146 Moving Images: Making Movies, Understanding MediaHowever, just as the transition to sound was made
very difficult because of the unwieldiness of the equipment
necessary for blocking the sound of the camera and
recording audio properly, the use of a three-strip system
was cumbersome and costly. It was clear that a system of one
strip of film would lessen the need for highly specialized
equipment and exacting laboratory processing.Color Photography in
Contemporary Motion Pictures
In the early 1950s, Eastman Kodak began to introduce color
motion picture fi lm stocks that ran through the camera
with only one negative. Th is meant that they could be
used in a regular camera and would allow for much easier
oversight by the fi lm crew. Over the years, many new stocks
by Eastman Kodak, Fuji, Agfa, and other laboratories were
introduced that improved on speed, sensitivity, and grain
quality. However, it is important to note that Eastman color
and other similar fi lm stocks used from the 1950s to the
mid-1980s have proven to be quite unstable and prone
to fading. For many motion pictures, image degradation
over years of storage has been signifi cant, and the salvaging
of movies shot on these stocks has been one of the most
important endeavors of fi lm preservation.
Control and use of color during shooting has been
a principal task of fi lmmakers using color fi lm since its
entrance into the mainstream in the 1930s. With black-
and-white fi lm, diff erences between objects are visible
when they register as contrasting hues of gray, just as Méliès
discovered in his set designs and backdrops (discussed in
Chapter 8). For example, shades of red and green can easily
photograph as exactly the same in black and white. Now, cinematographic
composition was changed signifi cantly by the introduction of color into
the image.
In addition, color temperature was now vital for cinematographers to
consider. With black and white, the light source did not matter; it was only
the illumination. With color photography, the source of light greatly aff ects
the image. For example, sunlight, tungsten light, or fl uorescent light generate
completely diff erent wavelengths and resulting color values. With digital
cinematography, this is dealt with through the use of white balance, in which
the camera uses the standard of a white card to automatically adjust its internal
settings for proper color temperature with the light of that scene. To do this,
the camera operator frames a perfectly white surface lit by the primary light
source of the scene and uses the camera controls to set white balance. Once
this is done, the sensor knows how to capture the light.Figure 4-28 Cinematographer Jack Cardiff
and camera operator Geoffrey Unsworth
with the enormous Technicolor camera
used to shoot A Matter of Life and Death,
directed by Michael Powell and written by
Emeric Pressburger. Note the dolly, the
large studio lamp on wheels, and the apple
box (a useful item on movie sets) on which
Unsworth is standing. (Courtesy Universal
Pictures/Photofest)Copyright 2010 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part. Due to electronic rights, some third party content may be suppressed from the eBook and/or eChapter(s).