Original subtitles

you

light while light having his knowledge

knowledge is love love is freedom

freedom is energy energy so without any

doubt without light we can't have any

images

a cinematographer is a visual

psychiatrist moving the audience through

a movie from here to there to there to

here making him think the way you want

to think painting pictures in the dark

you have to light you have to compose

and you have to create movement and

those are the three elements of

cinematography

you have to get style the hard way you

earn it by growing it internally and

letting it bubble out from inside some

of it comes from experience some of it

comes from inspiration and some of it

just happens film is like a sumo

wrestler it's you know sometimes you get

thrown out of the ring by it and

sometimes you win

I think it's really important to really

delve deep into it and really become

part of your subconscious and your

psyche to really develop an idea for how

you visually want to represent a story

we have the ability to work in all

genres and each film should have its own

style

I think was the fascination initially

with the technology and then how

mastering that technology in the service

of art made cinematography such a unique

thing that just kept me in it to this

day

my name is Ramirez Harrison Russell so

Brooke

Howard Anderson I'm Howard Anderson the

third Peter Anderson my name is Michael

ball house DM BB I'm Bill Bennett

Gabrielle berry stain and a machinima

tog refer a Mexican British educated and

American improved Larry bridges Jonathan

Brown I'm Steve Bureau - cinematographer

bill Butler

Bobby burn Russell carpenter James

chrysanthus your callisters yeah

Cooperman Erickson Corps I'm Richard

crudo I'm Dean candy Oliver catice I'm

Allen Davila and I'm a cinematographer

Roger Deakins Peter Deming Caleb

Deschanel I'm Ron Dexter bill bill

George P or ODB Ernest Dickerson I'm

Richard Edlund John Fowler I'm dawn

Fauntleroy and Steve fair burg William a

Fraker my name is Michael [ __ ] Steven

gold bland my name's Jack green Adam

greenberg Ravi Greenberg cinematographer

my name is Hannah Hoffman

Ernie Holzmann my name is Gil Hubbs I'm

Judy a rola mark Kerwin levy Isaacs

Johnny Jensen I'm Victor J Canberra

Frances Kenny Richard Klein Fred Cana

camp my babies Iászló kovács last local

watch I'm Ellen caress ASC yamato-class

coos hi I'm amber Lazlo

I am Dunedin wah Matt you know Peter

levy Matthew the boutique

I'm Steven Leight Hill karvall

son-in-law Bruce Lowen Julio makan

Isadora Mankowski ASC Chris Manley

Steven Mason I'm Clark Mathis dawn with

quake Rob mcLaughlin check Minsky Donald

M Morgan Cramer Morgenthau David Mullen

Fred Murphy my name is Huell Naruto I'm

Michal Negrin my name is Saul Negron

Darrin Okada I'm witty omens I'm Daniel

Pearl fern Pearlstein wally pfister bill

Pope Stephen poster Bob primes

Toni returned I'm a cinematographer my

name is Owen Roseman Pete Romano I'm

Paul Ryan from Nancy Shriver my name is

John Schwartzman my name is John Steele

Dean Semler

hi I'm Michael Sarrazin from New Zealand

Steven Shaw Newton Thomas Segal and on

my best days I'm a cinematographer

Bradley 6 Dantas Funaki I'm hooli

Steiger my name is Tom Stern my name is

Vittorio Storaro I'm a cinematographer

I'm not a director of photography Rodney

Taylor I'm John tow and less

cinematographer case fellows I'm Amy

Vincent

my name is Haskell

Wechsler Gordon Willis ralph Woolsey

Robert yeoman ambien mows England

messing them about you affair invariably

two questions come up and the first

question somebody will ask how did you

reading me

started the film business when I was a

kid I was I was mad about movies but it

was a long time is my I suppose my

career my life just sort of gradually

sort of gradually grew into my dreams

really you know I became a

cinematographer because at 14 after

being interested in photography for

about four years I met a cinematographer

in the day I met him I decided that's

what I wanted to do for the rest of my

life I got interested when I first saw a

demonstration of color television and I

had gone to movies and had

black-and-white television but when I

saw color I said I have to find out how

they do this even though in those days

you really had no hope of ever becoming

anyone in the movie business unless

you're somehow connected to somebody in

the business well my father was a

cinematographer I was born into it

my dad was an animation count I was in a

family business my father my uncle and

my grandfather and all of the relatives

that I can remember on my father's side

were barbers my father was a makeup

artist at Warner Brothers Brooklyn

during the Depression so I was always

around hanging around hanging around and

I decided I want to be an actor early on

when I was a kid lucky for me I changed

my mind I became a cinematographer

because of the influence of my

grandmother and she was a schoolteacher

must find Mexico when I was in Mexico

being been from a family of actors and

filmmakers my aunt who along with my

mother we're both extras and my aunt

said Billy you're gonna go to school

and you're gonna become a

cinematographer and I said what do you

mean and she said they're the most

respected people on the set they're all

wear ties

and it's a great profession my dad

always contended it was a great business

to fall back on if you had another

opportunity little did I know I spent

seven years cutting hair waiting for an

opportunity

my father was head of the Portrait

Gallery at Warner's my mother had been

an art dealer my father was a painter

and sculptor so if I went to become a

lawyer or a doctor I think I would have

been disowned I could never draw or

paint or do anything like that

I picked this camera up and I could

paint mother says wreck and Menace in

Minnesota I was born and raised in

Chicago I was born in Hungary Sydney

Australia born and raised in Los Angeles

I grew up in Mexico I grew up in

Cleveland Ohio

I'm originally from Poland this was o

Claire Wisconsin you know I come from an

area of Italy where which is very far

away from any movie industry we go back

actually to Jerusalem when I started I

built a tent and I start pick up

cartoons splicing together I love film

because all I've ever done really it's

all I've ever done from right from when

I left school at 15 I joined I joined

path a news

I started in television when I was 16 as

a props boy I was a messenger boy

running up and down Water Street with

cans of film I was lucky that my father

as a beautiful dream he was a

projectionist in a very big company in

Italy in the 15 it looks film looks

fitting and it was dreaming probably to

be part of the image they were screen so

it put his dream on me when I was a kid

I liked still photography loved it I

thought for a while I wanted to be a

photographer for Life magazine like Jean

Smith who was one am I here my childhood

heroes and the year I was a senior in

high school life folded and I ended up

starting go to university because of not

knowing any better I'm not daring to

apply to film school and then when I

went to college I kind of was trying to

decide should I go into filmmaking which

see my jumping off a cliff if you were

in Detroit in college I was a lighting

designer I was the AV guy was a town

projectionist I was also the school

projections every school

- it was in school studying mathematics

and physics I studied engineering in

college I'm educated as the mechanical

engineer in Copenhagen Denmark I was

studying English literature at Hofstra

University and I needed six credits to

graduate and I took a film course

well my first love really was journalism

I began studying architecture in

addition to your film studies I was an

architecture student and I was faced

with a difficult model I which I

couldn't build so I decided to make an

animated film but I remembered when I

was cutting it together between two very

old VCRs and I thirty minutes had passed

and I was getting hungry and I looked up

in actually six hours had passed and I

realized hmm and I never really lost

track of time doing calculus I went to

Johns Hopkins as an undergraduate to

become a physician first I was a movie

buff like watching Favreau teams or the

cinematic machines

I mean projected not tapes at the time

and of course my studies I was studying

many medicine at the time medical

studies but of course I was such a

failure so I had to do something else

and one day once a movie Akira

Kurosawa's Ron and I was pretty blown

away I thought if that's something you

can do I want to do it and seemed like

he film was closer to dreams than the

rest of the art work I was doing the

next big influence would probably be

days of heaven this happened when I was

in college the end of high school I was

happen to be was in a library and I was

walking through the stacks and a book of

a red cover caught my eye and it was

called the work of the motion picture

Cameron by Freddy Young BSC and I said

oh what's that what's the motion picture

camera man in film school I met a young

gentleman by the name of Spike Lee and I

shot all of his student projects in the

