Moving Pictures
- Issy Mcilduff
- Sep 29, 2020
- 6 min read
What is it and why is it important?
A moving picture is as clear as its name, a picture that has moving qualities, such as a film, music video or tv series. It has become more important in the majority of everyone's everyday life, we see different moving pictures all the time. There isn't a day where we don't see a moving picture at least once. This moving picture revelation came out in the 1800's where it started out as film projectors, then in the 1890's film movies came out with no sound, more commonly known as silent movies.
Who are the most important people in moving pictures and what do they do?
Typically the most important person in the moving pictures side of things (film, cinematography etc) is the Director Of Photography (or the DOB). The DOB could also be referred to as the cinematographer, their job is to make sure the camera crew know exactly what they are doing, and ensuring all the equipment works. as well as that they are also responsible for making any changes ,such as artistic or technical, to the images.
Who are the most famous film cinematographers?
Matthew Libatique
The first cinematographer is Matthew Libatique, he started his work back in 1996 for a music video by Tracy Chapman called Give Me One Reason. He is more well known for his work in the movies Pi (1998), A Star Is Born (2018), Iron Man 1(2008) and Iron Man 2 (2010). His work allows us to get really into the movie, and the different cinematic techniques he uses is really engaging. Here are my favourite scenes from a couple of these movies
The first movie I picked was Iron Man 1. After rewatching it I picked out my favourite scene that had the best cinematography in it. I personally thought that the intro was the best scene; it had the best soundings and cinematography of the entire movie.
Matthew libatique also filmed iron man 2 in 2010, the best cinematic scene in the movie would probably have to be the scene where he first meets Nick Fury in the doughnut shop, it has such nice cinematography, the entire scene is much calmer than the rest feisty, dramatic, action packed movie. There isn't much to this scene camera movements wise due to the calmness of the scene. However the camera mainly looks up to Tony Stark or at eye level to him, when he's sat at the table opposite Nick fury. It's a very simplistic scene, which then allows the scene to look and feel slightly calmer than the rest of the movie.
Trent Opaloch
Another cinematographer is Trent Opaloch; he was mostly famous for filming a few of the marvel series. Such as Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014), Captain America: Civil War (2016), Avengers: Infinity War (2018) and Avengers Endgame (2019). His cinematic work in these movies is really good and captivating. Here are my favorite scenes for a couple of the movies.
My first favorite scene was in Avengers: Endgame, where in the scene it was Tony Stark’s funeral. It had so much ambience in it. The camera glided through the scene so we could see all the emotions of the characters' faces. The only background noise was the birds, wind and stream, there was no one talking and it made the audience feel the emotions that are felt by the characters during this emotional time.
Another movie Trent Opaloch did was Captain America: Civil War, i think this movie had great cinematography.
This scene is the first scene where bucky and Captain America (Steve Rogers) re-meet since the first movie, bucky in danger and steve tries to save him. The focus is mainly on what bucky sees, or what he does, the cinematography is quiet still and only shifts to what Bucky sees or the conversation between Bucky and Steve
Opaloch is very good at creating scenes with dramatic tension with his camera techniques, he has mastered this action filming very well and very intelligently by using these camera techniques. However as it was simplistic it still allowed some dramatic tension in the scene due to Tony and Nick's conversation topic.
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Roger Deakin
The final photographer I chose is Roger Deakin, he filmed some famous movies such as 1917, dead man walking and skyfall. As well as that he was a visual consultant for many other movies such as How To Train Your Dragon 1,2 and 3, along with The Rise Of The Guardians. The visual consultant for movies is the person who overlooks the design aspect of the movies.
The first movie I chose was the one he filmed called 1917, the main scene I liked from this movie was the introduction scene. It was very smooth and calm compared to the rest of the movie. It acted like a ‘everythings going to be fine scene’ where all the men are relaxing in this green flowery field, if they weren't in the uniform you wouldn't be able to tell that they are off to fight a war. This scene was done by a continuous pull back on camera using a small stabilizer, this allowed us to see the landscape where the main characters are.
The second movie I chose was one he was a visual consultant for, it was The Rise Of The Guardians prior to this movie he worked on other visual consultant type movies, such as How To Train Your Dragon 1. Therefore he was able to make the animations as lifelike as he could by helping them with the lighting, as well as a contribution to the production such as contrast, saturation, depth of field and light intensity. As a result of this the film ended up looking really good and as life-like as an animation film can get.
The best scene would be the snowball fight scene, where the camera follows the ice and jack frost along his small little journey of his snowball fight and this little boy that has a fun sled fight
Laura Bellingham
Laura is a cinematographer who has worked on a lot of expensive brands such as samsung galaxy, currys, nikon, strongbow, hugo boss and max factor. She has done more than just commercials, such as dramas, like The Power, Siren and Double Date.
The first one I liked was the strongbow commercial with a lot of different camera angles, it was based around british summers and going on holidays or even staying at home. But being able to enjoy life on the fun side. The first scene is a pull back from a lady pulling a pint of strongbow at the bar to people enjoying that drink all over the country in different weathers.
The second commercial I chose by her was the Nikon advert. This advert for nikon was all about memories and how we hold those memories. From birth to old age, tears and laughter, and success and failure. The main focus on each scene is the person's face, mainly the eyes, this is to show the tears from their eyes or the smile lines that show. This is a good piece of cinematography as I think the focus on the eyes makes it really easy to show pure emotion and how they feel.
Music Cinematographers.
Bangjaeyeob
I chose Bang Jae Yeob because of a music video I saw that he filmed. It was stray kids' God's menu, the part that really caught my eye was the scene where the camera pans around one of the people and it pans around to some of the other members of the band. This music video was really cleverly done and very smart. I think this works really well with the music videos.
He was able to capture the intensity of the music as well as that the transitions of the camera allow the music video to easily be followed along, from scene to scene and evey music change (beat drop, change in tempo), sometimes it even follows the dancing of the bands for example whm they move there arms for a dance scene the camera follows it.
The second one i chose was EXO-SC '부르면 돼 (closer to you)’. This music video was very simplistic and done with very little camera movements. This allowed a very simple and easy to watch music video, with only the props and musicians to make the music video more interesting by the way they have the props and the way they move in the music video.
It gave a good sense of easiness and simplicity to their topic and music choice. The music to the mv has no dramatic music beats therefore allowing the need for a simple mv
Bang Jae Yeob’s website link- https://bangjaeyeob.com
Kwon yong Soo
I choose Kwon Yong Soo because he has a very good way of his camera techniques. He is able to change the way the mv looks by changing the way the camera looks at the band in time with the music.
The first music video by Kwon Yong Soo was Ice Age by MCND, this mv is very up beat and the camera angles changes along with the beat of the music. For example every big beat changes, the location changes or it pans in closer to the artists singing and dancing. Some camera changes are faster and only last a split second due to the constant change of beat. This works well with the music as it allows the beat to control the video instead of the musicians.
The second music video I chose was Lonely night by KNK. This mv starts off very calm, similar to the beat of the music however with the change of beat so does the video and camera techniques. The beat speeds up and has an increase in beat drops therefore the camera techniques change, more location switching etc. there's a lot of panning around, close ups and zooms into the musicians as the mv progresses.
Kwon Yong Soo’s Vimeo link- https://vimeo.com/saccharin
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