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 Notes
on Camera Movement
When to Move the Camera and Why
by M. David Mullen, ASC
Motivation is not just something actors need – it’s something
cinematographers and other cinema artists deal with every day
when making a movie. This not only applies to how a set is lit,
but also to elements like camera movement. When to move the camera,
why to move the camera, ultimately matters more than how you move
the camera.
As a cinematographer, I have to incorporate the tastes of the
particular director I’m working for when designing how a sequence
will be shot. Some like to find as many opportunities as possible
to move the camera; others would prefer to only move the camera
at very key, specific moments. My own personal taste is somewhere
in between. I dislike unmotivated, excessive movement, yet many
of my favorite moments in cinematic history involve some sort
of camera move, from the fast telephoto panning in Kurosawa’s
movies to the endless traveling shots in Kubrick’s films.
There is a basic truth that camera movement tends to weaken composition
and lighting, yet what it can add is energy, often justifying
the loss of control over the first two elements. Of course, there
are moments when an inappropriate movement can deflate a shot’s
visual tension and become a distraction to the screen action.
Often on independent feature productions, there is an attempt
to find ways of moving the camera because it is generally felt
that camera moves – particularly slick ones on Steadicam, dollies,
or cranes – add production value. This is an understandable desire
to want to make one’s movie look bigger-budgeted than it really
is. However, it doesn’t get around the fact that the movement
must be there for some dramatic or logical reason; also, the movement
shouldn’t cause a loss of production value by making the elements
in the frame less controllable.
I’ll relate some personal experiences dealing with moving the
camera. I photographed two small studio features recently, Akeelah
and the Bee (Lionsgate) and The Astronaut Farmer (Warner Bros.)
Though the second one had twice the budget of the first, the first
had twice as much camera movement.
On Akeelah and the Bee, the subject matter revolved around spelling
bees. Doug Atchison, the director, had assured the studio he would
make spelling bees look exciting by shooting them as if they were
sporting events. In theory, this was a sound idea, but in practice,
it was quite a challenge. The truth is the fast camera movements
and editing during a sporting event is naturally motivated by
the fast action going on in front of the cameras. In our case,
we had someone standing still in front of a microphone spelling
a word.
To crank up the tension and energy of these events, we tried every
trick in the book on our limited budget and schedule: crane shots,
fast dolly ins and outs, 360 degree dolly moves with zooming as
well, whip pans, Steadicam moves, snap zooms, etc. All centered
on this person standing still at a microphone. Therefore the movement
wasn’t naturally motivated, but it was emotionally motivated to
underscore the pressure these contestants were under. But it was
a very risky approach in that it could become a bit like the forced
humor that comes through the use of “funny” wide-angle lenses
on close-ups. The energetic style probably worked the best when
we were doing montage sequences because it created a musical quality
that was well-suited for editing to music.
Because we were on a tight schedule, we storyboarded these spelling
scenes very carefully so as to shoot only what we needed to make
the editing work. Luckily, I could do much of the coverage under
the stage lighting used for these events, allowing me on some
days to do as many as 75 set-ups in under 12 hours of shooting.
Our work was complicated by the fact that our lead actress, who
is in 90% of the movie, was a minor, and the child labor laws
are strictly enforced by set teachers here in Los Angeles. There
was no such thing as “grace” when it came to needing the actress
for a second take if her time was up, so there are a number of
ambitious shots in the movie which were the first (and only) take.
The most memorable was probably the biggest shot in the movie.
We had to establish the audience and TV cameras that faced Akeelah
at the National Spelling Bee. The shot started on her eyes, zoomed
out to a close-up, and then dollied 360 degrees around her as
it zoomed out to show the 1000 audience extras plus 200 kids on
stage behind her. When we got around to this shot, I was informed
that our actress had to be gone for the day within fifteen minutes.
Luckily, most of the stage and audience area (at the Hollywood
Palladium) had been pre-lit to some extent, but we had to quickly
build a camera platform that extended from the stage in order
to place the circular track that surrounded the Akeelah standing
at the microphone on the edge of the stage. The grips got that
built in ten minutes, the lighting was finished, we put the camera
up, and I zoomed in and got a quick eye focus, and then we shot
the rehearsal, with all 1200 extras in the shot. And I believe
that’s the shot in the movie, in the trailer, etc.
But the purpose of the shot was not just to be fancy. We had to
establish first her apprehension by being tight on her eyes, then
establish what she was up against by showing the crowds surrounding
her, and then end back on her face.
The Astronaut Farmer was made with a very different aesthetic
approach. Set on a ranch in Texas (though shot in New Mexico)
it has an Americana feeling of the Old West meets the Space Race.
Our visual inspirations were Norman Rockwell paintings, western
landscape paintings, and 1950’s NASA steel and chrome futurism.
Our framing and lighting was designed to look “painterly,” and
camera movements were designed to not interfere with that look.
Therefore, the moves were very elegiac and lyrical when they occurred
– slow, graceful, sometimes with a slight rise or fall. It was
the minimalist aesthetic of a John Ford film.
One common mistake directors make when designing a camera move
is beginning the scene on some unimportant but lyrical object,
slowing moving past it and through the space, and finally landing
on the beginning of the dramatic scene itself. The trouble with
this sort of opening to a scene is the moment the movie runs long
in the first cut, a shot like this will be the first thing to
be eliminated. The editor will “cut to the chase” as they say.
You want to design moving shots that are intrinsic to the scene
and will probably not be deleted later. For example, a slow push-in
on an actor’s face as they deliver the key piece of dialogue will
probably survive any edit of the movie. Movements that follow
important action or follow an actor as they cross the room and
deliver important lines – these are likely to remain in the final
cut. This is all to say that designing a sequence with camera
movement to some extent requires that you think about how the
scene will be edited.
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