second and third years I didn't go to

film school I worked on a lot of a lot

of student films I came out of film

school and then didn't work for a lot of

years I was painting the first year out

of art school I wanted to be a painter

at one time as much as I loved painting

I couldn't I couldn't get them to move

they were like and I took trying to get

them to move and the only way I could do

that was

shooting little films I had a dream I

dreamt of Gandhi and a spinning wheel

and the life magazine pictures that

market pork whited shot and in the dream

they animated not only did the spinning

wheel move but the camera moves around

it and I took that as a sign that maybe

it was time I add the dimension of

motion to to my still photography as a

designer or as an illustrator I would be

dealing with single image and they

became increasingly frustrating just to

be looking at a single image for a long

time and and and being just began to

think of sequence of images to tell tell

stories I was the secretary in the KQED

and I watched the people come out of the

the film Department every day carrying

silver cases and wearing Levi's and I

didn't want to wear nylons anymore I

said truly and I started working with

the film paper film department on the

weekends started actually as a stagehand

I started off as a documentary still

photographer I started as an underwater

camera in the US Navy and I was working

as a waiter I started off as an animator

when I graduated college I arrived here

in Los Angeles and sought work and

initially couldn't get the time of day

from anybody when I moved to New York

and answered an ad in The Village Voice

which got me onto a real movie had a

friend that was working on a low-budget

horror film in South Carolina and I went

down there and worked as a PA started

right from the bottom I was a PA I was a

assistant to the lowest assistant I did

everything from sweeping the floor to

projecting the film when I started in

the business the only equipment diverse

trusted grid was a broom when I was 26

years old I finished film school in

Hungary I went to film school in Hungary

and the revolution came in 1956 against

Russians with my friend boomer segment

we covered all the cinematographers in

the Revolution we were shooting for this

documentary footage we shot about 30,000

feet of film and we had the meeting

secretly think that that some people

will have to volunteer to go to the West

and take the footage out we smuggled it

out and we couldn't obviously we

couldn't go back and I volunteered

actually it was I had the reason to go

as long as we figured we are here in the

West this was still in Germany I'm in

Austria Vienna - well let's go to

Hollywood of course that was easy to say

but it but in reality actually if you

don't know the language you don't know

anybody and you you go and visit all the

Hungarians who are in in the business in

those days you know like your Pasternak

Josh I got bored and you can name all of

them and and then we thought that maybe

that can help us to get into the film

business but then work that way actually

you know they said that first you have

to show what you can do and then we can

help you and I didn't realize it once be

short but we can do we didn't need that

help anymore

like I couldn't get best secretaries at

one point I said that resumes hand

printed on sandpaper just so they would

remember it you know I sent the resumes

written on short cardboard so they

couldn't crumple it up and toss it in

the wastebasket my family won't know

well what are you gonna do with your

life now and they had some some business

ideas some things that I should do to

make something of myself

my father always would say to me when I

was first starting out well why don't

you join CBS oh why don't you get a real

job as you know a cameraman on a news

station became a news cameraman for the

16 mill bill and Hal black

we used to take great pride in shooting

3d do stories on 100 feet of film River

paradox channel with save money and I

managed to get into the government

station which is the Australian

Broadcasting Commission and there was

quite a good little group of features

type cameraman there from the early days

a lot of them were X World War two

combat cameraman so you had this amazing

crossover between fairly sophisticated

features cameraman and rough-and-tumble

alcoholic combat cameraman so it was a

good learning process you didn't know

who you'd be going out with to a system

but you did either end up you know doing

a lovely job of something or totally

drunk I had a couple guys live next door

to me and they asked me if I wanted a

job and I got a job at a television

station no pushing dollies and the boom

and all of that stuff and it seemed like

the coolest guys on the set were around

the camera

I started in 1943 and I worked eight

years as an assistant cameraman and

showed up first day of work with a paper

bag and a tape measure I was never an

assistant I was never an operator

actually even loaded mags and slept

slates for a long time clean tripods and

cleaned up the equipment in the cases

and and drove the gear from place to

place anything good that ever happened

to me happening because of someone else

giving me an opportunity the thing about

the businesses generosity of people so I

had a wonderful learning experiences and

working relationships with oh and

royzman taught me to see in a tenth of a

stop you know I always say when I'm

teaching students anything is

cinematography is an art form but at the

same time it's a craft and it's

definitely a combination of the two one

of my mentors at Dartmouth was Andy

Laszlo he was invited to talk about half

an hour to our to our class on

cinematography and two days later he was

still talking so Andy was a great mentor

and a great inspiration and probably one

of the reasons why I really wanted to

get into the business you have to be

totally absolutely

committed to it you have to it has to

become religion you have to eat it sleep

eat talk it and go after every

opportunity is to get yourself

established and in the process I ran

into this wonderful man who eventually

became my mentor Ron Dexter

and I would say Ron Dexter was an

inspiration to so many of us I taught

all along once I knew something I'd

share whatever I knew he would have

occasional symposiums where he would

talk about what he was doing and show

the experiments that he was making and

then he'd have us all bring in pieces of

film what we were shooting and have

group discussions I was lucky that the

gaffer really took an interest in my

learning electricity and light my mentor

in Hollywood is the cinematographer Bill

Maher cygwin I had the opportunity to

work with Vittorio here in Los Angeles

and I would pick up mr. Ferraro at the

at the hotel and sunset every morning

and we were drive by drive him to work

and I would ask him a question about

maybe composition or a certain scene

we're doing today and then I would get a

30 or 40 minute lecture I felt like a

doctorate on composition or color or

Yugoslavian primitive art or whatever it

was that was his inspiration for that

for that film so when I was young and I

was mentoring it was a really unique

opportunity to get to spend time with

these people and really sort of

understand their thought process I mean

I can remember with Vittorio bringing my

light meter in a sketchbook around and I

used to just berate me and he'd say

that's not what it's about it's you know

it's from the heart it's about the

emotion and I thought to myself yeah

yeah that's all good and well your

Vittorio Storaro I was always supposed

to be told you stood out even in my

beginning when I started there was

nobody knew me nobody

you know so myself compared to what I

did before I think the you should be

always yourself from when you start from

when you are in the journey or when you

think you reach one specific place

that's part of your personality part of

your way of thinking but you always do

it many times yes young cinematographer

telling me you can do that or maybe

refuse the project or maybe do one

selection in your life because you are

now this kind of person I always did

that I mean I remember that on the first

film germinate surgery Nitza and I was

doing tests for actors everywhere like

more or less your crew was much more

cruel we were working in a very simple

way and just try to understand what the

movie's supposed to look like and so now

I find myself uncomfortable for what did

he had to ask me to do and I was forced

to do it and at the end of the day I was

28 I say to him goodbye

I don't think I came back tomorrow

because I love you you need me you need

someone someone to just put one light

just let you see whoever's in front to

you not in a particular way they you

want to see this person so I don't think

I came back tomorrow

I was might that two years before I we

already have one daughter and my wife

was petting a child we had the only $50

imbalance and I say no no is a very

important word very important yes it's

not a good word all the time you know I

mean it doesn't get you more work in

