When the camera moves, the eye moves

Being that most of the movies that have been on my blogs are pre 1960, or pre color for that matter (even though color arrived before most of these black and white movies), I thought I would add a clip from a more recent movie--one that we all probably know. I do not know if this was the first type of this kind of shot, but it would be an example from me as being good camera movement. It looks as if this was shot with a Steadicam, that acts like a tracking shot. Why this represents good movement is that it does not distract from what is being said. It simply allows us to see the extent to which this guy's connections go. He enters from the back of a restaurant/club, which is a privilege, and as he takes this long walk through the back; it allows us to see that he is familiar to all. It let's us get a "frame" of the place--letting us really get a visual layout of the place, as it becomes almost comfortable. It is like taking the same route to school everyday--you get used to everything around you, the way the ground looks, the trees, and the buildings. This shot in Goodfellas allows us this same comfort.



This seems to be a home video that just happened to fall under a category that immediately came to mind when I thought of "bad movement"--slow panning at a table. This shot just does not feel right to me, even though it is a home video, because it shot from a person at the table and that person is slowly and perfunctory panning from one person to another. Have you ever been at a table and twisted your head very slowly, on the same eye level (not moving up or down) to one person and to another back and forth? Try it. It's awkward and this home movie is awkward. To the people that shot this, if you ever see this: I am sure that you or your friends or your family are not awkward. However, in a meaningful sense I would not feel right about using this type of movement within a film unless I was trying to give the point of view of a robot.



I could not find the single clips but I will add the times so that you can see what I am talking about. This is from the movie Le Notti di Cabiria (Nights of Cabiria) directed by Federico Fellini and shot by Aldo Tonti. This scene cannot be described properly to give the effect it was intended without watching the full length of the film--which I recommend if you have not. The first sequence is 3:12-3:19. This may have been slightly more involved had it used a handheld (as the camera cannot track enough to catch up with the man stealing the woman's money, however maybe it was intended as such because the man is trying to run away as fast as he can and the camera not being able to track fast enough shows how fast he was trying to get away). The reason why camera movement is important can be answered simply by this one sequence alone: picture to yourself a pan in this instance. What would it be like? Where would it be from? If it was a pan and a zoom it would emphasize quickness but rather a gradual attention (which we already would have on the subject) that would jar us, because the camera would be saying "look at this!"--but we are already aware of what is happening. It would not make sense to me. If it was a simple pan, maybe from Cabiria's perspective, it would lose its importance and devastation. It would seem as if Cabiria was casually glancing over at her hopes, of dreams and love, quietly vanish into the distance. Instead of what really is going on: her being tortured with hate and betrayal as she cannot think of anything else to do but twist around in the dirt in pain.

The second movement I want to mention is a brief but salient: 1:45-1:47. It would seem at first that the slight pan was to get the man in frame, but he is already in the frame. Cabiria is in disbelief in this moment--she wants to be proven wrong for what she is thinking is going to happen, again at this point, where she thought she had found happiness. This slight left pan makes me feel the slight hope that she has that it may just be in her mind. Let me try to explain this because this may not make sense: This man is going to betray her on the day they are going to be married (he only wanted to get her alone to steal her money). Cabiria starts to realize this but still retains that last little bit of assurance that maybe, just maybe, she might be wrong. This hint of a movement exemplifies that to me and to the viewers. We feel that bit of hope with her. It seems that the simplest of things are the most complex and dense.

A little short of irony

Although it is compulsory to seek meaning within something, almost always finding that we discover meaning in everything, I will try to refrain and instead delineate on the beauty of the replication. Furthermore, to understand something is to grasp a meaning, and this meaning can take the form of anything coherent to us. This short is excerpted from a film about a series of dreams from Akira Kurosawa (real of fabricated). I feel that if these were indeed real dreams they would be an exception to "everything having meaning" for dreams are authored in a language that is unique to the sleeping mind that experienced it. That being said, let us go on to the form then.

