The Cinematography Discussion #1 (1 Viewer)

[David Tolsky]

Yeah, Minolta's are great meters. For years, the classic light meter in cinematography was (and still is to some DP's) the Spectra. You can get a Spectra Candella, which read strictly in foot candles (or was it foot lamberts?), Spectra Incandescent, or whatever. They are great meters. Now of course, everything is digital, even Spectras. I remember using a Sekonic manual meter in film school and now even the Sekonic is digital. Damn, time flies. Back to you, JR
BTW, yes, I was referring to the Gossen meter. Good catch!

 

[JohnRice]

Well David,
Like a lot of other photographers, I started out using a Gossen Luna Pro, and then a Luna Pro-F. I just discovered they are both still made, which amazes me. They were good, but I can't imagine going back to them. For me, some of the analyzing capabilities of my Minoltas can't be replaced, since they cut down on the math I need to do in my head.
I guess I had forgotten that a lot of cine metering was in footcandles. It has been many decades since still photography was done that way. I mean, there was "exposure values" since then. Are cine cameras calibrated in footcandles? Geez, you're sending college spinning back to me. Lux, footcandles, footlamberts, I can't remember what they all are.
Anyway, nice stroll down amnesia lane.

 

[David Tolsky]

Are cine cameras calibrated in footcandles?

Ouch, that one hurts. Motion picture cameras are not calibrated at all. Lenses, well that's another story. They are calibrated in T stops. Footcandles are strictly a measurement of the source light itself. The higher the footcandle count, the deeper the stop on the lens will be.

 

[Seth Paxton]

Just to note. I have swapped the small pix to the ones I sent to Parker. To get the total package under 200K I compressed a bit more.
I have no problem hosting them myself since the provider isn't complaining, but I guess it's a bit safer to have them at the same server, that way if you can get to HTF you can at least always see the smaller versions even if my provider has a problem.
And if the HTF is down it doesn't really matter that it can't show the pix.

 

[JohnRice]

David,

OK, I set myself up on that one. :b

Seth,

Thanks for the update. The small shots are choppier, but I think they are just fine. The page loads significantly faster. Well get back on topic now.

 

[Seth Paxton]

Walter
On the commentary Soderbergh explains specifically that he borrowed ("ripped off" in his words ) that cutting effect from Link Removed.
There is a scene in that film apparently between Donald Sutherland and Julie Christie that director Nick Roeg cut the same way.

 

[Seth Paxton]

BTW, SS used it to much greater extent for The Limey. IMO, it was too much.
He backed off and used it much less for Erin Brockovich (love scene) and it's been awhile but I think Traffic had one of those moments as well.
To me The Limey felt like he was really running with the idea and sort of playing or experimenting. Not that that's a bad thing, but I think it bogged down that film.
One thing about Out of Sight for me is that it feels like the best representation of all things Soderbergh. We have some setting colorization, but not as much as Traffic. We have some steadicam work but maybe a little less than EB (IIRC sex, lies and videotape had a lot of stedicam work). We have the time-jump cutting in one scene. Just a bit of everything.
And a quote from Soderbergh in the commentary to support Elliot Davis' work in the film - "I'll tell ya, Elliot knows how to make people look really good." (1h: 23m:56s)

 

[Seth Paxton]

One other thing. There are several spots in the featurette on the DVD that show just how complex some of the lighting for "simple" shots is.
One good one is when George and Ving grab Lopez to put her in the trunk. You can see some footage of them shooting this at the 1m: 24s point in the featurette.
I'll post some caps here in a second from that featurette.
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[Seth Paxton]

Hmmm, I thought Out of Sight was the most mainstream of the films being presented, but not a lot of interest.
Maybe I should have done mine on Empire Strikes Back.
Well, I'll bump it through the line another time or two before Kaplan comes in with Vertigo.

 

[JohnRice]

A little patience Seth. I just picked up OOS today for a viewing. I'll have it through the weekend, so I'll be back.

 

[Mike Broadman]

What exactly is the difference between art direction and cinematography?

I rented the movie and plan on viewing it tonight. It's perfect cold rainy Boston movie-viewing night.

 

[Mike Broadman]

Ok, done watching.

