cinematography in 30 seconds
A face filmed from directly in front will also seem to be flat, especially if the light falls on it evenly. This circumstance is usually favorable for an older actress, because it obscures imperfections; the cheeks become smooth. To be filmed indoors sympathetically, a face needs to be lit by more than one light. A cameraman will often place a small light called a catch light close to the camera’s lens. The catch light will be reflected in the actress’s eyes. A face with no light in the eyes will seem remote, abstracted, the face of someone it is difficult to feel a connection with.
…We absorb images from left to right, the same way we read. Looking at a face that is lit from the left side is “restful.” Lighting against the grain—from the right, that is—introduces a discordance. Light from below distorts a face: unnatural shadows appear. Light from the top makes a face appear gaunt. The eyes go dark.
…Moonlight is the most challenging fabrication that appears commonly in movies. “It’s so difficult to achieve that cameramen are sometimes judged by their ability to simulate it”… On a huge landscape, the light, to be convincing, must fall with the same intensity on an actor in the foreground as it does on the trees or the hills in the background. Unless intercepted by clouds, actual moonlight is uniform… Moonlight is most often created using enormous lights on cranes some distance from the set, perhaps a hundred yards…sometimes a quarter mile away.
— New Yorker article on Roger Pratt (via spaceships)
2 notesShowHide
-
monstersetc reblogged this from spaceships
-
monstersetc liked this
-
spaceships posted this