I would be hard pressed to offer anything other than a few words to express why this short was arrestingly immersive lest I go on a descriptive musing that will last and last and last.

What is of the irony in this short, that I inferred with the title, is that we are seeing paintings replicated in real life (as displayed by the film itself) that are not paintings (as spoken by the film's Van Gogh--and yes that is Martin Scorsese). In the film we are within the world of the man who painted these, as he saw him, not as we do. Yes, we see the paintings in the film, but these are from the perspective of how Van Gogh himself painted them. So the film seems to be ironic in that we should not be thinking of these highly saturated and stylized portraits as "looking like a painting", even though that is what the whole essence plays off of, but rather "that is how Van Gogh saw life, so he painted it and thus it is a painting".

Solitude becomes a party for two

A Place in the Sun (1951)
Dir. George Stevens
Cinematographer William C. Mellor

Brief Summary: George Eastman is a loner who gets a job from his wealthy uncle. While there he forms a forbidden relationship with a coworker--who he gets pregnant. He then falls in love with a captivating debutante who cannot help but be drawn into a life so different from hers. Finding this out, the pregnant girlfriend threatens to go to his uncle with the news that may cost him his job. George has fate within his grasp: 1. Break off with a new found soul mate (that guarantees him a life of happiness) or 2. Deal with woman threatening his livelihood.
The nephew, who is of a lower class, enters his uncles estate, who is obviously of a higher class. In this first shot they use a wide angle lens (everything, including behind Eastman, is in focus). Here he is dwarfed by the party when he first enters. Everyone is face away from him with no attention diverted to him. He, on the other hand, is fixated on the crowd--meaning this is new to him, he is curious but alien to this scene. The director fills the frame with crowds so that it feels crowded, but that Eastman is coming in last--as if left behind.
I will note that the previous, and later shots are all high key lighting. Nothing to note really of that choice, rather than it is a party and is not meant to be a dark one--even though the character does not fit in. It is still supposed to be a fun, light, cheery place. Here we see a POV from Eastman, with another wide angle. The attention is not necessarily meant to be concentrated on the main character, rather how he is alone and out of place and facing towards the crowd as he is left by himself. We see how he sees it: everyone is having fun and he is outside of that fun. Nobody is paying him any attention. Still a wide angle here as we can see towards the very end of the room.
Again, the shot is away from his face so that we are ONLY concentrating on the woman who seems to be very gregarious and jovial. What is uncomfortable in this shot is how close the main character and her are--but that she is oblivious to him. He is again alienated and alone even in the presence of a group. Everyone has there eye on someone else, even the background, as everyone is interacting except for Eastman. He is still an observer. The big pillar in the frame seems to act like a wall--in which he is trapped between the group and the pillar. Seems suffocating.
A MCU from the side to put the attention on Eastman. Now it is no longer the crowd we are supposed to see, it is how Eastman is reacting that we are supposed to be paying attention to. Notice how the group has their backs turned to him. He is ostracized from the group as well as the party. Again, he is alone and alien. Again--if you look closely the pillar seems like a wall that is placed out of no where. It is the director or DP's choice to include that little bit of space at camera right so that we see maybe that he is trapped within an open space. He is backed up against the pillar.