One neat scene that must have been at least partly due to cinematography was when Clooney and Rames are driving down Miami- I think it's when they're going to his ex-wife's house- and they spot some obviously undercover police types hanging around. After Clooney points a few out, the camera pans out, and a few more agents show up. It becomes like a Where's Waldo thing. Because of Clooney's explanation and the camera work, we know how to spot them and we can't help but try.

 

[JohnRice]

What exactly is the difference between art direction and cinematography?

Well,

Since no one else has said anything, I can contribute my $.02. Art direction has mostly to do with the content and style of the things in the film, as in the period of the decorations and clothing. Cinematography has mostly to do with how those things are shown and lit. This has to do with the composition of the image, the mood of the lighting and how much or how little "stuff" is shown to the viewer and where those things are placed in the frame.

 

[Seth Paxton]

Yeah, I would say Art Direction has a lot more to do with what the setting and mise-en-scene look like. Sort of like Costume Design for everything else besides costumes.

Now a cinematographer has to light and capture that setting, actors, mise-en-scene and a lot can change in that process.

A director is traditionally in charge of a variety of things depending on the director. Some like Soderbergh (or Kubrick) are cinematographers themselves and tend to take over that role. I'm sure that Baz had a lot of input on the Moulin Rouge art direction. Some directors like to get in the editing bay themselves. Some like to be hands-on with the actors. So that role can be very diverse.

BTW, with computers the art direction process can sort of reach out now to include production work after principle photography is done. But with that sort of stuff I suppose it can almost border on cinematography. Like color timing is cinematography, but what about computer color adjusting (like Pleasantville). I think that area becomes tricky to define.

I just fall back on the definition I mentioned above - the design of everything besides costumes.

 

[Seth Paxton]

After Clooney points a few out, the camera pans out, and a few more agents show up. It becomes like a Where's Waldo thing. Because of Clooney's explanation and the camera work, we know how to spot them and we can't help but try.

This is exactly the kind of thing that can be either the director or the cinematographer's job. Really depends on the director.

Again I think of Kubrick who had a veteran cinematographer assigned to him for "The Killing", Lucien Ballard (Wild Bunch). This is only Kube's 2nd full film keep in mind. Well things came to a head when Kube had laid out a tracking shot from a certain distance then left it to Lucien to do. When Kube came back to check Lucien had gone to a farther shot and changed lenses to compensate. He explained that this would be better for him for coverage reasons, etc. He had plenty of experience and certainly knew what he was talking about but Kubrick shut him down and quietly asked him to do it HIS way. Lucien was put off, but typical of most Kubrick confrontations he gave in and that was the end of their debating.

So does that make it direction or cinematography? I say it's cinematography even if it's the director that is doing it. Just like editing is still editing EVEN when it's Hitchcock storyboarding every single shot and then not shooting coverage so that it HAS to be edited in the manner he shot it. In fact some directors would edit in the camera by shooting it in the order that they wanted it. But that doesn't make it not editing somehow.

 

[JohnRice]

but what about computer color adjusting

Or, O Brother, Where Art Thou? which has even more computer manipulation than Pleasantville.

There is a technical issue you touched on that I hear mentioned but have never heard a real explanation of. Maybe you or David Tolsky could explain. That is "Color Timing," which I am assuming is something controlled by the lab. This is a term I am not familiar with in "still" photography and I sure would like to know what it is.

 

[Paul_D]

Quote:

My jaw literally dropped when I saw this in the theater, because everyone in the film, just looks, well, perfect. But contrasting this seeming perfection, despite the heavy, heavy stylisation, the film has a genuine gritty, real edge. It's bizarre, and a credit to Soderbergh's and Davis' individuality and creativity.
I think Out of Sight is a really special film, because along with many other things, its the first bigish-budget movie he made after his Schizopolis-induced, rebirth as a film-maker. There's a glee and playfulness to the film, that perfectly complements the tone and themes of the story and the characters. In my estimation, its almost a perfect movie.

 

[Adam_S]

I remember reading that Kubrick story, he set up the shot, left the DP to execute it. the way Kubrick has it set up made it a difficult shoot, so the DP moved things closer, but changed lenses to compensate, so that the full image would still be captured. Kubrick was furious when he came back and found the new set up. they had an argument, the DP pointed out the same frame was beign captured, and Kubrick countered that now the perspective was completely different and not at all what he wanted, Kubrick was right, but the DP had never expected a director on his sophmore film to know that much, or care that much about the cinematography of his film. I think the DP said he then realized he was workign with someone very rare.

