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when I worked on the remake of King Kong. My
character, Jack Prescott, was a palaeontologist, and
he carried a motor-driven Nikon wherever he went. In
preparing for the role, I started taking pictures again.When did you start shooting with
the Widelux on movie sets?
In 1984, when I was doing Starman, [the actress]
Karen Allen saw some of my Widelux shots and
suggested that we combine them with the unit
photographer’s [Sid Baldwin] to make a book for
the cast and crew. Karen’s brainstorm marked the
beginning of a series of privately published albums.
These have been given in appreciation to the casts
and crews I’ve worked with over the years. The
photographs celebrate our times together, and my
Pictures books are selections from these albums.Do you like or admire the work
of any other photographers?
One of my photo heroes would be [Jacques-Henri]
Lartigue. He might have used a panning shutter as
well on his cameras – his photographs look like he
might have. I loved the way he worked, a little like
snapshots back in those days when most photography
was quite formal and stiff. He really captured the lifeand what it was like to be alive in those times. That’s
kind of what I aspire to in my shots... To let people
see what’s it’s like, right in the centre of making
movies in the 20th and 21st centuries.Obviously you have great access to movie sets.
Do you like to mix it up and have some posed
shots, but also try to be inconspicuous and not
make it obvious that you’re taking a picture?
Yeah, well, absolutely. I do both. The thing I think
you’re referring to [with regards to posed shots] is this
series of ‘tragedy and comedy’ images that I take of
the actors doing the classic Greek tragedia/comedia
masks. I like it for a number of reasons. One reason is
kind of a demonstration of how willing actors are to be
fools and to play, as it’s kind of a playful thing to do.
It’s fun to organise that and, again, it’s a great
example of the Widelux and how it can show two
separate times simultaneously... and the whole
tragedy and comedy thing of how as human beings
we’re so capable and willing to do both of those. That’s
a thing that I’ve got to work out with the actor who
does that – we’ll have rehearsals and stuff to get that
image. But then, you’re right, at other times I like to be
more candid and be like a ‘fly on the wall’ kind of thing.Do you find the Widelux quite a forgiving
camera to work with?
Yeah, I think so. I mean, for my money, I really have
kind of a love affair with the camera. I think it sees
more like the [human] eye, you know, and it almost
has peripheral vision. It’s very much like the movie
screen format, so I like that aspect of it.
The Widelux is a fickle mistress. Its viewfinder
isn’t accurate, there’s no manual focus on it; you’re
focusing just with depth of field. I sometimes use it
as a landscape camera but, most often, I like to get
as close as I can to my subject, which is a yard away or
something like that. A little above my arm, [that] kind
of thing. So, with that, I often shoot at f/11 at 1/15th ofAbove: Maggie
Gyllenhaal, Crazy
Heart, 2009.Below: Jodelle Ferland,
Tragedia/Comedia,
Tideland, 2005.