More covering shots of Eastman walking through the party and the groups, but as an observer. The shooting here is contriving in our minds that he does not belong in this society. He is a drifter in the movie, so that he is a drifter in a closer setting--the party. It seems also that he might be searching.. Even though the shot is wide angle and the background is in focus, the center of the frame (and half of it) is the foreground group--laughing and having a good time. It seems almost an intrusion by the main character that he be in focus. So it seems the director's intention and the story coincide here.
The light here is concentrated on the pool table and the three balls. It is highlighting it for him. What is interesting is that the room is empty, lifeless, but that Eastman seems to relate to that. The choice here is that instead of opening the door and standing full body in frame--he just "peaks" in--like another main character that we will see shortly. It is as if, even though it seems he is alone at the party, not really used to this seclusion-yet. It is drawing him in. It is kind of funny too that the 8 Ball is in the middle and pointed directly in his line of sight. The POV seems to come from the angle of the pooltable, or the pool balls. Kind of a portent of what is to come?
This is the first time we see him fairly calm and cool. He even has a cigarette in his hand. He is comfortable in this environment--darker, quiet, alone. The door is just left open--kind of relating that he is on the 'inside' of what everything else is on the 'outside'. Or Vice Versa.
The girl in this shot was seen earlier by Eastman--in which he fell in love on sight with. In the story I feel that she is drawn into this world of his. She is a socialite, he is a loner. Here in the pool room, he is alone but it is his room, his domain. She is attracted to him I think because he is different than anyone she converses with. She is curious of this difference, of this rogue of a guy. The choice of the long shot, to me, was only because they would eventually have her walk around the table itself.
Simple shot of him, not being startled, but calmly looking up, as if he was expecting her. Little soft focus of the background so that we are concentrating on him only. The director wanted a cigarette in his mouth to seemingly relate the calmness.
Needless to say, I really like this shot--always have since I first saw it. For me, it seems like this curiousness of hers is leading to what she really wants for herself (the light from the room versus the shadow, on the otherside of her face, from the party). The door is blocking her so that it acts as a barrier to her. She is like a stray puppy you see on the road one day, that you get out to pet but that it is hesitant to trot up closer out of fear and apprehension.
As she makes her way in the room, she is used in the foreground as taking up a bit of the frame, but that her face is not what we see rather a shrunken Eastman in the back. It seems the comfort has shifted from him to her as he looks rigid and nervous--or more like a confrontation.
MCU of Eastman--high key lighting with the wood panels helping with depth. Middle of the frame so that we are supposed to be fixated on him. Versus the pillar at the party--the wall is behind him, but he seems to be trapped not by a group not paying attention to him, but trapped with a girl who noticed him.
Reverse shot of her coming up to Eastman. The shot leaves a lot of space in front of her so that she walks into the frame and the space. There are no walls behind her--giving her freedom and openess to move and feel in control.
I cannot help but think that they intentionally spotlighted her just a bit here. I know that because of the previous shots that there was a shadow between the frames--and my guess is that they did not want that so they spotted a light on her. It seems the director wanted her to intentionally trap herself between the wall and Eastman--though it is was a choice for the character that she calmly lays on. Contrast this with the party earlier that Eastman used the pillar as a sort of safety net. Here she is using it as a prop--or somewhat like a chair.