fact no gets you more work than yes

because anything works while you're

shooting it nothing works in the

screening room if it's no good so what

they said the day before they can't

remember when they get in the screening

room so if you said no to something bad

and it turns out to be right in the

screening room they forget about the

know the day before but they never

forget about the yes if it's no good

and this was wonderful and I was

victorious tonight oh then on my first

film I believe a cinematographer should

always be interpreting we should never

be recording but adding their point of

view their interpretation to anything

and in order to interpret you have to

make a commentary have to say something

about it either with light and dark or

color composition or textures or

whatever to shoot it in a gritty grainy

handle way or do you do it in a very

beautifully lit way with glided tracks

you have to make a decision so it's not

always as obvious what style you would

want to use to make the film when you do

a scene you ask yourself what do you are

the audience to think or feel the end of

this scene they didn't at the beginning

of the same so what path do we take that

will evoke that emotional response by

the end of the scene style yeah

everybody wants a story about style you

know how you get the formula well there

is no formula because style comes out of

you I mean people who like to hear that

you did this you did that but really the

reason you did it is for something that

you were thinking and I actually it

comes out of your life what you've been

exposed to who you are what you think

and that's what ends up on the screen

and style basically comes out of

conceiving designing creating a a visual

approach to a particular story style is

an individual artists own take on things

it's not a coat of paint it's not a suit

that you can just put on it's not a coat

of paint you can just put on a building

it's not surface I'd like to think that

my style is based on the translation of

the material and I think the most

important thing is the the narrative and

our job is to is to take that narrative

and translate it into into imagery style

of the picture and the look of the

picture it starts with the written word

first you read the script start at the

story it's always always always about

the story the script obviously it starts

with the script the story the material

the written word starts with the script

you've got to know the script that

number one you read the script and you

try to figure out what this movie's

gonna look like I mean if I get a script

I really like to read it at least 10

times when you first read the script you

have no idea the cast is what the

location is what the sets are like what

the Wardrobe is but you have a vision is

you come up with pictures you read any

pictures I try to read it for just the

words and the feeling of it I end up

pre-visualize in it no matter how hard I

try not to you first you need the script

and maybe you already have some ideas

how it should look

but the basic thing is that you sit down

with the director and start to talk

about the movie first when I read the

script I never almost never have any

ideas of images and trying to just to

read to see if I would like to see it as

a story at all and also because I

probably because I'm I don't want to

maybe it's wrong I don't know better

maybe I don't want to come to the

meeting and meet the director and say oh

I see very strong colors and the

director say well I see it black and

white so I guess for this reason I just

restrain myself to have any idea in the

beginning and not only the first meeting

but also in the first weeks where I see

my job I like trying to be more like a

sponge and to try to get any information

I can get I very often don't really know

I have my ideas and then you know I let

it I listen a lot and I just walk

through it and pretend I know I don't

have a clue and because it sort of comes

later I really do believe every film

that I've done has sort of found its own

style somehow basically you haven't you

have a great idea or you have an idea

what you want this picture your picture

to look like I call yours because you're

working on it and you talk with your

director and it's usually you and the

director who who who find a bond who

form a marriage and that's what it's all

about and when you go to work with a

director I think you have to find out

what is inside his or her head I'd like

to break down the screenplay with the

director scene foreseeing act by act

discuss things back and forth until we

know it's sort of the the right way to

do it and we'll bash it back and forth

and and we'll keep landing on the

same sort of thing and I think that the

photography falls into place and that if

we're talking about you know how to

shoot something or what the mood is or

how important something is I don't think

the director and I discussed anything

about the style of the film the style

kind of grew out of itself as we work

together they are cinematographers who

are cinematographer painters

cinematographer engineers

cinematographer editors I believe that

I'm a bit of a cinematographer writer in

as much as I try to penetrate a story

really well and I try to find a way in

which my lighting on my camera work

becomes a character within the story

that's why it's called - Imam Musa

because he's nourish itself from the

other Nine Muses from literature from

painting from dancing from philosophy

from sculpture from architecture only

when you are cinema is really today that

in an art form

there were combined all the different

art form in this I think is one of the

things how a style involves for a

picture is that you look at films

together you look at still photographs

you look at paintings in a sense

painters and cinematographers it's

they're cut from the same genetic strain

I mean it's their special every

cinematographer would love to shoot you

know from sunrise for about two hours

and then stop when the lights no good in

the middle of the day and then at the

end of the day shoot at the end of the

day that's like painters painters used

to go out really early in the morning

and capture all their effects and I mean

people said well why you know why did

constable look look better than Turner

and the answer always was constable got

up earlier in the morning when I think

of painters that I would like to make

honorary members of the ASC I would in a

second write a letter to the Membership

Committee for Monet

because Monet taught me a great deal

about color latitude and about

atmosphere

I'm always resourcing visuals sometimes

music but usually visuals from all the

other arts and bringing them together

what I call my brain book which which is

well before we start shooting sometimes

becomes one or two volumes of

photographs of drawings of diagrams of

thoughts that I have about the look of a

picture the idea being that that usually

by the fourth and sometimes by the sixth

week of a production everybody's brain

dead everybody's exhausted and so having

done that work in pre-production in a

coherent state I have a bottom line of

quality that a safety net that I can

descend who by looking into that book

and I'll always have that and then

everything else that I bring is is icing

on the cake what I bring to the style of

a particular movie is that initial

intuitive impulse of how a movie should

feel and the tone style though I think

is so much besides the materials so much

determined by the cinematographers life

experiences and the things that

personally move the artist the

cinematographer when you have an idea

it's usually an idea of you've seen it

you've heard it or you experienced it

when I should movie even prep later in

prep close to shooting I wake up at

night two o'clock three o clock at night

with thoughts with good ideas the best

ideas coming to thirty of nights

ideally you bring your life experience

to the process of making a movie at its

best so you connect to it in a way that

you want your audience to it has to do

with the art you see the photographs the

paintings and so on the images on the

street sometimes delight the way it

falls in certain places on buildings and

so on

everything you've learned influences

what you do Raul Butare wonderful French

Cameron talked about working with guitar

and he said you don't know who this

gentleman that walked through the door

what is in his mind but the left side of

the frame is striving for came from John

Renoir silent film of the 20s and the

right side is a poster he saw in the

Metro that morning and I mean literally

you find out what what is is creating

the images in the directors head and how

you translate those onto film but I

think when you you're kind of looking

for new ways to do things because you

just don't want to be telling each story

the same way that you've told the last

so improvisation and imagination is

really important I really like to

research things have a clear idea what

I'm doing but then I also like to

respond to what happens you know at the

moment I mean an actor can come in and

