You know the old saying "A picture says a thousand words", well try thinking on the scale of 24 pictures a second. That's what film runs at, and for each of those 24 frames the Director of Photography is responsible for making sure that story gets across.

The role of the DP is very important, equally important as the Director or the actors who star in the movie, but to great dissapointment usually go unrecognized when the audience watches a film.

The DP must be able to read performance just as good as the director, even though their artform is different. They tell the stroy in terms of color and shade, and light and shadow. They can create mood and feeling, making you feel all warm and fuzzy in a bright rap around color scheme of pinks, yellows, and whites, while on the other end of the scale the lighting crew can create terror and claustrophobia with dark tones of blues, grays, and purples.

For instance, I was just sitting down to my Sunday dinner watching Star Trek: Voyager on TV. There was an episode involving the Borg (but then again these days they are always in it) and it got me thinking. A couple of years ago when we first met them, they didn't look all that terrifing. In their setting, all they had were plain yellow and brown coloring, with the occasional lighting fading up and down. These days, they changed their whole philosophy (The DP I mean), and displayed them in low lighting settings, with shades of green and blue, coupled with quick camera movement they are now a much more threatning race.

I want to discuss my two favourite shots in film. The first is from The Empire Strikes Back where Luke confronts Vader in the Carbon Freezing Chamber (you know when they just stand there and stare at each other, sabers at the ready). It's a great looking two-shot where there are some vibrant colors, warm orange mixed with cold blue, all with a beautiful sillohette creating the images of Luke and Vader, father and son ready to fight to the death.

The second one is from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, where Indy turns the tables and stands up against the Indian slave cheifs. He stands infont of the big man ready to fight him, when the camera closes up on his face. There is a brilliant white light coming from behind Indy, to shine in the camera. Another sillohette. One shot you have tension, the other you have the "hero fator". Both thanks to the skill of the DP.

As an ameture filmmaker, you will have a limited budget, so you will not be able to afford the heavy duty equipment that is used on the big budget movies, but really any lighting equipment, even the average house hold gear will be useful.

The Basics

There are three basic forms of light, and are pretty self explanitory.

Key Lighting: Your PRIMARY light source. Should you be filming outside, then this would be the sun.

Fill Lighting: Used to fill in the areas which are in shadow. Adds depth to the image.

Back Lighting: Primarily coming from behind the object in shot, back lighting seperates the object from the background. Can also be used to create that glow like in the Indiana Jones shot I described earlier.

Filters.

Filters otherwise known as Gels can help establish mood. A gel is essentially a really thin piece of glass that is put into a slide over the front of the light, effectivly changing the color of the light. Another thing that is used in lighting is a thing called "Scrin" (I think that's what it is called, I haven't used it in ages). It is used to soften the light on the object. It is made out of a woven glass, and is very fragile (and very expensive to replace) so they should be used with care.

Another thing to consider when lighting your scene is the apputure of the camera. If you open the apputure of the camera, you let more light in. This is helpful in filming in low light conditions. If you close the apputure then you let less light in, which is handy for bright sunny days.

One thing that a friend of mine did once was to shoot a film in Kodak 8mm Tri-X film on a bright sunny day with the apputure open. In bright conditions you should use Plus-X, which is designed for outdoor shooting where as Tri-X is used for indoor filming. The end result of her film was a kind of washed out white effect which looked good because it was from a dreams point of view, and it looked quite ghostly. A nice effect.

Any comments, questions, job offers, love letters, and hate mail should be sent to the following E-Mail address.

dirkdiggler@onetel.net.uk

Good luck in your projects.

Yours truly,
Mark Hedge.