Assistant Cameraperson-ing for Dummies!

Hello and welcome back! I hope everyone's weekends were filled with splendor and fascination. Keeping up with our century-long tradition, today I'll go into infinitely specific detail of a film crew position. Bet you can't guess what position it is! Can you? You can?! Wow, you're smart! Here's a cookie.

Last week, we discussed the importance of the 1st and 2nd Assistant Directors. Today, we'll be discussing a very similar topic. Like the director, the director of photography has two assistants. Can you guess what those assistants are called?...You're right! They're the 1st and 2nd Assistant Camerapersons.

The camera assistants' main responsibilities involve assisting the Director of Photography in camera operation and maintenance. They essentially help the DP with the execution of their (hopefully) well-planned shots. They assist. It's what they do. It's what they've always meant to do. It's their destiny.

More specifically, in helping the DP in camera operation and maintenance, the 1st Assistant Cameraperson's duties include:

      -Operation of cameras

      -Slating and loading

      -Focus marking and pulling

      -Preparation, maintenance and management of camera equipment

Where their responsibilities really differ from the 2nd AC is in the physical operation of the camera. A person may think, "Oh, they're just an assistant, what could they possibly be allowed to do?" Well, frankly, that's a very silly question. While 'assistant' is in their title, an AC is really anything but an assistant. They're practically part-time director of photography.

What about the 2nd AC? Where do they come into all of this madness? It turns out that the 2nd AC actually shares many of the responsibilities of the 1st AC. It'd be too much to do for one person, so the film industry thought it'd be good to get a second! The 2nd AC is responsible for:

      -Slating and loading

      -Preparation maintenance and management of camera equipment

      -Maintenance, labeling, logging, and safekeeping of reels and tapes

The last point is where the 2nd AC stands out from other AC's. Basically, they work in coordination with the script supervisor to make sure all the reels and tapes are labeled and organized so those who work with them later know what they're messing with. The process of digitizing the film would be a much more grueling process without this step.

So who are AC's? What do they do? Why are they here on Earth with us? What is their purpose in life? In layman's terms, they do everything the DP has to do but doesn't have the time for. While the DP is setting up the perfect shot, the 1st and 2nd AC's are busy doing everything else camera related. Thank you, AC's!

Creating Depth in Art, Film, and Photography

Although 3D imagery is becoming more prevalent in blockbuster films, the fact still remains that depth is something established in 2D imagery.

A recent post on zevendesign.com outlined 8 pain ways to establish depth it art, photography, and film.

• Atmosphere 
• Color
• Linear Perspective
• Light
• Shadow
• Solidarity
• Focus
• Movement

We've all read or watched something that teaches us about creating depth, but the examples they used in this post were so beautiful and unique I found it necessary to share.

1. Atmosphere

The man stands holding an axe in front of the misty forrest that slowly fades off in to the distance. This form is depth is created by having the background less clear then where you want the focus to be.

2. Color

Maybe I'm just a color kind of guy, but I find this form of depth to be the most interesting. The repetition in color palette reveals some of the science behind creating depth.  

The opposite is also true with a white background.

3. Linear Perspective

Linear Perspective is probably an obvious one and usually one of the first ways we thing of creating depth. It's what your second grade art teacher called "the vanishing point". All of the material in your drawing is aimed at one focus point.

4. Light

Obviously if you point your light on to what's in the foreground the attention is going to focus there. But in this post they used light to show that when something is lit in the background, you get a very interesting effect. 

 In the picture below I feel pulled in to the scene. That path is beckoning for some quality strolling down.

The Light here is used in a much more metaphorical way. The focus in this painting ties in to religious beliefs on where our focus should be in life. Although we may first look at the man, that is not where the attention is pulled in the painting. 

5. Shadow

One the flip side of the last one, attention can be brought to what is not in the light by using shadows.

6. Solidity 

Solidity refers to the level of detail in different parts of the image. Solidity differs from focus in that it is usually used in cartoons and paintings. With this technique, the foreground has more attention detail then what is in the background.

7. Focus

Focus is the most common way to achieve depth in film and photography. It can also be achieved in computer art and animation, as they show in a couple of these examples:

 And hence forth the term "Bokehlicious" was created. 

8. Movement

Movement is another common technique used in film in photography. When your subject is on the move, moving the camera with them can blur stationary elements and bring focus to the subject. 

Which is also a synthetic effect I used in our promotional poster to give depth to the room:

The opposite of this (stationary subject with a moving background) is another way to achieve this effect. (Shout out to that time we made Cracked).

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Of course, many of these examples are not limited to their exemplified use. Often times, it is the combination of several of these techniques that create depth in a scene. It's up to you to decide which ones will fit your image for the right effect.

"Soft Focus? Fix it in post."

"Soft Focus? Fix it in post." While that is a phrase no one will hopefully ever say on set, there is a camera that can do just that: Fix focus in post. The Lytro is the first commercially available, consumer level, still-photography camera that doesn't just record a 2D image, it records the entire light field. This  allows for entire new editing possibilities in post. The two most outstanding features of the Lytro is that you can shift the focus and slightly change the perspective after the shot has already been taken.
Try it out on a few pictures here:

The Lytro however, does not support any video recording capabilities. There are many things that excite me about this camera, and many features I feel it is lacking. Regardless, this is a unique, new advancement in the world of consumer cameras. Advancements like these force other companies to step up their products and make advancements of their own. At the rate technology is changing and being developed I can't wait to see whats next.