their performance can so overpower

something that you suddenly realize that

what you imagined was an actor in you

know lost in a setting is suddenly a big

close-up because the performance is so

extraordinary I think you could always

arrive on a set or on a scene and sort

of feel how it should be done and I

think the doctor I like in even a

shooting featuresnow if it looks good

the way it is and it's going to

photograph good the way it is don't

change it don't start changing it

there's just so many factors along the

way that affect you and you you know I

mean it's to some extent it's it's like

you know learning everything you can and

being well rehearsed but then when it

really comes down to it it's like jazz

in the sense that you respond to the

things and you haven't flow with

everything as it as it evolves on the

set on a day as a musician will find a

false in them that they can't really

explain when they play or when they sing

so so you can as a photographer and so

you can as a cinematographer there is a

there's an instinct I think that the

visualization for me always came at the

production meetings and the head banging

that I would do with the director and

the production designer your

communication with your production

designer is

so important because the production

designer and the cinematographer are

there working with the director to find

that look to find the style of a film

the production designer is also a very

key person for me I spent a lot of time

in the art department talking about

color practical lighting if they could

build that into the set I've generally

been on the film earlier than I would

get there they might have done all the

surveys through foreign countries or

they've already started to design

sometimes in fact most times they've

started to build sets so they're way

ahead of you and and I've had the long

talks with the director as to to how the

director wants that scene in that

particular location to play and our

North Fork we wanted an almost black and

white feeling and one of the keys was to

get nothing in color in the frame so our

department in that film actually put

great paint in the ketchup bottles and

our diner scenes we covered all the

surfaces of the counters with great

contact paper we even sewed a black and

white American flag that was blowing in

the wind and I actually got a call back

from the lab asking me how I managed to

get the color out of the American flag

when I told them it was a black and

white American flag against the blue sky

so a lot of cannot can be done in camera

in front of the camera by coordinating

things with art department the key

meeting was the first meeting we had

with the production designer I had read

the script I met Ed Wayne and the

designer we said in a room we just

looked at photo books and I brought

similar photo books then the production

designer had brought in already and all

the walls were pasted with his pictures

and was very magazine and and I had my

Ovitz and things like that and it was

all about color and and how we see the

South because the movie takes place in

my south and from that my concept

evolved I mean it was a great starting

point and it was always something I took

a couple of pictures out of the books

and always stuck them on my wall in the

hotel that was my key thing that's the

first thing you're afraid of as a

cinematographer you can shoot good

pictures individually but you know what

makes you think that as a whole it's

gonna fall together into this this thing

that you meant to be a movie you spend

you come

the look and then you spend three months

doing that one look and then a year

later you see how it worked when it's

all cut together whereas in a commercial

music video you he tries something for a

day you see it two days later you know

okay okay that was good let's try this

and so you can you can grow really

quickly I think commercials have always

sort of been the area that can allow us

to sort of experiment in commercials

it's all about the cinematography that

and the story is what grabs the people

in the first five seconds you've got 30

seconds to tell a story I learned a lot

about shooting via commercials because

there was so much technique in

commercials and so much gear and so much

stuff that you could draw on to learn

things that I learned a lot it was a

great place to begin a career in

cinematography because we were studying

for myself I studied and learned quite a

bit of different technique and was

always trying to look for the new thing

so it gave me a broad quiver of things

to experiment with the things I've

stumbled onto in terms of a look has

come out of ignorance and I mean naivete

and making like horrible mistakes and

then going actually it looks kind of

cool it's kind of interesting and then

if you're smart or at least if you're

paying attention

you let great accidents happen I love

what Connie hole used to call happy

accidents you know you're in a set and

suddenly the light starts flashing

through a window and even even if you

don't use that natural light you

suddenly think well that's it I didn't

think of that so you maybe cut that

light off and put a lamp to do exactly

the same thing so you can have

consistency all cinematographers take

credit for wonderful happy accidents

along the way and you know I'm certainly

one of them where you know the the

clouds come in and you know the light is

amazing for a brief period of time or

suddenly the clouds are blowing over I'm

just looking at this little dapple of

light on my shoulder here and reminds me

of Conrad Hall who was the master of the

found accident and capitalized er or if

you there's such a word

and who capitalizes on those discoveries

always awake for them Conrad who was

great on this he was great on this I

said you know he sometimes he really

want his films to look ugly to capture

something that we don't really that we

normally shy away from him in making

movies you know you ugliness can have a

certain beauty as well it's a strange

sort of dichotomy going on there really

it's symbiotic and it really works hand

in hand I mean there's certain kind of

film it's definitely affected by the

tone of the film the light the shadows

the color how how the camera moves when

it moves the moment that an actor turns

its head and you just pan slightly to

the left to just catch that gaze and to

frame it in a certain way that I think

evokes a certain kind of emotion there's

a spirit in each cinematographers work

that's not comparable to any others you

see the techniques appear to be the same

you see the same approaches in lighting

you see what you can do with the

materials at hand but there there's

always an ineffable quality in the

actual film when it comes out of

processing or onto the avid that is

almost indescribable there is a

definable style that's going through

most of my movies I mean it's applied

differently I mean I do a lot of the

same things but it's applied differently

and I mean I don't mind saying that it's

it's you know and I don't the trick is

to integrate your visual decisions with

the movie with the story and you can

have both I mean you can have a good

movie with good visuals I mean that's

the best movie you know good content

good visual structure you know I think

it's very important that the style of

the film be as transparent as possible

now I'm saying that having done movies

like the rocker we're getting in Ferrara

which are almost all style but that's

what really those movies were about

because in those cases if you ever

stopped long enough to figure out that

an oil driller was on an asteroid and he

was gonna blow it up with a nuclear bomb

you probably would have left the theater

so the idea was to keep the to keep it

visual into

to make it exciting for an audience and

that and that was the goal of a picture

like that and we knew it going in I'm

not demeaning the work it was just of we

were we were meeting a different set of

needs for a picture like that then then

I was on a picture like Seabiscuit where

it was really very emotional and very

moving and I didn't want my work to get

in the way of the story the matrix was

influenced almost entirely by the light

yes believe it or not as interpreted by

filmmakers in in the 60s so after they

discovered this great emotion like blue

in Paris in the conformist I felt that I

need to discover him a deeper the

possibility of this vibration do

discolor so many other movie that and

after the confirm is sever one I tried

to use this color to investigating the

possibility of this color till they get

in a Last Tango in Paris and I remember

that was going to see Bernardo every

weekend in Paris and I was so astonished

about the chance the Paris a city in

winter of all the lights on was alike a

city light in their Tavitian light when

he's on during the daytime as a kind of

conflict between the artificial energy

international energy it was give me the

feeling totally different almost

opposite complimentary of the blue of

the rest of the conformist in orange

like the warm feeling the kind of womb

of the mother or the city of Paris there

