cinematography Cinematography, tricks that bug you...
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clive said:
I highly disagree. I've grown to hate script-driven films. Film is a visual medium, it shouldn't be an appendage to theater (at least in my opinion)
In that way, I guess you can say I agree with Vertov... But there is such a thing as over styling. I found Man With a Movie Camera kinda pointless. Stylized films today are pretty much like that. Take the Japanese film Versus. The camera won't slow down, the editing won't slow down... Same with Moulin Rouge. One of the more important things to remember about film being a visual medium is to also let the subject matter permeate a bit, show some more landscape shots... Let it linger... There needs to be some balance.
Whilst I fancy myself as a cinematographer, I agree with Clive. Cinematography should be a visual aid or a component. It's just like making a cake, if you put too much of one thing in the cake won't taste as good. If the cinematography can be evenly balanced with the story then the film should work
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.I would have to say period lighting, basically thats when the lighting doesn't match the era or time period.
Breathing new life into a dead thread.
I hate how indie films often light from below because they either don't have big enough sources or can't find a good place to hide the lights during their 10 minute single shot film. Unless you have a really shiny floor it just looks fake.
I hate how indie films often light from below because they either don't have big enough sources or can't find a good place to hide the lights during their 10 minute single shot film. Unless you have a really shiny floor it just looks fake.
-Adjusting the shutter to create that strobe light effect in action sequences. Right after Ridley Scott directed Gladiator it became overused.
-A line of people walking in slow-mo towards the camera, like they're The Right Stuff. Like George Carlin once said, "You're not fucking cool. You're just chilly!"
-Filming fight scenes in nothing more than close ups and extreme closeups. I have a idea as to why this is so prevalent in the US and not other countries. It's because all the old kung fu movies from Hong Kong were filmed cinescope aspect ratio, but blown up to do pan-and-scan when showed on TV, thereby make all the medium shots into closeups and closeups into extreme closeups.
-Real long steadicam shots used for superfluous reasons.
Good: Boogie Nights (there's a ton of them)
Bad: Better Luck Tomorrow, where the guys just walk into a party and don't even say anything. Boring!
-Not necessarily a cinematographic peeve, but visual and, IMO, dumb. Those "into the components of an electronic devices" shots. Such examples are seeing the insides of the rice rockets in The Fast and the Furious, in the CD player in Josie and the Pussycats, look at how communication satellite technology works in Phone Booth, or look at how industrial air conditioning works in Bad Boys II. (Actually there's a laundry list of things in Bad Boys II I could tell you about.
-Bullet time. 'Nuff said.
-Slow motion shots of objects falling after something bad happens in a generic comedy. That last attempt at tugging at my cynical heart strings. Congratulations, you have failed admirably.
-A line of people walking in slow-mo towards the camera, like they're The Right Stuff. Like George Carlin once said, "You're not fucking cool. You're just chilly!"
-Filming fight scenes in nothing more than close ups and extreme closeups. I have a idea as to why this is so prevalent in the US and not other countries. It's because all the old kung fu movies from Hong Kong were filmed cinescope aspect ratio, but blown up to do pan-and-scan when showed on TV, thereby make all the medium shots into closeups and closeups into extreme closeups.
-Real long steadicam shots used for superfluous reasons.
Good: Boogie Nights (there's a ton of them)
Bad: Better Luck Tomorrow, where the guys just walk into a party and don't even say anything. Boring!
-Not necessarily a cinematographic peeve, but visual and, IMO, dumb. Those "into the components of an electronic devices" shots. Such examples are seeing the insides of the rice rockets in The Fast and the Furious, in the CD player in Josie and the Pussycats, look at how communication satellite technology works in Phone Booth, or look at how industrial air conditioning works in Bad Boys II. (Actually there's a laundry list of things in Bad Boys II I could tell you about.
-Bullet time. 'Nuff said.
-Slow motion shots of objects falling after something bad happens in a generic comedy. That last attempt at tugging at my cynical heart strings. Congratulations, you have failed admirably.
Just Another Yokel said:
You forgot Goodfellas. IMHO, while Scorsese didn't invent this technique, he mastered it.
I didn't forget Goodfellas. It's pretty much understood that all the long steadicam shots done by a lot of the "hip" directors nowadays are more as a reference to Saint Scorsese than an aide in storytelling. I was just noting two post-Goodfellas uses of the long shots.mrde50 said:
Scorsese's not the only guy to do it, of course. There are long tracking shots in The Shining and Brian De Palma uses long takes a lot. But when you watch a De Palma movie, most people don't say "Oh, he's just trying to do the Copa shot." Say what you will about Snake Eyes, that opening shot is a beast of itself.
Coincidentally, I just read an old interview with Paul Thomas Anderson and he said that the opening shot in Boogie Nights wasn't really an ode to the Copa but was a rip-off from the British movie Absolute Beginners.
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Just Another Yokel said:
Yeah, I usually don't like this either. One exception is Krzysztof Kieslowski's Three Colors: Red. Because the plot of that film was heavily involved with electronic evesdropping, the shot of the electronics and wires fit the story.
Anything that when used the first time was innovative and clever but gets overused and hackneyed with repeated use.Anything that detracts,rather than adds to the story by calling attention to itself and away from the plot and mood of the film.This includes many shots that have already been mentioned.These things in and of themselves aren't annoying,it's just that they get overused.It's like the filmmakers said,"Hey this will look cool!"rather than,"Hey this will make the audience really feel for the characters."
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