of making an effects-intensive film. In the end, the VFX work was not that difficult. They seamlessly integrated their effects into our visuals."

Q: Are UNCSA guys looking out for each other in the business? Do you want to make the leap from this kind of indie product to more mainstream movies?

"I was lucky to graduate with a super-talented group of filmmakers (who) have a shared vision: It was cultivated by the success and honesty of 'George Washington' (director David Gordon Green's 2000 breakthrough). 'George Washington' taught us we could make successful films outside of Hollywood.

"I hope my films stand on their own and are recognized for authenticity and beauty. If I never make the jump to bigger-budget films, I'd be fine with that."