a photography studio in the Granada Building.
The following year he received a visit from the
legendary photographer, Edward Steichen, who
needed a darkroom to process some of his film.
Steichen disclosed that he was charging his client
$1500 for similar work for which Hurrell was char-
ging $50. Shortly after that the opportunity came
for Hurrell to photograph the star Ramon Novarro
and Hurrell made a series of portraits that not only
pleased Novarro, but also stood out from the usual
studio portraits. By then he had acquired two arc
lights so that his portraits could be done indoors at
any time of the day or night.
Norma Shearer, who was married to Irving
Thalberg, head of MGM Studios, was put in
touch with Hurrell by the same person who had
introduced him to Novarro. Hurrell made a series
of indoor portraits of her that were startlingly dif-
ferent from the standard studio portraits. The dif-
ference was in the lighting scheme.
The standard equipment of the studio portrait
photographer was the 810-inch view camera.
Most studios used a Kodak Portrait lens, which
had purposely several chromatic defects. The visible
effect of this was the halos that formed around the
highlights when the lens was used at a wide open, f-4
aperture. It must also be remembered that using a
lens at its widest aperture produces very shallow
depth of field and the result is a picture that is
sharp in only one plane, but out of focus in all
other areas. This ‘‘soft focus’’ effect was actually
sought after by the studios since it gave the portraits
a dreamlike and romantic quality. But as important
was the fact that this method produced fewer skin
flaws and reduced the amount of retouching
needed. The method of lighting the portrait fol-
lowed the conventions of centuries of painting. A
large light source was placed at eye level, a hair light
was set behind the subject aimed in order to sepa-
rate the subject from the background and finally, a
light was aimed at the background to provide even
greater separation. This lighting scheme and the use
of the soft focus lens satisfied the portrait buying
public. This scene was ready for a revolutionary
change by a bored and restless George Hurrell.
When Hurrell did Novarro’s portrait, he started
by placing his main light on a boom directly above
his subject. This placement has a tendency to create
strong shadows in the eye sockets as well as a deep
shadow under the nose and chin. He opened these
shadows with his second light set at face level.
There were two other tools that Hurrell used. He
owned a Wollensak Verito soft focus lens, but for
the Novarro portrait he closed the lens down to an
aperture of f-22, thus defeating the purpose of the
soft focus lens. The result was sharpness across the
entire picture plane. Finally, Hurrell used ortho-
chromatic film for his portraits. The effect on skin
tones with this film was to give the sitter a tan,
which translated into an exotic look. These three
parts added up to a greater whole. It provided
Hollywood with a new and glamorous way to por-
tray its treasure of stars. It turned the stars into
idealized icons.
With the success of the Norma Shearer’s por-
traits, he was hired as the chief photographer at
the MGM Studios in 1930. But his interest was in
operating his own studio and in 1932, he left MGM.
He was quickly imitated, not only in Hollywood,
but all over the country, and his style lives on in
many studios.
PETERLEGRAND
Seealso:Beaton, Cecil; Blumenfeld, Erwin; Dada;
de Meyer, Baron Adolphe; diCorcia, Philip-Lorca;
Erotic Photography; Faurer, Louis; Hiro; Horst,
Horst P.; Hoyningen-Huene, George; Hurrell, George;
Klein, William; Krull, Germaine; Liberman, Alexander;
Lighting and Lighting Equipment; Miller, Lee; Mun-
kacsi, Martin; Nast, Conde ́; Newton, Helmut; Penn,
Irving; Ray, Man; Ritts, Herb; Surrealism; Turbeville,
Deborah;Weber,BruceFurther Reading
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