Fields, lighting, and fields o my!

With this painting "Christina's World" by Andrew Wyeth it is not the lighting I necessarily prefer but the ambiguity in its portrayal. We do not see the woman's face--therefore we can think anything we like about it, that is what I genuinely like about this painting. She could have just woke up after dozing off from the lazy musing that a field of grass and a sunny day could only do. Maybe she was in the midst of running away from a life that begged to be eschewed; only as her beginning departure teemed regret was she able to look back one last time at what she might possibly leave behind. So I guess I would say this painting represents anything that you might give it. I cannot help but give preference also to the fact it is set in the country, in a wheat field (my soft spots).

I figured I ought to put a photograph here instead of concentrating on just paintings. I know nothing of good photographers so picking out which one struck me within the brief period from which I was browsing left me with this photograph by Florian Ritter. What is it with me and fields and open country? Nevertheless this is how and why I like it: I cannot help but see the pathway between the plateaus (naturally made) and the road akin to go around them. The natural trail is green and full of life, whereas the road matches the clouds above: gray and ominous (lifeless and dull). That is probably an odd interpretation but that is why I like it nonetheless.



To me this just shows how austere objects can be enhanced with the proper placement and precision of light. I look at light two ways: 1. No light 2. A degree of light. With this painting by Pieter Claesz as an example I will try to explain what I mean. Take the light away from this painting and what do you have? Nothing, blackness. Ok now put light on the background but not directed at the objects on the table and what are you left with? Similar, but different colors: (a uniform murky, brown color on the glass/a cloudy, but lightened, dark of tarnished silver: both for the candle holder and the saucer with the solitary olive). With the proper light I feel that these usually ugly things are slightly hinted with eloquence and beauty--which is what Claesz has done. The light here almost becomes another color that was not before present or intrinsic with these objects--the color of the light here becomes almost angelic because it adds something that cannot be possessed otherwise. That is the simplicity which I found within this painting, and that is why I felt the lighting made it beautifully simple.

Portrait of a "friendly" golf game

I actually shot two different things, but this one was easier to edit together...so here is a golf game under portrait. For those who might be confused, it is sort of a montage (silent film esque) of a bet between friends, and how they try to cheat each other. For the location--well it is outside of Tuscaloosa (was out of town last weekend for a friends wedding--I hope they don't mind that I took the equipment!) and shot at a golf course/park. The DP and AD are friends of mine.

Coalescing big ideas into doable ideas.

There is much that can be said visually, and when there is much that is wanted to be said it may seem like a conformity to pick just one. For this particular project, there was a lot of thinking, and a lot of directions I could go. Some of these ideas were constrained by time, by funds, by ability. However, I do not think this should always limit ideas, but in this case I went the easiest route. Originally I wanted to speak through glimpses of our everyday lives in a way that we may not normally have noticed. I cannot say I accomplished this, but I learned a lot from the attempt.

To start, I grabbed a notebook and a pencil and wrote (with my terrible handwriting--thank God for fonts!) everything meaningful and purposeful that came to mind. I had to choose fast—and I did, judiciously or not. Being since I have nothing to contribute to the field of artistic drawing, I had to make a enigmatic shot list—and hope that I would have the same sense of the scene when we actually shot. I actually prefer relating what I am seeing to someone with more talent than I, and directing him or her as appropriate until the idea is achieved. For me though, I can say that I see visually what I am looking for, and sometimes you are surprised to find something better when it is actually being done—sometimes not.

I feel that as we worked, I was seeing with an eye that had not noticed the smaller things before. I notice now what gets in the way of a shot, what is distracting it. It is a special and important moment when you improve in anything, whereas you might not have thought you could or would. Moreover, I felt after this weekend I did come away with something new, something that I will be the better for—and for that I am grateful.

All you need is a little direction.

The project we had to undertake this week was not meant for us to showcase our witty abilities to write dialogue, improv a great scene, or record a shot that is above spectacular. It was a run-n-gun exercise that was implemented to invoke pressure on the creative team to rush the thinking process, or eliminate it all together—ironically giving pressure so that there is no pressure. I tend to think that such an endeavor has with it an imminent sense of failure in that we know it will not turn out like how we had thought out in our head—everything about the exercise prohibits the ability to achieve what would be a perfect showcase of our vision. However, the failure here should not be intended to be used as a negation of progress. To the contrary, since it puts us immediately at a disadvantage, it forces us to think what could have been different if only we had the proper timing and planning. This is the beginning of how you should undertake any creative medium, namely film. Moreover, this is how I feel the run-n-gun benefits us and how I took it.

With this type of learning, we also get the sense of what makes people different and how they look at the same thing (our prewritten dialogue) with dissimilar eyes. You see how people give direction differently, approach shots differently, seek fluidity in the most enigmatic of situations differently. It is this uniqueness for which we try to demarcate ourselves as we seek to communicate it.

Am I an Artist? Are you an Artist?

