Compiled
by: Dru Pfeiffer & Brandon Rawlins
On Gregg Toland
www.Imdb.com
www.wikipedia.com
For "Kane", Toland used a method which became known as "deep focus" because it showed background objects as clearly as foreground objects. (Film theorist Andre Bazin said that Toland brought democracy to film-making by allowing viewers to discover what was interesting to them in a scene rather than having this choice dictated by the director.)
Orson Welles once said that everything he knew about the art of photography, a great cameraman - Greg Toland - taught him in half an hour. In truth, before the filming of "Citizen Kane" Toland invited Welles to his house and spent a weekend teaching Welles everything about lens and camera positions that he thought his novice director should know. For the remainder of his life Welles always payed Toland the ultimate compliment. "Not only was he the greatest cameraman I ever worked with," Welles often said,"he was also the fastest."
-Jeff Cronenweth-
Some stories are just best told digitally, and certainly most are told better on film. I probably would say that I prefer to shoot on film, but there are certain cases where digital is the proper approach to the job... I think they're both great mediums
-On Terry Gilliam
One Of Hollywood's Greatest Visionaries'?!? I'm Not Even A Hollywood Director!!!"
"People in Hollywood are not showmen, they're maintenance men, pandering to what they think their audiences want."
"Hollywood is run by small-minded people who like chopping the legs off creative people. All they want to do is say no."
"I do want to say things in these films. I want audiences to come out with shards stuck in them. I don't care if people love my films or walk out, as long as they have a strong response."
"I am getting tired of these fights [with backers.] Each time you get into a fight the world closes in a bit. You start losing an innocence, a belief that everything is possible...
" (on future use of CGI in his films) "Nooo! Leave that to George Lucas, he' s really mastered the CGI acting. That scares me! I hate it! Everybody is so pleased and excited by it. Animation is animation. Animation is great. But it's when you're now taking what should be films full of people, living thinking, breathing, flawed creatures and you're controlling every moment of that, it's just death to me. It's death to cinema, I can't watch those Star Wars films, they're dead things."
"In the end, people have to learn to live together. That is what I didn't like about America - it is so homogeneous. I like places where there are people who are different culturally, physically, in every way. And I like to see how they succeed in living together."
On Orson Welles
"A film is never really good unless the camera is an eye in the head of a poet."
“I think I'm... I made essentially a mistake staying in movies, because I... but it... it's the mistake I can't regret because it's like saying ‘I shouldn't have stayed married to that woman, but I did because I love her.’ I would have been more successful if I'd left movies immediately. Stayed in the theater, gone into politics, written-- anything. I've wasted the greater part of my life looking for money, and trying to get along... trying to make my work from this terribly expensive paint box which is an... a movie...
...And I've spent too much energy on things that have nothing to do with a movie. It's about two percent movie making and 98% hustling. It's no way to spend a life.”
“I want to give the audience a hint of a scene. No more than that. Give them too much and they won't contribute anything themselves. Give them just a suggestion and you get them working with you. That's what gives the theater meaning: when it becomes a social act."
Visionary: A Revival of Super-16mm Production
by Dixon Galvez-Searle
Reprint from SCREEN Magazine
Schumacher Camera
Film is not dead. With the release of three new Kodak Vision2 16mm film stocks, there has been a surge in business for Super 16mm film production. According to Brian Spruill, vice president and general manager of worldwide sales, operations and marketing for Kodak’s Entertainment Imaging division, Kodak’s sales in this area are up 10% for the first half of 2004.
High-definition and other video acquisition formats had made a serious dent in the Super-16mm market over the past five years. "There was a point, maybe a year or so ago, where we thought HD had taken over," says Stan Glapa, sales manager at Schumacher Camera, a film camera rental house in Chicago. He’s seen a 90% increase in 16mm rentals this year. Glapa credits the combination of the new Vision2 stocks along with the use of digital intermediates with the surge in interest in Super-16mm.
Brian McGraw, owner of Cinequipt, a camera rental house in Minneapolis, thinks some of the luster of high-definition has worn off, even though he has not seen HD business go down. "I think a lot of people have tried HD and got it out of their system," he says. "The [Super-16mm] cameras are a lot cheaper and they’re easier to shoot with," he adds. Both Glapa and McGraw say most of their rentals have been for commercial work.
Late last year, Kodak released the 7218 (500 ASA) Vision2 16mm film stock and followed it up with the 7217 (200 ASA) and 7212 (100 ASA) stocks this spring.
Ben Stone, regional account manager for Kodak says, "flexibility" has made the 7218 the workhorse of the group, but adds the format in general has seen a boost. "Based on what I’m hearing from the post facilities and the camera rental stores, they basically can’t keep 16mm on the shelf," says Stone.
Reid Brody, the owner of Filmworkers Club, a transfer facility in Chicago, has seen an up-tick in Super 16mm over the past few years. He’s done some digital intermediates on independent feature films and thinks he may see more advertising work in Super-16mm, as HD becomes more popular with consumers. Since the aspect ratios line up so closely, Brody calls Super-16mm the "perfect" acquisition tool for productions looking to finish in HD.
A colorist at Chicago post house Optimus, Craig Leffel hasn’t seen a rise in Super-16mm commercial work, but has seen a rise in Super-16mm for features. He believes a major selling point is the aspect ratio, which fits neatly into a high quality HD finish. "Lots of stuff is being finished in high definition these days," he says. Leffel thinks the quality of the stocks has improved dramatically. "Most people can’t tell the difference these days between a 16mm and 35mm film," he says.
Oscar Oboza, a colorist at Hi-Wire, a post house in Minneapolis, says he’s been working on Super-16mm at least once a week. "There is a lot of Super-16mm being shot, period," he says. Oboza thinks the format works nicely with Thomson’s Spirit Datacine, since the data is such a high resolution that it can easily be converted to HD or printed to film. Oboza thinks working with data gives DPs a certain amount of flexibility. "It doesn’t have to be perfect," he says, "but you can still make great pictures."
Rainer Knebel, marketing manager of post production at Thomson, says the Spirit Datacine is used for regular 16mm roughly 80 percent of the time. He has, however, seen a general up tick in Super 16mm. "What makes it unique is the HDTV production at the moment and the Super 16mm aspect ratio, which is very close to 16:9," he says.
For Ericka Frederick, production account executive at Kodak, the resurgence of Super 16mm has busted a number of myths about working with film. "The technology of the newer film stock [makes] it easier to shoot on film," she says. It has an organic look." Frederick says cost is a popular misconception when it comes to acquisition formats. "It’s funny how people just assume that film is expensive," she says. "Well, it’s not." In addition, Frederick notes how lightweight some Super-16mm cameras are. "It ’s so moveable," she says. "It ’s like a video camera [in that regard]." With the introduction of Kodak’s new Vision2 stocks and the advent of HD finishing, the production community has found some new uses for Super-16mm. The format is, at this point, very much alive.
Website developed by Rawlins Information Technology Services
bcrawlins@ritsonline.com