In fact some directors would edit in the camera by shooting it in the order that they wanted it. But that doesn't make it not editing somehow.

John Ford was somewhat notorious for this, he was often never involved in the editing process, and to keep the film somewhat the way he wanted, he would shoot very sparingly, this gave him the reputation of shooting cheaply and quickly. He also had quite a few confrontations with producers, they always wanted to edit in closeups. On How Green was my Valley, there were several scenes he was supposed to shoot closeups for that he just didn't do, saying if he shot a closeup up they'd end up using it. One scene I remember this was mentioned for is when Huw relearns to walk, a scene that a closeup would ruin, IMHO. John Ford's career and films are really fascinating, he's one of the very few directors to move from a decades long career in silents to a decades long career in sound, and his early grounding, pounding out serials, meant there were many times there was no DP or editor and he was required to do the jobs of three men.
Adam

 

[JohnRice]

Well, I think we'll be moving on soon with Vertigo. George should be posting in the next couple days.
I'm still curious about an answer to my last post. I really don't know what is actually involved in this and what the results can be.

 

[george kaplan]

[c]Vertigo[/c]

I have foolishly agreed to lead a discussion on Vertigo, even though I know less about cinematography than the other discussants, and Vertigo has been seen by a lot more people. Not to mention that Robert Harris is a member here, and likely to come in and correct all my stupid errors. To paraphrase Midge, “Stupid, Stupid, Stupid”.

BTW, I will be eternally grateful if no one brings this thread to Mr. Harris’ attention.

A word about plagarism. My opinions are my own, but the facts as I lay them out come from things I’ve read or watched. Although I have tried to put things in my own words, some descriptions of certain technical aspects are of necessity very similar to the source material.

Preliminaries

Cinematography can obviously be thought of in two ways. Either as the look of the film in it’s entirety, or more narrowly, as those aspects of the look of the film directly under control of the director of photography (the cinematographer). This thread will most certainly take the first definition.

And while this is a discussion of the cinematography of Vertigo, a lot of what we discuss will apply to Hitchcock’s other Technicolor films from this period. Vertigo will be the exemplar, and there will certainly be things specific to Vertigo, but the general look of Vertigo has much in common with those other films.

To see why, consider the crew who worked on Vertigo.

Hitchcock of course, directed all of his films.
Robert Burks, the cinematographer worked on every Hitch film from Strangers on a Train to Marnie, excepting Psycho.
Saul Bass also designed the titles for North by Northwest and Psycho.
Herbert Coleman was the producer of every film from Rear Window to North by Northwest.
Bernard Herrmann composed the score for every film from The Trouble with Harry to Marnie (except for the Birds, which had no score).
George Tomasini was the editor from Rear Window through Marnie, except for The Trouble with Harry.
Henry Bumstead was also the art director on the Man Who Knew Too Much.
Edith Head was the costume designer on most of the films from Rear Window through Marnie.
Farciot Edouart was also responsible for process photography on To Catch a Thief and The Man Who Knew Too Much.

The point is that all of the Technicolor films from this period were basically worked on by a Hitchcock team that was fairly intact from film to film.

Hitch liked to find people he trusted and worked well with and keep on working with them. It even applied to actors as this was Jimmy Stewart’s fourth film with Hitchcock. The only major position which didn’t fit this mold was the screenwriter. There had only been one screenwriter on the four color films preceding Vertigo (John Michael Hayes), whereas Vertigo had three (Samuel Taylor being the final one).

Note on screen captures: These screen captures can’t really illustrate most of the points being made. You need to go watch the scenes they come from to fully appreciate them.

Lennon/McCartney

As we will see, there are a lot of people who share some of the credit for the look of Vertigo. But who deserves most of the credit? In this case, I think that the lion’s share of the credit has to be shared by Hitchcock and Burks.

Burks is obvious, he’s the cinematographer. But why do I think Hitchcock deserves so much credit for the cinematography of Vertigo? To answer this, you need to understand a bit about how Hitchcock worked on his films. It has become pretty common today to give directors the primary credit for the films they direct. Those who were around can correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m pretty sure that before the mid-sixties, that wasn’t always the case. If I’m not mistaken it was Truffaut’s interviews with Hitchcock that popularized the auteur theory (it was around before that, but not as widely accepted). And it was a very accurate concept applied to Hitchcock. Certainly other directors deserve the auteur title, but relatively few are as deeply involved in all aspects of their film as Hitchcock was.