I am not sure if I can say I’m an Artist, however I would like to think I should never stop aspiring to be one. Where is an Artist without feeling? If the relation of an intention, through a medium, cannot be felt by at most one person--where is that intention and what good has it done? An Artist to me exists devoted to the striving to invoke or evoke feeling from within a person or from within a static ‘thing’. By whichever means the Artist chooses, his driving purpose is that feeling—from within him or herself, unto the observer. How is a film different from a painting as different from say the feeling of love? When you see a film, when you look at a painting, or when you see glittering whites from squinted eyes and the flash of happiness from within a smile-all from the person you care about—what says to us “masterpiece” or what drives us to seek that medium or event out again? The feeling from it. These feelings are what I get from some of my favorite films. I should only humbly think, and wish, to be able to do the same for someone else. To have the capability of this magnitude—reaching out to someone through a depiction on a screen, is at first thought: impossible. However it would be an impossibility I would like to try and reach. If someone seeks films to find experiences or feelings that may lie dormant within them, then the job of quenching that desire as a life-trade or duty is as priceless as the water from within our springs. I seek to use filmmaking for that purpose.

In TCF 312 I feel the teacher is the first passionate person I have come across in this school with regards to filmmaking and student’s individuality. I think that a mentor of that magnitude can only help, not impede, artistic growth; from which I think we can all spread our legs so to speak. Growth comes from freedom not restriction, and I believe we can only go where we lead ourselves as a result.

Two Extremes of Lighting

The shadow is created here without the glare, or presence, of a sun. It seems to imply there is a sun in the foreground but there is no 'screen presence' of it to be found. In the story I feel the shadow here, that is so isolated, is meant to be ominous and foretelling of a love that will persist through death and that that death will likely be upon the couple soon, since this scene being in a flashback after it happened. Again it is clearly shot in the day but is very soft in its approach. The only sharp object here is the shadow, which is brought out as if separate from the sun. I really like how the attention is drawn not to a light source, but to the dark, shadowy silhouette.

Black and White inherently contains very sharp contrasts between dark and light; but here the bright neon lights act as beacons of attention within this frame. The lights from these buildings almost seem to float in air, as they appear to be dancing within a mass of black night. One of the beauties of this shot is that the main character is robed in all white, almost blinding us, as she walks away from the town that is all but convivial only to ironically be whelmed by the signs that appear to be the only life left in the place.

Edward Hopper painting. I love the sense of solitude here that the couple have within a surrounding black frame--maybe the black of the surrounding neighborhood or the darkness of fields and fields of country. A very realistic look and feel to it almost as if it is a memory etched with a brush. I want to say it looks like the talks on the porch I used to have as a kid. Notice how the only light source is from ceiling though it only lights what is on the porch--nothing else. It's framing it. It feels really simple and salient.

From my tastes, this is about as good as it gets when it comes to color. Yes this is from Bladerunner, which is my favorite movie out there for the shots alone. For color, I really prefer cinematography from the 80's that focused on the dark tenements of cities. There is a quality from those movies that is certainly unique to its time. This shot is obviously not from any tenement, but it is spectacular nonetheless. Aside from being aesthetically pleasing to the eye I like the use of the sun as being the only light source and how it hits the different objects within the room. One thing I really like in this shot is the feeling of space and light. It feels as if we are occupying a hollow, antiseptic room which is whetted by the orange light from the sunset. The pillars seemed to be 'graced' by light, as if they are looking up to the sun--nevertheless the angle of the shadows make it appear to be a lower angle shot which would agree with that interpretation. Really powerful.

One thing I really like about animations is there vibrancy of color. Normally, though, I tend not to like shots without any shadows but here I feel they would hinder an already perfect, serene picture. Again I like the feeling of openness here that is created with a very bright, shadowless and sunless field. If there were shadows I think it might just make the depth of field more constricted then it should. This movie was about searching and freedom within unlimited distances; and with the space depicted, from an almost dimensionless shot (contrasting/shadow), I think that is what is accomplished here. There is no uniformity in colors that is usually the case with great distances (because of the tapering off of light as the field of view grows) rather a differing in color as the trees and grass still focus into our view even into the far reaches of the frame.

Here are some more samples of visually compelling portraits

Ten Films

• Red Beard
  
• Hiroshima, Mon Amour
• The Browning Version
• Nights of Cabiria
• The Petrified Forest
• The Odd Couple
• The Apartment
• One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest
• Stalag 17
• Umberto D

Red Beard: