Cinematography

Summary

Cinematography is the science and practice of making motion pictures. It includes the technical processes behind all imaging formats, including film, analog, and digital video. Cinematography is concerned with the careful manipulation of technical and mechanical tools, such as lighting, exposure, lenses, filters, and special effects, to create a coherent visual expression of information, emotion, or narrative. Besides the filmmaking and commercial industries, in which cinematography plays a central role, virtually any area where the production of a moving image is useful relies on the principles of this field of applied science. For example, cinematography has important applications in disciplines as diverse as military, education, scientific research, marketing, and medicine.

Definition and Basic Principles

Cinematography is the science behind the techniques involved in creating a motion picture, as well as the practical application of those techniques. Basic cinematographic tools include film and video cameras; different lenses, filters, and film stock; the equipment involved with artificially lighting a set; the machinery used to mount and transport cameras and control their angles and movements; and a wide variety of computerized special effects that can be created or integrated into the motion picture in the postproduction stage. Unlike still photography, in which a complete product is composed of a single image, cinematography uses the relationships between quickly moving images to produce a narrative arc.

At heart, cinematography is based on an illusion caused by the interplay between technology and human perception. The typical motion-picture projection, whether the format is film, video, or digital, consists of at least twenty-four separate still frames per second. These still frames are transformed into what appears to be a moving image through two related features of the human visual system known as "persistence of vision" and the "phi phenomenon." "Persistence of vision" refers to the fact that when light hits the retina of the eye, the images it creates persist in the brain for a tiny fraction of a second longer than the physical stimulus itself. The "phi phenomenon" refers to the fact that when the eye is shown two separate images in rapid succession, the brain creates the appearance of seamless movement between the two frames. The combination of these two psychophysical characteristics makes it possible for people to ignore the tiny fractions of darkness that appear for a moment in between each still frame.

Background and History

Motion picture technology was born in the late nineteenth century when a research team led by American inventor Thomas Alva Edison and engineers working in England and France all independently developed a means of photographing still images at a rate fast enough to capture movement and of projecting successive images at a rate fast enough to create the illusion of seamless motion. Among the first motion-picture projection technologies were Edison's Kinetograph and Kinetoscope.

Early motion pictures were recorded in black and white (though they were often hand-colored) and had no sound. Early in the twentieth century, various experiments with sound recording and amplification equipment were carried out, including a technique for using wax phonograph discs to record sound and an electronic loudspeaker for amplifying it in theaters. The Vitaphone system, created by the Warner Bros. studio, used these developments to produce a short musical, The Jazz Singer (1927). By the late 1920s, studios had moved to recording sound optically on a separate reel of film stock. For the soundtrack of a film to be properly synchronized with the visual image, the speed of motion picture projection was standardized at twenty-four frames per second. Color cinematography was first achieved through a system of filters that recorded information from the red, green, and blue spectra of light separately onto a strip of black-and-white film—later, color film stock was developed in which three layers of emulsion on the film served the same purpose.

In the 1990s, digital cinematography, which captures moving images in a digital rather than analog format, began to take off. The first major cinematic release shot entirely on digital video was George Lucas's Star Wars Episode II: The Attack of the Clones (2002). In the 2010s, this technology overtook film for most applications.

How It Works

Cameras. The body of a traditional motion-picture camera consists of a sturdy, lightproof housing, a system of motors that control the movement of film and mechanical components such as the shutter, and a viewing system through which the camera operator can monitor the footage being shot. Onto the body of the camera is affixed a lens, which uses one or more convex glass elements to gather and focus rays of light onto the film. Depending on the type of framing the cinematographer wishes to achieve, standard, wide-angle, telephoto, or zoom lenses may be used. To produce a smooth, not jerky, moving image, cameras are usually mounted on sturdy supports during filming. A basic dolly mount consists of a large, heavy tripod on a sturdy base with casters. A mount has various adjustment levers that allow the camera operator to raise, lower, and tilt the camera. To raise the camera to an elevated height, a crane is added to the dolly; for long panning shots, the entire contraption is often moved along specially built rails that are laid on the floor. Steadicam systems, in which a camera is harnessed to the operator's body, reduce the jerkiness caused by movements during shooting and allow for smoother handheld operation of cameras.

Film Cinematography. To capture a rapid succession of images, the film is inserted behind the camera lens and automatically unrolled by an electric motor from a supply reel, through a gate, and onto a take-up reel. As the film travels through the gate, a motorized shutter lifts up and down at regular intervals, usually twenty-four times per second. Every time the shutter lifts, the film is exposed to light. Film stock is composed of a base, traditionally made of celluloid but later usually made of polyester or Mylar, painted with a layer or layers of silver-halide emulsion. This emulsion reacts when exposed to light. (Color films have three layers of emulsion, each of which reacts with only one of the three primary colors of light: blue, green, or red.) Once the film has been shot, a chemical known as a developer is used to process the exposed areas of the film and produce a negative image. With black-and-white film, a negative shows dark areas of the image as light areas and vice versa. With color film, a negative shows complementary colors—for example, red areas appear green. Further chemical processes make a positive print out of these negatives. When a positive print is projected onto a screen, the image appears in its correct form. A type of film known as "reversal film" is also available. It has the advantage of producing a positive rather than a negative image at the end of the developing process.

Video Cinematography. Although film remains an important tool for some cinematographers and motion-picture producers, other imaging formats have become dominant. Analog video was an important development that rose to popularity in the late twentieth century, though it too has since been largely superseded. In analog video imaging, light gathered by the camera lens is not captured by the emulsions on film stock but instead is converted into electric signals by tiny photosensitive diodes on a component known as a charge-coupled device (CCD). In some cameras, three separate CCDs are used, with each capturing information about one of the three primary colors. This electric signal is then recorded as a pattern on a strip of magnetic tape. Analog video imaging replaced film for news broadcasts and other television broadcasts. Because it was very inexpensive, it is also a popular tool for at-home or amateur motion-picture production.

Digital video imaging also makes use of photosensitive diodes, whether on CCDs or later technologies such as active-pixel sensors (APS), of which the complementary metal–oxide–semiconductor sensor (CMOS) became widely used. With digital video, however, the electric signal from an image sensor is not converted into a magnetic pattern on tape. Instead, it is translated into a digital signal or binary code consisting solely of 1s and 0s. Digital cameras can record onto hard disks, digital video discs (DVDs), flash drives, or any other digital format. By the mid-2010s, digital video had become the dominant form of cinematography. Since the late 2010s, over 90 percent of film has been shot on digital.

Applications and Products

Filmmaking. With the advent of motion-picture imaging came an entirely new form of visual communication, one that—unlike photographs—could depict a series of events, thereby expressing a narrative rather than a single moment in time. In addition, the illusion of movement and the fidelity with which the camera records images lend viewers of motion pictures an irresistible sense that the events they are watching not only are somehow real but also are occurring in the present rather than the past. Arguably the most significant application of cinematography, at least in terms of its cultural impact, is the use of motion-picture imaging to create narrative, documentary, and newsreel films. Practicing cinematographers can apply the full range of cinematographic tools and techniques in different ways to achieve sophisticated effects. For instance, the use of a dolly mounted on tracks allows a camera operator to pan (turn) the camera in a horizontal plane. This is often used to produce the illusion that the camera's perspective is that of a character in the film. Although this application has largely been taken over by computer-generated imaging (CGI), cinematographic techniques also enable the creation of animated films. Animation is created by using a motion-picture camera to film a series of carefully constructed illustrations (or objects, such as clay puppets). When replayed, the still images appear to move.

Education. Cinematography has made it possible for students of all subjects to engage in learning through direct observation without ever leaving their classrooms. Techniques such as time-lapse photography, in which still frames that were captured at a very slow rate are replayed at a much faster speed, enable teachers to demonstrate incredibly drawn-out and subtle processes, such as the development of vegetation from a tiny seed to fruiting tree, or the movement of the stars across the sky. In the same way, high-speed photography, in which still frames that were captured at a very fast rate are replayed at a slower speed, enables students to see clearly the steps involved in processes that happen in the blink of an eye, such as the formation of droplets as a bead of water hits the surface of a pond. Time-lapse photography is created with a standard camera attached to a device set to trigger its shutter at extended, regular intervals—such as an hour apart or more. The technology behind high-speed photography is more complex and requires careful control over the precise timing of the camera's shutter and the amount of light the film or image sensor is exposed to during the time the shutter is open. A shutter, for instance, may be triggered by a sound associated with the event the cinematographer is trying to capture, such as the firing of a gun.

Another cinematographic technology that has transformed both education and entertainment is the use of three-dimensional (3D) imaging and projection systems such as IMAX. With three-dimensional cinematography, two camera lenses are used to capture two separate streams of images, one corresponding to the view a human observer would receive through their left eye and one corresponding to the view through their right eye. In the theater, these two images are then projected onto the screen simultaneously. With the use of a special pair of three-dimensional glasses, viewers are able to perceive the dual cinematic streams as a single three-dimensional image. Three-dimensional imaging and projection are widely used in science museums to give museumgoers a more vivid entryway into presentations about topics such as space exploration and underwater habitats.

Medical Video Imaging. A host of specialized cinematographic techniques have found useful homes in the realm of clinical diagnosis and surgery. For example, stereo endoscopes make it far easier for physicians to perform minimally invasive surgeries. A stereo endoscope is an instrument that can be inserted into a patient's body through a small incision or down a natural orifice such as the throat. It is used to transmit a three-dimensional video image of a patient's internal parts to the surgeon as they work. A stereo endoscope consists of a tube, often flexible, containing a dual lens system and a bundle of optical fibers. These fibers bring light from an external light source into the patient's body and then transmit the video image from the lens back out to a large screen in the operating room. When cinematographic techniques are combined with tools from communications technology, another application of real-time video imaging in medicine emerges—web-based conferencing, which enables collaborations between clinicians who are physically distant from each other.

Careers and Course Work

Within the motion-picture industry, the role of the cinematographer is more creative than technical. Cinematographers work with the director of a film to decide on how each shot will be composed. Students interested in more hands-on career options may consider becoming camera operators, lighting technicians, sound engineers, set electricians, or postproduction editors.

Anyone interested in a career as a cinematographer or camera operator or who plans on pursuing some other kind of technical occupation related to cinematography, such as lighting, sound recording, and postproduction and editing, should acquire a strong body of knowledge about the physics of light. Besides courses in optics, it is important to take specialized classes in the mechanical and electrical engineering of film, video, and digital cameras and to understand how each type of cinematographic equipment, including lenses, interacts with light to produce an image. Other important educational requirements include an understanding of the chemistry of film emulsions and development and the mathematics of exposure.

Finally, it would be appropriate for any student of cinematography to take a course in human visual perception through a psychology or physiology department. Understanding how the eye and brain work together to process light and visual information allows those who work in motion-picture imaging to carefully manipulate those processes to achieve the desired emotional or visual effect. Many practicing cinematographers have graduated from a technical college rather than a traditional liberal arts university or have pursued specialized training in motion-picture technology from a formal film school program. A degree in computer science or computer graphics would also be an appropriate starting point for someone wishing to work in special effects, animation, or video editing.

Social Context and Future Prospects

It is hard to overestimate the social impact that cinematography and its associated technologies have had. One important cultural role for motion-picture imaging has been expanding the horizons of viewers beyond the concerns of their own lives, their own communities, and even their own countries—enabling them to see directly into entirely different worlds. In this way, many films have served as powerful mechanisms for social and humanitarian change. In the 1980s, for example, when documentary cameras captured dramatic footage of starving Ethiopian men, women, and children and delivered it to the eyes of the Western world, aid money poured into the impoverished nation. The 1993 film Philadelphia, which told the story of a lawyer infected with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and his partner, highlighted the growing devastation wrought by the acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) epidemic in the United States and put a human face on what was still considered by many Americans to be a shameful disease. The documentary An Inconvenient Truth (2006) has been credited with greatly raising awareness of climate change, while the 2017 documentary O.J.: Made in America examines the arc of the life of O.J. Simpson and racism and culture in America. The role of film to educate, invoke emotion, and make a social impact continued into the 2020s with movies like Oppenheimer (2023), which shed light on the moral and ethical implications of nuclear energy, and Killers of the Flower Moon (2023), which exposed the brutal history of Indigenous Americans.

The use of motion-picture technology by nonprofessionals has also had a profound cultural impact. In the second half of the twentieth century, the development of less expensive cameras for making home movies enabled individuals across the world to create a tangible archive of their personal experiences and domestic milestones. Unlike a photograph, which is often posed, the home movie preserves not just formal, fleeting glimpses of the past but rather ceremonies, events, and candid interactions. In addition, the home movie transports the viewer straight back to the moment when the footage was recorded. The potential of amateur cinematography was further expanded as digital video cameras became cheaper and smaller in the twenty-first century, especially when they were integrated into ubiquitous consumer electronics such as smartphones. With multitudes of people around the world carrying around powerful cameras everywhere they go, the social impact continues to be felt, from the proliferation of social media videos to the real-time documentation of social movements. For example, the app TikTok exploded in 2019 and, within two years, the short videos were credited with boosting social justice activities and the Black Lives Matter movement. Video recorded on mobile devices and uploaded to social media and the Internet has greatly impacted the Black Lives Matter and Me Too movements in the twenty-first century. However, the ability of private individuals to record and post videos also has moral and ethical implications.

Other developments continue to shape cinematography on a more technical level. While some apparent advancements, such as 3D films, experience surges of interest only to fade from popularity again, others have had a lasting impact. One example is the emergence of a technique known as the "digital intermediate" (DI) process. This is a means of scanning motion pictures recorded on film—which many advocates argue is of far superior visual quality than digital video—at an extremely high resolution, thus converting it into a digital format. The DI process has enabled the motion picture industry to use the best film and digital technologies to produce stunningly crisp and clear imaging that is far easier and cheaper to distribute. New advances, like using drones or artificial intelligence in editing, continue to revolutionize cinematography. As filmmakers seek the highest-quality images possible and experiment with new techniques and formats, cinematography will continue to refine and evolve.

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