Tag: reading

Reading: Cinematography – Writing with Motion

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Cinematography: Writing with Motion

Cinematography – Greek root meaning writing with motion.

Cinematography is ‘the process of taking ideas, words, actions, emotional subtext, tone, and all other forms of non verbal communication and rendering them in visual terms’ (Blain, 2012, p.2) – the process of adding layers of meaning and subtext to the context of a film.

Building a visual world – create a visual world for characters to inhabit; the visual world is important to how the viewer will perceive the story, ‘how they will understand the characters and their motivations’.

The cinematographer should ask:

  • How do we communicate the story through visual means?
  • What are the essential elements we work with and manipulate to create this visual world?
  • If cinema is a language, then we must as what is the structure of that language?
  • What is the vocabulary, what are the rules of grammar, the structure of this cinematic language?
  • What are the tools, the essential techniques, methods and elements that we can use to tell our story visually?

The Conceptual Tools of Cinematography:

  • The Frame – direct audience attention; convey story through choice of frame size; composition, rhythm, perspective.
  • The Lens – various lenses render images in different ways; ‘Every lens has a personality – a flavour and an inflection it adds to the image’ (e.g. contrast, sharpness, focal length).
  • Light and Colour – powerful visual tools; special power within the art of film; touch people at an emotional level.
  • Texture – manipulating the image adds visual texture; by changing colour and contrast, desaturating colour, adding filters, fog and smoke, rain, or digital manipulation.
  • Movement – film is one of few art forms that employ motion and time; dynamic motion serves the storytelling process.
  • Establishing – the camera reveals or conceals information; the visual equivalent of exposition – conveying important information or background to the viewer; accomplished by the choice of frame and lens; can also be achieved with lighting that reveals or conceals certain details in the scene.
  • POV – the camera becomes the perception of the viewer; make the viewer more involved in the story; the viewer inhabits the character’s mind and experiences.

Visual Subtext and Visual Metaphor:

  • Cinematography extends far beyond simple ‘photography’.
  • It is about adding visual subtext to the scenes.
  • Also about adding visual metaphor.

 

The key points for me

Cinematography is more than simple ‘photography’, it is the art of communicating a story visually, building a visual world with added layers of meaning and subtext. In order to achieve this, the cinematographer employs a range of conceptual tools.

 

Brown, B. (2012) Cinematography: Theory and Practice New York: Focal Press

Reading: Cinematography Robby Muller

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Linda Van Deursen & Marietta De Vries (2013) Cinematography Robby Muller. Zurich: JRP Ringier

I discovered Deursen & De Vries’ book Cinematography Robby Muller while browsing through Ashley Lauryssen’s OCA blog. Organised thematically, the book collects together hundreds of shots from fourteen films Muller worked on during his career with directors such as Wim Wenders, Jim Jarmusch, Peter Bogdanovich and Lars von Trier.

Rather than analysing and discussing the techniques Muller used within individual films, the authors present a series of film stills, organised around several key themes found in Muller’s cinematic practice; such as filming road movies; filming in natural light; filming at different times of the day; filming lens flare. Most of the stills are accompanied by captions, in which some of the directors and technicians Muller worked with offer a brief comment on the images, providing a pithy insight into the way in which he worked.

The book contains stills from fourteen films on which Robby Muller worked as cinematographer, of which only Paris, Texas (dir.  Wim Wenders) and Down By Law (dir.  Jim Jarmusch) are familiar to me.

Alice in den Stadten (1974)
Falsche Bewegung(1975)
Im Lauf Der Zeit(1976)
Der Amerikanische Freund (1977)
Die Linkshandige Frau (1978)
Saint Jack (1979)
Repo Man (1984)
Paris, Texas (1984)
Down By Law (1986)
Barfly (1987)
Mystery Train (1989)
Dead Man (1995)
Breaking the Waves (1996)
Dancer in the Dark (2000)

What struck me about the film stills is the way in which Muller uses light to convey a mood. His ability to use both natural and artificial light in a way that appears so natural to the location. This is summarised nicely in the caption to the stills from Saint Jack (1979), in which Theo Bierkens, the best boy on the film, says ‘He always looked carefully at what a location had to offer and enhanced that. Not in a dogmatic way, but more intuitive’ (Duersen & Vries, p.89).

Together, these film stills are a wonderful resource on the creative practice of a cinematographer who is passionate about light, how it works and how it falls within a scene. It’s the kind of book I can browse through, look at a single shot or a series of shots, and see exactly what Muller saw when his eye was to the viewfinder. It’s a book I shall be returning to again for advice and inspiration when lighting my own moving images.

References

Van Deursen, L., & De Vries, M. (2013) Cinematography Robby Muller. Zurich: JRP Ringier

Reading: Video Art

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Video Art

‘The story of video art embraces all the significant art ideas and forms of recent times – Abstract, Conceptual, Minimal, Performance and Pop art, photography, and digital art. The story also departs from art-historical categories into a new domain, that of the technological, which has its own referents and language’ (Rush, 2007, p8).

An all embracing art form

  • multiple ways of constructing a history of the medium of video art
  • history of video art so far concerns three generations of artists
  • video artists ‘spontaneously adopted a massive communications medium for their own purposes, turning an implement of commerce…into a material for art’ (Rush, 2007, p.8)
  • two difficulties for critics: (1) the language used for video art is borrowed from film; (2) there are no convenient ‘themes’ or ‘schools’ of artists to help organise critical discussion

Blurring the boundaries

  • video art emerged when boundaries between traditional art forms were becoming blurred
  • painting, performance, dance, music, film, writing, sculpture combined in single works of art
  • early video art emerged from or reacted to post-Abstract Expressionism
  • the physical and the conceptual were linked from the start in video art – remain linked today
  • performance – principle material in the medium

A hybrid art form

  • video used in combination with film, computer art, graphics, animation, virtual reality, all types of digital applications
  • video is rarely the ‘pure’ medium of a work – more often a mix
  • is video art obsolete?
  • ‘We live in a time when ideas – and not specific media – are central to artists’ (Rush, p.11)

Key points for me

There are no obvious ‘themes’ or ‘schools’ of video artists. Today’s video artists are interested in the manipulation of time and breaking the boundaries between the material used and the medium of its creation. I don’t know how I plan to use what I have learned here. Though I do have one question: how do you create something new through the medium of video in a world so saturated with moving images?

 

Rush, M. (2007) Video Art London: Thames & Hudson

Reading: Christopher Riley, ‘The Hollywood Standard: The Complete and Authoritative Guide to Script Format and Style’

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Christopher Riley (2009) The Hollywood Standard: The Complete and Authoritative Guide to Script Format and Style, 2nd edition California: Michael Wiese Productions

Quite possibly the definitive guide to professional script formats used in Hollywood, Christopher Riley’s The Hollywood Standard contains answers to all the questions you might ask about how to present a screenplay that reads fluidly and in a format that meets the demanding standards of a Hollywood script.

Beginning with a Quick Start Guide outlining the ten most basic things a new screenwriter needs to know when writing their screenplay (e.g. the right font, margins, shot headings, character names, etc.), the book goes on to explain in depth the main components of a script as it appears on the page.

It is intended to be used as a reference, with all the information organised  under key headings such as ‘Shot Headings’, ‘Direction’, ‘Dialogue’, ‘Transitions’ and ‘Punctuation’. There are plenty of practical examples of how to work within the rules of standard screenplay format, including a complete short screenplay illustrating how these rules are applied in practice. There is also a chapter on avoiding the ‘Dozen Most Deadly Formatting Mistakes’, such as underusing shot headings, using too many words or slipping into the past tense.

I have found the book very helpful while drafting the screenplay for the project on narrative form and structure. Throughout drafting the short screenplay ‘The Wonderful Things’, I found myself wondering how to present details of the story through the use of shot headings and transitions. I wanted to keep things as simple and succinct as possible and not overload the script with too much unnecessary descriptive text, so Riley’s guidance on the best use of shot headings and transitions was particularly helpful. For example, on page 7 of my screenplay, I wanted to move from an aerial viewpoint above a small river running through the landscape down into the landscape itself in which the characters are moving. After looking at Riley’s book for guidance how best to show this through the use of shot headings and transitions, I realised I could show this sequence through a series of very straightforward headings and ‘CUT TO’ transitions. A result I was very happy with.

I think one thing this book has shown me is that screenwriting is not just another form of storytelling. It is also a very precise form of annotation, in which the screenwriter is presenting an outline of very specific notes for the director to refer to while making the film.

References

Riley, C. (2009) The Hollywood Standard: The Complete and Authoritative Guide to Script Format and Style, 2nd edition. California: Michael Wiese Productions