CINEMATOGRAPHY

“Life is unpredictable, and I feel, to some extent, lighting and

cinematography should be a reflection of that” - Cinematographer
Rachel Morrison
On every film set for every movie, a Director of Pho- Practitioner - Roger Deakins
tography (DoP) will be present. Their role as the cin-
ematographer is being in charge over the separate
camera and lighting crews for a production.
To define what’s involved with cinematography. It’s the art of photography and
visual storytelling in a live action motion picture or TV show, as well as com-
prises of multiple different on-screen elements. These are the lighting, camera
angles and framing, colour, exposure, depth of field and mise-en-scene (the
scenery, props and elements in a surrounding) and camera movements.
All these individual techniques go into what’s ultimately called cinematogra-
phy.
By including all these elements into your short film, it will help set and support
the overall mood and look to the visual story you are wanting to tell.
The DoP usually works closely with the director of the production, or could
even be the director, such as in the film Roma, released in late November
2018, the Director Alfonso Cuaron also worked as the cinematographer on the
“I like simplicity. I like using natural sources. I
filming of the movie. By doing this, Cuaron could completely produce what he
like Images to look natural - as though some-
envisioned for the film, every shot, as well as working with a crew of people,
body sitting in a room by a lamp is being lit by
could be set up and composed to create the mood and look he wanted for the
that lamp” - Roger Deakins
film.
At present, the 72 year-old British cinematographer, is said to be one of the greatest
Short history about cinematography by the constant way he adapts his style to each film, as well as his cinematography
In the late 1888s, the earliest surviving live motion picture film was created by shots are motivated by the story by using simple yet effective camera and lighting
a man named Louis Le Prince. It is called ‘Roundhay Garden Scene’, and lasted techniques.
around 2.11 seconds long, as well as being shot on old celluloid film. He was born on the 24th May, 1949 in Torquay, Devon UK. When Deakins was
Then in 1895, two brothers by the names of Louis and Auguste Lumiere, de- younger, he studied Graphic Design at Bath Academy of Art, where he started to get
signed and built the first camera with a projector and film printer all in one. It into photography. He applied multiple times at the National Film School, which he
was called the cinematographe. didn’t get in at first until many years later.
He had worked as a cameraman for multiple small feature films, until he created a
Throughout the early 1900s to 1940, the era of cinema was building to its unique washed out film look, following this he has collaborated with multiple direc-
peak. With the first test of colour being added to black and white film in 1906, tors including the Coan Brothers, Sam Mendes and Denis Villeneuve.
but became a predominant process of film in 1932, as the expensive process Throughout the film productions he has been Director of Photography for; he has
became cheaper more reasonable for production companies. been nominated as well as won multiple Oscar and BAFTA awards. Such as in 2020,
In 1927 the first full length feature film to include synchronised sound was Deakins won the Oscar for Best Achievement in Cinematographer and won the BAF-
produced. TA for Best Cinematography for the film 1917, which was released In 2019.
Then in 1942 a film called Citizen Kane was released, but saw the first proper He also won the BAFTA and Oscar for Best Cinematography/Achievement in Cine-
break through with visual storytelling (cinematography), as the Director and matography for the film Blade Runner 2049, which was released in 2017.
DoP, Gregg Toland, experimented with different lighting techniques and lens- Deakins has also been nominated for more BAFTA and Oscar awards do to with Best
es, resulting in the discovery of depth of field, deep focus. By the 2000s, all the Cinematography for films including Skyfall, No Country for Old Men, Unbroken and
films before had been shot in film, but this was slowly changing to digital me- many others.
dium formats, until 2010 when digital became the primary format for cinema.
How cinematography techniques have
improved over the years
Camera movements have been very important to shooting a scene in a film as it allows cinematographers to be able to shift the viewers view
of a scene without cutting to a different angle.
In the very early days of filmmaking, all the camera shots would be static and stationary as in the early days of cinema, filmmakers thought
having movement would disorientate or confuse the audience as well as it being difficult to move the camera around on set.
Before the 1920s, the were no types of Steadicams, gimbals, tracks or any special rig to help with camera movement. But by this time and
later on, the use of cranes and dollies for cameras were being built, introduced and used on film sets, then by the 1960s the development of
Steadicam devices were being used to stabilise camera shakes. Following in the later years of filmmaking, cameras have become much more
mobile and stabilised, as now in the present times cameras are able to move in any direction and be moved in any way the directors want for
a shot, by the use of specially designed rigs to allow the camera in positions that humans physically can’t get to.

Colour is very and has been an important visual tech- nical aspect of movies. From the start of live motion
pictures in the late 1800s and early 1900s, all the film footage was monochrome, meaning purely black and
white, also at this time the audiences got use to watch- ing movies in this style.
In 1906, experimenting with different colouring techniques had begun, but these processes were so
expensive that no film was fully in colour until the late 1930s.
Early colouring techniques included stencilling, which was where each individual frame would be manually
coloured in by hand, however this process would take a very long time and be expensive.
Tinting was another colouring technique created, as this process could colour certain scenes in a film. This
was done with coloured dye, with different colours used to represent the time of day a scene takes place, as
dark blue and purple dyes would be used to represent a shot at night and would distinguish the daytime shots
which would be normal monochrome. However, this technique would only be a representation of colour.
Over time, a different colouring technique was being developed which was done by a two-colour film
process where the film would be projected through red and green filters. This was known as Kinemacolor and
was created by George Smith.
Later in the decade, an American company, Technicolour, created their own two-colour process which would use two projectors, one with a
green filter and the other with a red filter. In the 1920s, the company had developed a process where the colour could be directly imprinted
on the film. The also went onto create a three-colour film process, by using dye-transferring techniques.
By the 1960s, colour in film had become a standard for movies, as the price to use colour to decreased significantly where all production
companies to include colour to their films.

Ground Breaking Production Tips and techniques for

An old black and white feature film from 1941, called Citizen Kane, cinematography:
saw a breakthrough in the way visual storytelling could be done.
It was directed by Orson Welles, with the Director of Photography -​ Stay inspired and study great cinematogra-
being Gregg Toland. phers.
This was seen as a break through, due to the experimenting from -Don’t become too occupied with trying
Welles and Toland with different lenses and lighting styles, creating to create the most cinematic style, instead
what is known as Deep Focus as this could create composed shots.
The term ‘Deep Focus’ is defined by the wide depth of field, meaning
focus on the story
the object or human focus in the shot would be in focus however -Push yourself creatively
close or far from the lens they are placed. This was done with the use -Know the script
of a wide angle lens and small aperture. This was not at all common
or even used in early films, so was in some way, revolutionary to
cinematography in the way scenes -Keep the frame
could be shot. moving to make
Long tracking shots was another the shot stay ac-
technique used in Citizen Kane, but
this was done without the use of tive and visually
any camera stabilising equipment, engaging
but instead the camera was moved -Get creative
forwards and backwards on round with different
the set, tracking the movement of lenses (different
the actors as they moved around
the set, with the furniture and focal lengths)
props also having to be moved to -Add depth to
allow room for the camera set up. the shot
When using Deep Focus, it was -Mix colour
important for the filmmaker to remember mise-en-scene, as this was temperatures
to help guide the attention of the viewer by the camera movements
and the subjects focused on.