M² · The Bridge, from the air
Treatment by M2ONE Carmel
October 2026
The Founding Generation
Rotate your phone
The Founding Generation · ONE Carmel
M² proposes to film ONE Carmel from the land as it is today to the last finished estate, beginning with the founding films, filmed by March 2027.
Every film M² makes is a story first. This one starts before the first groundbreaking: 891 acres of the historic September Ranch, as they are today. The ten Founders' Estates are the characters. Each is filmed in the hour its light belongs to, from first light to the last of the sunset.
Everything in camera. Nothing generated.
When the first home rises, targeted for July 2027, the land as it stands today is gone for good. The founding films keep it, shot on cinema cameras: the land's provenance, the archive every later film cuts back to.
Before and after, from the same frames.
Each estate is filmed at its own time of day, the hour its light is best. First light: The Gift, The Heirloom, The Peak. Day: The Vista, The Sanctuary, The Legacy. Golden hour: The Treasure, The Panorama. Last light: The Sunset, The Pinnacle.
Ten short films, each opening on its own title card. Together they tell one story, a single day on the land, from first light to last.
A 120-degree southeast aspect: the eastern sunrise first, the Pacific sunset last. We hold the sun clearing the hills in one unbroken take.
A winding drive opens onto a level clearing facing southeast. The approach is the shot: one continuous move until the land opens.
A private hilltop drive to a perch high above the hills, the Santa Lucia Mountains beyond. The day begins here.
A private hilltop over the valley floor, which can be combined with The Panorama. We travel from the valley floor up to where a home will stand.
Native grasses, tucked away from every neighbor, with full southern exposure. Wind in the grass, no people in frame.
Its own hilltop at the heart of ONE Carmel, out to Carmel Valley and the Pacific. Filmed from the center outward.
A plateau on its own peak, with a long downslope to the valley and the Pacific. A slow push to the edge, then over it.
A private knoll staged for the sunset over the Pacific, which can be combined with The Vista. The sun held until it is gone.
An ocean-view crest with a panorama of all 891 acres, west-facing through the long late light.
Ground that seems to float above the landscape. The last of the sunset, the final frame of the day.
Art is the founding identity of ONE Carmel. The art film follows the program James Pihakis is building: works placed across the land, commissions as they arrive. We film each work the way a visitor meets it: the walk up, its scale against the hills, the light moving across it from first light to last. Its own film, cut alongside the founding films.
Alongside the art film, the residency gets its own film: artists at work on the ranch, filmed close on hands, tools, the medium itself, while the work is still being made. It's the way we filmed Daniel Boulud at the pass. Future owners see what a rendering never shows them, a place where people make things.
The clubhouse, the equestrian center and the historic barn come back alongside the first homes. They are the life a future owner is really paying to live next to. We film the rebuild as it happens: the first ride out to the arena, the barn's first exhibition, an evening in the clubhouse, a season of horses on the grass, all cut against the ranch as it stands today, patina and all. Future owners in Hong Kong see that life before they ever visit. Monterey County sees its equestrian center stay open to everyone.
Story comes first. Here the story is the land in its light, with everything that has lived on it since long before the homesites were drawn: oak over open grass, quail in the brush, hawks overhead, deer at the tree line at first light. We shoot it as it is, in natural light, with dawn and dusk scheduled like talent. One idea per shot, on cinema cameras: held still on tripods, moving on a dolly, or in the air. Owners and guests get the discretion they know from us at The Bridge. We work a full room without anyone feeling the camera. Rego and I are on every shoot, with a crew we trust, sized to what each day needs.
We build sound the way we build the picture. Sound is what turns an image into a place you're standing in. The score decides how that place feels. Rego and I cut the sound design with the music as one piece, recorded on location, scored to the frame.
For ONE Carmel, the land is the instrument. Wind, grass, hooves, water, recorded on the ranch, then scored. A future owner in Hong Kong hears the place before ever setting foot on it.
Sound plays in the live version.
Shuga Films set a bar for light, texture and stillness in finished villas and hotels. The pages that follow pair that level with work we have already made, pointed at 891 acres of untouched land becoming estates, across seasons, through groundbreaking to completion.
Films for Rimac, Rolls-Royce, Lamborghini, Michael Andrews Bespoke and Doug Bihlmaier, made the same way we will make yours. Mate Rimac, CEO of Bugatti, founder of Rimac, proudly shared our work on his personal Instagram account. Our four Rimac films drew 35.9 million views on Instagram alone.
The Bridge is invitation only. So is the Monticello Invitational. We've filmed both, year after year. At Monticello, we were the only crew there. When Rolls-Royce opened its Manhattan flagship, the whole night was planned around the Spectre and Daniel Boulud. They had our team on it from load-in to the last plate. The people in those rooms are the families ONE Carmel is built for.
When ONE Carmel hosts during Monterey Car Week, the people filming it should already be trusted in that room. We are. The work earned it. The hosts we've filmed for walked away with films that look the way their room felt. Those results keep us in the room. ONE Carmel gets the same. Bridgehampton to Pebble Beach, dusk till dawn, this is what we do.
After the shoot, we cut the films to the music, letting the long takes breathe. Later films cut back to the archive: the same ground, before and after.
The color is graded by hand, to the light we shot in. The sound is mixed with the score.
The founding films, the land as it is. Filmed by March 2027.
The groundbreaking. July 2027: the first home begins, filmed against the archive.
The build. From July 2027, with a short film from the land every week, for the partners, for social.
The estates. Each home filmed finished, then cut against the land it was built on.
Also proposed, each scoped separately: the September Ranch film as the rebuild begins. The residency film, as the artists arrive. The Ferrari event, when dated. Monterey Car Week, the hosted evenings, filmed as they happen.
Every film subtitled in Traditional Chinese, with vertical cuts for WeChat.
We're Moses and Rego, M², based in New York. For a decade and change, I cultivated delicate and complex relationships with some of the world's most discerning collectors, founders and families. I guided them through acquisitions of their prized Rolls-Royces, Bugattis, Koenigseggs, Paganis, Rimacs, and whatever came next. Many of those relationships became friendships. M² is built on them. I direct. Rego is our director of photography. His photographs have made the cover of several magazines. He's also our editor: every M² film in these pages, from Rimac to Lamborghini, passed through his hands.
Walk us through the land and the vision you have for it. We'll map out the first shoot together.