was been bracing ourselves when I was

thinking about the Godfather both one

and here at the time I it was about 20

minutes before we started the movie that

I finally decided what it should look

like and the feeling of how a film

should look really comes out of you and

I can't tell you why I decided that I

said was it should be kind of dirty and

streaked and should be brassy yellow and

if somebody said why did you decide that

I was how to say I have no idea

it felt like it should be that way I

almost wonder if

the Godfather would look the way it does

if somebody had sat on the set with a

video monitor and looked at what was

going to come out on the screen they

would everybody would have chickened out

and that's a problem I think there were

people who felt that way and there are

other people that felt at god almighty I

don't want to hire him look what will

happen so yes yeah I got for Gangs of

New York

I got influenced a little by Reverend I

must say because Marty gave me a book

about Raymond which is but the best book

that came out about Rembrandt and his

way of shadows and darkness and people

being in the shade and people being in

the bright light also the simplicity of

of the lighting was influential on the

way I tried to light Gangs of New York

well st. Elmo's fire because that was a

that was the ensemble picture you had

five or six kids and there was a lot of

rapid-fire dialogue and I thought it

would be more interesting to always have

it in the group so be shot in scope so

you could fit five people across the

frame everybody would be you know like a

waist figure so you'd see them very well

and they all the more good actors it was

good dialogue and they can just spit

that stuff out like crazy I think it's

more interesting to see actors take

their paces off of each other than have

it forced by the cutting deliverance

they decided that it has to have a very

real look if it will actually more real

than reality is that's why we decided to

shoot the movie sharp but we decided to

do this saturation of images

I'd say the New York look probably was I

think it's one of the things that I

started with the French Connection which

was more of a realistic quality or of a

little low-key grainy dingy quality to

it not documentary totally but verging

on the on the edge of it there are

certain definite

appearances that when you shoot in New

York you do get a different kind of a

look all told we worked in the streets

we worked at night and we just had him

get those pictures and we had very

little lighting with which to do it but

at that time what it was was single

source no feel a soft light kind of a

look that came from still photography

basically the buildings are very dense

population densities very big and you've

got high buildings so you've got a lot

of shadow and contrasting light that's I

think another distinction about New York

is people walk in and out of very hot

bright source of light and then into

very deep shadows and there's one thing

I've always noticed I find interesting

is multiple reflections in New York

because as the Sun kicks off of a

variety of glass window buildings you

can have this very artificial light you

don't have to do much to make it look

good

you know you don't have to build

anything visually to make New York

interesting again you know you choose to

shoot this you choose to shoot that you

put them together and you've got a good

New York when we talk about style we

also talk about personal improvising

with to fit the vision that we're

thinking of within the equipment and the

time we've got a sometime style comes

out of pure necessity or desperation

case in point in the 60s and 70s with

the new lightweight cameras you had

directors who wanted to take those

cameras on the road stick them in cars

put them in bathrooms and so as

technology evolves and we have equipment

that's light or easier to shoot with

faster you're going to see experimental

shooting with it of people who want to

take it to the edge and see what it's

capable of there is a story behind Easy

Rider

there's about three four five years

until we got to that point you know we

are very fluid in making low-budget

films and we knew how to do it we knew

how to do it do a movie just enough

equipment putting into a station wagon

and that was it we didn't need trucks we

didn't need generators we couldn't even

think of it we were always dreaming

but you know all these great equipment

we could have and but you know we made

this work for us we made the stories you

know of fit what we can do in the same

way the equipment fit the stories also

let's take it back to the cinema build

the equipment that went into this truck

it was a Ford Econoline truck very very

small we didn't have Mitchell cameras we

had blimp there flexes which were

smaller we use color Tran lamps which

was all quartz lights no phenols on him

so it was a hard light that you couldn't

cut with flags cuz it didn't have the

lens in front so you bounced the lights

instead so you know a style evolved from

having very little equipment and by

necessity basically if you can think of

a quick way of doing it the cheap way

that still works it saves a lot of money

in time and you're not scared of doing

the Black Stallion is really very much

really came out of the style of really

educational documentary films at both

Carroll Ballard and I really came out of

because we both had worked together on

some educational films and you know what

Carroll really does you know his

directing style is to set up a scene as

if it's really happening and then you

photograph it as if you were making a

documentary of that scene chasing the

situations in your documentary allows

you to to develop a style in camera as a

documentary filmmaker you're hyper aware

of the location where you are because

that's how you have to have to work with

the documentaries I did was so very kind

of Verret a you know we would go you

know some you know film a tribe in

Africa or film a war zone and you kind

of make up the movie that make up the

film and what you were trying to say as

it almost as a journalist exploring the

subject but often documentaries are

emulated by fiction films

and and now you find documentaries doing

recreations and then creating their own

fictional sequences within a documentary

so I think both schools inform each

other if you worked on a lot of

documentaries you already know how

people walk you know how they talk you

know that when they're making dinner

they're not standing there looking at

each other ones over here ones over here

they're of speaking over their shoulder

sometimes their silence and it's a great

training ground for shooting narratives

and seeing what is available light you

know where does the light come from what

makes a Japanese restaurant beautiful

and a Chinese restaurant not quite so

pretty if the lighting Hollywood I think

I found out as always that is cool of

keeping in touch with an audience and

this has happened not only and this is

carried itself also into the language of

filmmaking the shots are made in a way

that they don't make the movies no you

know from car to car as opposed to

having it slower kind of pace generally

use of European pictures I shot uprising

which was a miniseries for NBC

three years ago three or four years ago

and when it was shown here people were

thinking that it was very European in

the my work you know cold colors

contrast the contrast I'm not sure such

2d saturated tones and all that and then

I I screen it for my colleagues at the

AFC in Paris and they for them it was so

Hollywood thinking okay I mean I'm in

the middle of the ocean with really one

foot in and after X years Here I am you

know not completely American and not

anymore completely European I think

Americans are getting very brave with

their style I think the thing about

European films is that you don't have

Studios leaning down so heavily on you

and execs worrying about their job and

worrying about which way it should be

made so the filmmakers they trust the

film

to make a good job I never did anything

that to be doing I just didn't because I

liked it and it kind of caused a riot a

couple of times in certain studios and

they were very upset but I didn't I said

wow this is it

and continued well that helped other

people do things possibly in it but a

long time took him a long time before

they would shoot with one light or no

light or against the window or this or

that but it's it's something that I

enjoy doing I never think about it I

just think about applying it but I never

think about I can't do this or I can't I

don't we can put the light over here we

can put here we can put here we can put

here we can put just in front or in the

back change completely in the way

they've any cinematographer is using

these kind of lights can tell really a

story can rightly light you walk on a

set

it's absolutely black absolutely black

and you strike your first light for what

you're gonna do and that becomes your

first brushstroke and then you add other

brushstrokes all the way through at

different lights and so for like that

you come out with your complete picture

and then you look at it and say okay

let's do it

my welcome to a dark stage you say I

turn on one light and I've usually this

light hopefully it's been there before I

put it there earlier because I hopefully

know where the lights coming from in the

scene but and then I decide what what

does that look like and that's

theoretically the light that's coming in

the window or the light that's coming

from the main lamp in the room or

something and I'll start with that and

the other lights also should be in place

then I'll turn them on I like I don't

turn on all the lights at once you see I

turn them on one at a time and then I

start turning them off again usually

when I show up on a set and

get ready to shoot I've already lit the

set in my head I mean my favorite thing

and and using light for instance I like

relativity I like light too dark

you know big to small and a favorite

kind of thing is you have somebody

standing by a window talking to somebody

who's standing in the corner and someone

standing in the corner is in the dark

you know so you're cutting from the sky

the window talking to this girl was

standing in the corner and the dark

there are three things that lighting has

to do it has to provide for sufficient

illumination to record the image on film

it has to make up for the difference in

contrast between our eye and the film

and it has to enhance the illusion of

third dimension and a two-dimensional

medium okay well that's what hazarded

what it can do it can affect you

emotionally it can help tell the story

you have to know what story you're

telling before you even start to think

about how you light it and you have to

think about whether you want the

audience to see everything clearly or

whether you want to hold it back of it

from the audience whether you want to

throw the actors into a little bit of

shadow not adding but taking away is

better always know but I don't know it's

like somebody something's not working

so another sandbag in the boat because

it's listing you know and they keep

throwing sanding apparently the whole

boat sinks you know you know don't put

any more you take away usually when

something doesn't work it's because

you're doing too much or you've made the

wrong choice I remember when I first

first started as a cinematographer the

first thing I was into us is there

enough light so I light and he said

bodoni it's flat and suddenly it opened

my mind ah light can be flat or not flat

and clearly flat is not good a film is

like like in my tennis days my coach

would you know where people say keep

your eye on the ball well that's pretty

easy to say keep your eye on the ball

but I had one coach that said keep your

eye on a certain part of the ball he put

a face on the ball two eyes a nose and a

mouth

and when you in two ears and if you hit

right on the nose it just goes flat

if you hit underneath anyway so it's not

a question to keep your eye on the ball

it's it's question was the part of the

ball that's same thing with the screen

when you look at the screen you have

your imagery it's not just to look at

the screen you've got to make the

audience look at some part of that

screen that's important where the

dialogue is going on and so it's

precision in a sense it's precision

lighting rule of thumb if I'm lighting

for several actresses in in a large

spaces to go with to 12 by 12 layers of

full or half grid and then maybe a four

by four layer of to sixteen and in front

of a large light and start there and

then but what's very important is

exactly the direction that that light is

coming from even though it may be a

large soft source the difference of a

foot or two either closer to the camera

away from the camera could make all the

difference in the world and that's the

thing you have to you have to really

look at the scene how it's being

rehearsed and go wow this is great for

this actress when she's looking this way

but when we come around or she turns

this way we run into trouble I

personally don't like the soft lighting

too much because many many times it gets

boring actually for me it's it I mean I

study a lot of paintings from the Dutch

painters and all that they hardly ever

used actually soft light actually they

used a lot of the election light which I

love to use backlight was used in

painting for centuries but on film it

had been in the silent days the

characteristic of just using front front

light soft light all all direct front

light and Mary Pickford was photographed

by I think Billie Bitzer at a at a lunch

break in back light with her curls of

flame and that came up with dailies and

it changed history I think that a single

gesture coming from a single side is

powerful if you put a light on the other

side it weakens it now the force of that

light is not as strong so this is a what

we call a flag

and if we were on a set we would do

something like try to bring in an a

black flag that would take away some of

the light so we're not completely

surrounded by light from several

directions we try to bring it from one

direction and that gives us a sense of

richness and and texture and a mood as

opposed to what that looks like I think

as a look I think good cinematographers

don't really use light actually they use

shadows for the light is creating

shadows and then I would like to insist

on that you know the shadows are more

important than the lightest we're always

working against that is there enough and

of course with time once we master as a

quantity then we start to deal with the

quality control the light I having

figured out when you put a light up how

are you gonna control it whether it be

grab Nets dimmers diffusion on the light

itself in the hunt for sometimes a

specific kind of light that just does

that particular thing you find you know

technology to be on your site because

either other people have already

ventured out in that and have created a

tool or you go out on yourself and you

start creating stuff there's a keynote

flow here is a 4-foot tube and

everything and it's light it's small you

can it's fast it's like it's and it's a

beautiful quality light you can you

don't have to diffuse it something that

changed cinematography was the Kiel flow

I mean that to me is all of a sudden

practical locations were something that

were embraced even more so and it's and

ceilings went back on two sets and and

no and people weren't flying him anymore

and you saw less you know unnatural back

lights and lighting changed I think it

people were able to put a light that

didn't have to travel to create softness

three feet away from a person and all of

a sudden you had this quality of light

that look very natural well of course

the Musco light and the the nine later

race that are out today have changed

things for us because now we can light

four or five six seven eight blocks

with just several instruments this is a

blonde it should be yellow yeah Nero the

original DNA Ural blown is yellow that's

why it's called long like the red is red

that's why it's called red this one's

another plan so it's blue it's an open

face with a quartz 2k bulb and bound or

holding but all van doors on the side

but and the great thing it's not here

the gaffers they just hate it because

for them it does nothing well and us we

love it because it does everything

not so well maybe but everything nothing

does everything I guess my favorite form

of lighting is you know put a hundred

watt bulb in a lamp and turn it on

you know if it's close enough to the

actor great you know I think this it's

really terrific you know I like that say

it turn off the key light a second see I

like that you know I mean this is good

for something like that but this is

really the best no light at all the the

back edge and a little bit of fill

worked perfectly for that film not only

did it give the beautiful edge that you

imagined from old black-and-white stills

dude that were appeared in jazz

magazines like Down Beat jazz magazine a

bebop magazine wonderful old stills with

beautiful edge light because the

photographers had to go had to find

wherever there was like to get their

imagery so they would use that edge

light and so that became my sort of

template for all the all of bird a lot

of films when you get started they seem

to have a life of their own and

sometimes your plans don't quite work

out but at least you start with a an

idea in mind and try to pursue it

through the film we were looking for

this big finale on Chicago and you know

we sort of came up you know in our sort

of discussions of this sort of idea of

this big like board you know this that

filled the stage and

would come on and sort of explode

explosion of line and then they would

sort of machine-gun out their you know

their names

I guess you light with your best

instincts you build in some flexibility

into the rigging so that if you want to

make changes it's it's they're available

to you there was with the bad you know

only about five hundred light bulbs in

the board and three guys screwing them

in and and one thing we unfortunately

overlooked is that it took three days

for these three guys to screw in ten

thousand light bulbs a cinematographer

not only has to be a scientist and an

artist but they they have to be a

manager and a politician and a people

person and the your greatest gift to an

actor or an actress is to create a

comfortable arena for them to to be

stellar to do their best work and if

they feel like they're cared for by the

cinematographer their work is indeed

going to be better they're going to take

bigger risks than they might if they

felt that they were being watched after

by the cinematographer many many years

ago right after I've become a cameraman

a very famous came at that time his name

Charlie Lange and Charlie was talk to me

one day and he said there's two things

I'd like to tell you Freddie said save

your money

but surround yourself with a good crew

it's not realized by the general public

with a focus boy has a tremendous

influence on the look of a film and he

has a has to do something it's quite

athletic and graceful and artistic and

it's really not well known it's because

of name is focus puller or assistant

camera doesn't really give blend you

know full weight to what that person is

doing with a good gaffer sitting right

over your right shoulder you can whisper

during rehearsals or whatever and a good

careful would be there knowing your

situation that you're not able to to

work whilst rehearsing or whatever

quietly in the background when you work

the year after a year and a month after

a month and the kind of hours we worked

on a set and the long locations and

you're with your crew really mourn your

your family

which was the same but that's just the

way it worked out but a strange fire

crew becomes your family and hopefully

you all get along because you're there

for extended periods of time my

management style is basically admiration

I find people gaffer's first assistants

camera operators the key grips that that

I just love and admire and I got to work

with those people cinematography is the

mastering of a complex technology in the

service of art and a lot of people think

that that if you're a cinematographer

that you're more of a technician than

you are an artist but I would I would

say that you're more an artist that you

are a technician because the technology

serves what the ideas are and how

they're filtered through your mind I can

say that I've always been type of person

that are the type of DP who's always

approached the subject matter first with

my heart first approached it as someone

who wants to tell a particular story and

how can the technology help me to tell

that story I think the great challenge

for us the cinematographers is is moving

into technology and I think that that's

scary for all of us there's no one

that's not scared by it it's hard to

keep pace with such changing technology

a piece of film is moved through the

camera and it's exposed and it goes to

the laboratory and if you have light and

a lens and you can look at that image

almost anywhere in the world it's

amazing that that little machine can

create so much magic and is the basis of

an art form that has more power and

influence than any other art form ever

invented the cameras are so much smaller

than other they're much easier to use I

mean you can get them into places that

we could never have got a camera into 10

15 years ago they're very light they're

perfectly balanced if you want to go

handheld the new way of people were

freed by their small camera

I could handhold and run around Paris

with and it's important to know the tool

and the best way to in order to is when

you carry that tool for eight hours

walking in the in the field so the

camera is part of you but to be able to

actually have the camera in my hand

looking at an actor and seeing them talk

and knowing that's the way it's gonna be

on the screen see and hearing at the

same time and to to feel if you are the

power I often think of myself as an

actor I mean I'm the person who stands

up on my feet with the actors day-to-day

and walks around them if you have a

camera on your shoulder enough and

you're shooting and shooting and

shooting and shooting you I found that I

developed a second sense about where

people were going to move and where the

best place to be was cameras you know

they'll hate me for saying it but

cameras don't matter to me I think that

it's the lenses and I've said for years

that a camera is just a light type box

with a lens on the end well I've got a

very strong feeling about lenses and

personally I'm sitting here talking to

you and me you are filming me from over

there on a shoulder on a property a

single where I'd rarely do that because

I think you know the camera was to be to

me I would shoot singles inside here

unless it's through a particular facts

and then I'd drop back off and be more

observational with a shoulder in I mean

I think it's a totally different effect

to an audience looking at somebody on

the end of a hundred millimeter lens as

opposed to somebody that's been being

shot on a twenty-seven close to or

twenty one so here we are 32 min or 30

millimeter is on a zoom so sometimes you

can't tell what the millimeter anyway

but um it's different right

you know there's a sense of presence

you're right there with somebody

supposed to being this I think

psychologically it's a totally different

effects the psychology of lenses is that

a wide-angle lens has a different effect

than a telephoto lens and so for example

Widing and in many different ways one of

them how the face is rendered also a

sense of action like Frank bring my hand

closer or further from the camera the

wide-angle lens is gonna have much more

effect than it does and even if I'm

shifting like this it's gonna hat it's

gonna

more live more edgy than it would with

the telephoto light

I mean it's just the same as your

relationship and real life to somebody

I'm sitting this close to you I'm not

I'm not seeing you from over there on a

long lens you know so I I don't think we

take that into account as much as we

should really with all of these tools

available to us the question is what you

know what comes first the chicken or the

egg do you find a great piece of

equipment and modify a shot to suit that

piece of equipment or do you figure out

what you want to do and find the right

piece of equipment I've never liked to

hear someone say we can't do it because

you can always find a way to do it and

if it requires different technology or a

different maybe even a different number

or two on the crew that's what you have

to do I love mechanics I mean in the

business I was always going home there's

got to be a better way to do this

there's got to be an easier way

I made the hi-hat because you know

hi-hat on a board is 1930s technology

and I bet you you still got one on the

stage here

Ron Dexter is an amazing person the

thing that one of the most important

things I learned from him is you never

have to accept the equipment as built by

the manufacturer what I did was I got

outside of the movie industry how do

other people do things I look at

catalogs I'd bounce things off of people

and found incredible tools that other

industries use it why aren't we I can

distinctly remember to this day him

bringing home a to see body that he had

just bought walking over to the bandsaw

and cutting in half you had a soft part

of the lens to mount put a different

mount on it I take the whatever the

simplest tool is to get the job done

approach if we can do the shot static

then it's on sticks if we need to move

the camera hopefully we can do it on a

dolly if it's got to go upstairs then it

might be a Steadicam and if it's going

to make a huge rise it'll be a crane but

to try to keep it as simple as possible

I find works the best for me every piece

of new technology

she inspires ideas film stocks have have

been the thing for me that have sort of

shaped the way films look today as the

digital word is coming towards us the

film keeps getting better so the bar you

know one raises the bar that the other

one needs to come to meet film is has

much more resolution buried in it then

then a 1k a 2k or a 4k skin when you

would go to release a motion picture

film there's a process called color

timing and when you sit down to do that

that has not changed basically since the

advent of you know color film when

Kalmus came up with Technicolor and

essentially you sit there and you hold a

different color pieces of gelatin in

front of your eye and you say do you

like this yellow one no no let me see

the green one hey here's a yellow and a

green or hey try this magenta and you

try to get the color balance right I

think everybody now is probably played

with Photoshop or something like that

and these computers are incredibly

powerful tools in terms of doing very

subtle color correcting I would say the

traditionally film timing is compared to

digital well what we call a digital

intermediate or digital color correcting

is much cruder it's just like printing

printing a still photograph the great

photographers like Ansel Adams part of

what they did in creating their images

was the negative and the second part was

the print and the print was where it all

came together in this world of digital

intermediate were that's becoming more

common there's gonna be a lot of choices

to be made a lot of variables isn't an

interpretation that has to carry from

what the photography the original intent

is it's like when those people need at

the beginning at the beginning of

filmmaking used to ham paying the frames

the h1 each one each one they used to

hand-painted in order to give it a

personal look so by God by us going into

the digital Bay but by us using digital

intermediate we are hard painting over

films and that is going to make our our

our art it still to preserve and he's

gonna give each one of us a look which

is I think it's very very important that

we preserve the danger is that the role

the cinematographer is much more

vulnerable now if you're not available

six months nine months a year after you

finished shooting when the studio or

whoever's making the film is ready to do

the digital intermediate you got a

problem

the downside is any technology that

gives you sort of endless options also

gives you endless options to screw up

the image or have other people take over

the image so it becomes much more

important for this Montag refer to exert

some control over the post-production

process before with traditional film

printing there was limitations on how

much you could change the image or

reformat the image or reframe the image

without affecting the quality so the

cinematographer could rely in some sense

of the limitations the technology to

keep the image close to what he intended

but now with digital intermediate that's

not the case he could turn the movie

into a completely different looking

image the advantages that you only have

to do your work once you can take this

digital intermediate and and port it

over to your HD mastering for DVD and

for all other uses and not have to do

the work twice again and this is a great

boon which was all those only pressures

on all of us to do more faster cheaper

this is a tool which helps us those

companies are out there and they're

doing everything they can to bring in

the jobs for us to shoot the commercials

and music videos but at the same time

the economy is tight so that their

profit margins are being cut closer and

closer so we're always trying to find

things that as well as advancing the art

that'll also will advance just let us do

it quicker the movie industry is is this

is wonderful combination of high finance

and and art that's what a

cinematographer has to do all filmmakers

do when you show up you have to look at

your restraints as an opportunity every

time I see a new piece of equipment I

look at and in Envy and I say what do

you offer somebody let me have this for

Christmas for my next film well I tell a

story the first day we were shooting on

Barton think I have this story but I'm

really nervous I mean I think the guys

are great filmmakers so I was so pleased

to be working with him

in America I am being here really much

by then and anyway so that there's sort

of storyboards for the day I think and I

got and in prep I went up to Jolla said

well you know these shots what we were

on that we were looking at the location

we were in a theater downtown and I had

a series of shots going around this

stage and I said well what a Joel would

you know we could combine these and do a

moving camera shot and combine five

storyboards in woman's oh well okay yeah

that'll be great so we got a luma crane

it is about the only time I used it I

think and and did this did this little

shot instead of five shots it was one

fluid thing it's a opening of the movie

and so what I love about working with

them is they have this very thought-out

idea of what they want how they want to

cover things this sort of feel of the

movie but then they're really open to

ideas and that was the first day I work

with them so they had this they had this

day's work laid out in this theater we

wrapped at 12 o'clock you know in the

morning I mean midday cuz we've done

this lumic range shot I was here we had

nothing else to do I think people fall

in love with the process you know and

equipment and the process is a means to

an end I mean a camera is a tool you

know films a tool I Matilda the actors

are tools the directors are tool you

know and the whole thing is to move that

script onto the screen

the thing about tools and technology is

it's how you use them that makes us

different it's the ideas in your head

and the vision that you have and it's

like paint brushes you have one big

brush half an inch to inch work what a

finish that's what technology today

that's how I use it as new tools the

relationship between technology and

style is a kind of dialectic really

technology does release you to do new

shots new angles new new movements but

you have to decide why you're doing them

not because you can but because you

should and I think that's the key to to

the use of technology you can have all

kinds of ideas on what you want to

achieve but if you don't know your craft

if you don't know how to use your tools

you'll never be able to get those ideas

across

so you have to master that part of it

and part of that the tools are the

cameras the lenses the film stock the

lights the type of lighting you're going

to do exposure the lab work it's all

part of it well for every artist no

matter what the art form they're dealing

in the technology is the servant of the

artist

it could be cave painting in southern

France seventeen thousand years ago the

technology of creating dyes and pigments

to scratch images on the cave wall was

the technology that the artists used to

create those images when I was a child I

used to of envision II I used to run to

get a kick by running on stones which

were by the sea and moving all of them

and the fun was to to choose by with you

for your eye on which stone put your

food and that you are already a gun but

if the stone was a bad stone or because

you had the deaf you were barefooted it

would be hurt and all that and in

filming is a little like that swimming

is always running forward looking for

not losing your balance and and having a

lot of fun from this kind of event yes

adrenaline shot that we're having all

the sets all the time in our lifetime

we've already gone through major changes

in technology technique black and white

color negative reversal

not to mention from silent to sound and

I think those those changes

talk to me far more greater than the

change that we're facing at the moment

which is from film to digital mediums I

think cinematography hasn't changed but

it might require a new cinematographer

one who's versed in digital technology

and fearless and able to assert the the

the view the vision as as the

cinematographer traditionally is done on

the set is also to command the process

through the end so that the look

creation doesn't escape the

cinematographer I think all of the

techniques all of the tools all of the

new materials that are that allow us to

make images no matter what they are

whether they're digital whether they're

film or whether they're you know we're

shooting on on tissue paper it doesn't

matter what what is important is that

the cinematographer is needed from the

beginning of the production till the end

of the production and not until a film

gets on the screen is when the

cinematographers work work over I think

what has mattered to me in my career is

the times that I really thought that I

really hit the mark was when I closed my

mind to all the technique and the

technology and listened to my heart and

my soul and then the answer came just

like that we create our own vision we

get to put it on film we get to show it

to the world I have always felt that one

of the greatest gifts of mankind is not

the opposable thumb which has given us

technology in our society but the

ability to tell story that's very

beginning we create fire light sources

and we create shadows we need to make

images it's not really a thing we choose

to do it's something we need to do we've

always needed to do this we've always

needed to create images before there

were words there were images before

there were numbers there were images

there were drawings on caves that's how

that's how deep our drive to do this is

it's interesting because the images they

created with flickering light in a

darkened cave

is not dissimilar to the images we

create with flickering lights in a

darkened theater the future is in us

telling stories with pictures but there

is only one thing they never change the

idea the idea doesn't matter if you do a

mono or stone on wood on canvas on films

or in electronic the idea is the one

that really stayed always because it's

energy because it's part of ourselves

it's the idea that is important it's why

you do something as opposed to how you

do something what you do and why you do

it

if the emphasis remains on good

storytelling visually then this great

work to be seen in the future with no

limits as to what the image could

conjure up so I think we're in for a

good ride

you

you