Of course Hitchcock didn’t do all those other jobs. He didn’t light the set, he didn’t write the score, he didn’t design the costumes or the set, he didn’t write the screenplay, he didn’t edit the film. And yet, he was a collaborator (to varying degrees) and a guiding vision on all of those things. And there’s no doubt that when it came to cinematography, he was a strong collaborator.

Hitchcock had his films fully filmed in his own head before a single frame was filmed in practice. He knew what he wanted the film to look like, he had every shot planned out. He conveyed this to his team and trusted them to bring his vision to the screen.

With Hitchcock and Burks, I think there was a collaborative relationship in the Lennon/McCartney mold, with the whole being greater than the sum of the parts. To see this Gestalt, consider Hitch’s color films post-Burks. None of these look as great as the films with Burks. Hitch still knew what he wanted, but without Burks, he didn’t have a cinematographer who could give him that look (Burks probably would have worked again with Hitchcock, but tragically died in a car crash along with his wife). And Burks did some other fine work, but in my opinion, none of his other films are as great as the Hitchcock films. For example, The Music Man is well photographed, but it’s no Vertigo.

Overall Look

To me, the overall look of Vertigo, and indeed all of the Hitchcock/Burks color films, is what I call “Sustained Unsustainable Beauty”. Hitchcock paints a world that is clean and beautiful. There’s nothing unrealistic about this beauty. Except in the gestalt. For most of us, most of the time, the world around us isn’t anything to write home about. But we all experience moments of extreme beauty. Whether it’s a gorgeous sunset, or the lights twinkling in the distance as we drive at night in the hills looking down at a city, or seeing the stars in all their glory in the desert far away from the demeaning glow of civilization, the world often looks exceedingly beautiful. But in the real world, these moments don’t last. Hitchcock populates his films with these moments, but they never go away. This beauty, which in the real world is unsustainable, is sustained in his films. Again, this is kind of a gestalt thing. I don’t think there’s a single shot that isn’t realistic in his films, but the constancy of them, is certainly not realistic.

Of course, Hitch has a certain wicked sense of humor, and the beauty of the world he creates is part of this. He likes to take his main character, give them a beautiful world, beautiful women, a good job, and then put them into serious jeopardy. The world of a Hitchcock film may look beautiful, but murder is always right around the corner.

The Screenplay

Huh? The screenplay? What’s that got to do with cinematography? For many films, probably very little, but for Vertigo and other Hitchcock films, quite a bit. This is one of the places where Hitchcock’s collaboration was strongest. He never took screenwriting credit (although early in his career he wrote or co-wrote 4 screenplays for another director), and rarely if ever wrote any dialogue, and yet, he worked very closely with his screenwriters on the story. He provided extensive feedback and probably spent more hours in rooms with his screenwriters than any of the rest of his crew. For example, consider the following, just one example of the kind of note that Hitchcock wrote to the screenwriter, in this case talking about the scene at the top of the tower:


when Madeleine continues to the very highest landing, she should not lock the door on [Scottie] because this would indicate that they are not using his acrophobia at all. After all, if she was going up to a tower she could even elude a normal man and lock the door.
When he looks out and sees the body falling, we should create again the same effect as at the beginning of the picture. In fact, we should show it twice in the tower – once when he is deterred from following Madeleine and again when the body falls.
After the body has fallen and he is staring down we should quickly lap dissolve to a reprise of the shot when the policeman fell at the beginning so that we are able to photograph his terrible guilt and his reason for hiding and running away.



But what has this to do with cinematography? Well, keep in mind that Hitch planned out his entire film before principal photography ever began. Part of this was through the screenplay. The screenplay for Vertigo isn’t just dialogue, but is filled with directions for camera movements and framing. For example, consider the famous kiss in Judy’s apartment and how this is described in the screenplay.

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Quite silently, she turns and takes a step towards him. Jimmy moves over and takes her in his arms. BIG HEADS of the two of them together. At last. The camera moves around the big heads. We see Jimmy holding her tighter and tighter. He looks past her shoulder and we see that his eyes are closed, because he now has Madeleine in his arms. He opens his eyes – the camera swims around the room. We are now in the livery stables at San Juan Bautista. We see it only for the briefest moment and it DISSOLVES away. Jimmy kisses her once more as he did then. The camera PULLS BACK slowly and their two figures are held in the center of the room – one of the beds is brought into foreground of picture. DISSOLVE.


As you can see, a Hitchcock screenplay contains a lot of plans for the cinematography of the film. So who deserves the credit for this part of the cinematography? Hitchcock certainly. But after four films with a single screenwriter, John Michael Hayes, Vertigo went through three. I won’t go into the details, but most of the credit is generally thought to belong to the last of the three, Samuel Taylor. However, both of the other screenwriters, Alec Coppel and Maxwell Anderson deserve credit for some of the planning of the cinematography as well.

The Storyboards

During pre-production, Hitchcock also was working on the storyboards. It’s impossible to know exactly who contributed what to these, but certainly they were a collaboration between Hitchcock, Burks, Coleman, Bumstead, Tomasini and others. Earlier in this thread, someone said that framing was almost always done by the DP, not the director. Perhaps, but for Vertigo, and other Hitchcock films, all such decisions were made ahead of time, and Hitchcock either made, or approved every such decision.

Editing

Before we discuss the actually filming of Vertigo, let’s jump ahead a moment to post-production. The most important part of that for cinematography is editing. George Tomasini was the editor on Vertigo. And while I don’t want to minimize his contributions, I do want to emphasize that while he edited the film together very well, not only was the editing under Hitchcock’s supervision (who wrote long, extensive notes to Tomasini), but in many ways the film was already edited by the time it got to Tomasini.

Hitchcock had learned a long time ago, back when he had little control of his films, that the only way he could guarantee it would get edited together the way he wanted it, without interference from the studio, was to give them no choice. And so, he filmed almost no coverage. Practically every shot was filmed only from the angle, and with the lens, that he had already decided would be used in the final film. He often filmed multiple takes looking for the best performance, but these takes did not vary in any other way (such as different framing).

[c]Cinematography specifics[/c]

We now move on to a discussion of specific aspects of the cinematography of Vertigo.

The color scheme

I start with a discussion of the color scheme, because I will refer back to it many times in the remainder of this discussion. The color scheme is very important to Hitchcock, but, and I consider this a very important but, Hitchcock never let the color scheme, nor the symbolism that we will discuss later, get in the way of the primary purpose of Vertigo – telling a story. This is to me, one of the marks of a great artist. To often, we are beaten over the head with symbolism or the color scheme, as if the artist is afraid we won’t see how clever they are if they don’t throw it in our face. Cries & Whispers bludgeons us with its color scheme. The use of various color filters in South Pacific is about a subtle as pan & scanning the chariot race in Ben-Hur.

The color scheme of Vertigo is much more subtle. It’s important, and gives the film its look, but if you’re not looking for it, you probably wouldn’t even notice. There are things that Hitch wanted to do in keeping with the color scheme (in particular some shots with a green filter), but they didn’t work, so he abandoned them. He was not a slave to it.

The basic scheme is of red and green and gold (to a lesser extent). The contrast of gray to this basic color scheme is also very important, as can be seen by the gray suit worn by Kim Novak. The color was not good for Novak and she hated it, as Hitch knew she would. But he wanted her in it, and wanted her looking uncomfortable. This was very important to contrast with the more colorful clothes worn when not in a trance, and as Judy. Of course, Kim had told Edith Head she didn’t care what color her clothes were as long as they weren’t gray. Edith, however, knew what Hitch wanted, and managed to give Kim so many choices (all variations of a gray suit of course) about style and fabric, that she and Novak got along well, and Novak went along with the gray suit without further complaint.

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Here we have a shot of Madeleine in the flower shop. The color scheme is apparent, although not obtrusive. We have the green boxes, red and yellow flowers, and Madeleine (in her trance) in her gray suit, looking uncomfortable and out of place.

Symbolism

In addition to the color scheme, there is lots of other symbolism used by Hitchcock in Vertigo. To me symbolism is a spice. It makes the film better, but you wouldn’t want it for a main course. Certain filmmakers think that a film full of nothing but overt symbolism is somehow deep, but I think it is much more of an artistic feat to create a work of art that works on the entertainment level, and still has lots of interesting symbolism that you don’t need to understand to enjoy the film, but will enhance it once you do. Allow me to veer off for a moment and bring up the Wizard of Oz. No, not the movie, the book. This book is filled with symbolism, the entire story is a parable about the political situation in the United States at the turn of the century. And yet, as fascinating as that is, Baum never let it get in the way of the primary purpose, writing a story that would entertain children. As a matter of fact, while the symbolism is immediately obvious once it’s pointed out to you, almost no one who’s ever read the book even knows it’s there.

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Above is a shot of when Scottie first sees Madeleine. As you watch the scene, notice how it is dominated by green, red and gold. Also, notice how the camera moves first, from Scottie to where Madeleine is seated, and then following Madeleine as she moves to the above shot. Notice how the camera turns during these scenes. And then when the camera stops, how the actor’s heads turn. This is the first sign of what is to happen later. Later, there will be much more elaborate spinning camera movements symbolizing Scottie’s internal confusion and loss of control, such as the spinning kissing scene from the first screenshot above.

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Hitchcock often used some of the more obvious sexual symbols, but even when he was using what amounted to clichés, he did so either subtly, or with humor (such as the final shot of NxNW), and never at the expense of the story. Here we have a shot of Scottie in his apartment. Notice the Coit tower through the window over his right shoulder. This can be seen during much of this scene between Scottie and Madeleine. This is of course, a phallic symbol, and it is the only thing manipulated for Scottie’s apartment. The view is basically what you could actually see from the window, but Hitch wanted the Coit tower visible, even though you couldn’t actually see it from Scottie’s apartment. Notice also, the green sweater. The use of the color scheme in this scene is better seen by these other shots:

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Finally, at the end of this scene we have a shot of her leaving his apartment in her green car. Notice his red door with green trim.

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As I mentioned, Hitch was not above using some obvious symbolism. The frame below is another example.

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Here, as Scottie & Madeleine kiss, the previously calm sea erupts with a fury. Crashing waves have long been a Hollywood symbol for orgasm. If you watch this scene, it seems amazing that the calm waves erupt just as their dialogue ends and they embrace. However, the background was filmed during location shooting, and was used as a rear-projection transparency for the actors later in the studio, making it much easier to manage. As with all the rear-projection and process photography on the film, it is very well done.

Again, I will bring further examples of symbolism as it occurs during the rest of the discussion.

The use of height

Another example of symbolism, is Hitchcock’s use of height. It is used throughout the film to emphasize the vertigo of the main character, although these are also the types of shots that Hitchcock liked to use anyway.

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Here we see Scottie meeting with Elster. Notice how Elster towers above him, presaging Elster’s plan to use Scottie’s vertigo against him.

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Here we have a shot of the nuns running after Madeleine’s fall from the tower. This is followed by:

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Although kind of hard to see here, there are people on the roof in the upper left discovering the body, while Scottie walks away lower right. Hitchcock had similar shots in North by Northwest, when Thornhill exits the United Nations, and a shot panning up when Van Damme talks about disposing of Eve Kendall from a great height.

Also, notice the tower in this last shot. This segues nicely into our next topic.

Matte paintings

One of the classic Hitchcock effects is the use of matte paintings. The most prominent one in Vertigo is the tower. The tower had been destroyed at the mission in a fire in 1906 caused by the San Francisco earthquake.

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Yet, except for the missing tower, Mission San Juan Bautista was the perfect location. The problem was easily solved by painting the tower in during post-production.

The title sequence and animated dream sequence

There are two sequences that were done at Hitch’s direction and with his input, but not directly by him. And yet, both are appropriate in a discussion of the cinematography, because both are very much a part of the final look of the film.

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The first of these is the title sequence created by Saul Bass. The sequence uses Lissajous spirals as seen above, which were created for Bass by John Whitney. Creating these animated spinning spirals, at a time before computers (as we know them today anyway), was a real challenge, and actually something that Whitney had been working on for many years. It required a way to draw the spirals as they spun, without the various wires doing the rotating becoming entangled. Basically they found that WW2 airplane machine gun turrets were able to do this. And so he bought never-used surplus turrets, and redesigned them to do this.

Whitney created the machine that could draw the spirals, but Bass designed the sequence itself. The woman photographed is not Kim Novak (there’s no record of who she was), and the sequence is designed to do a number of things, according to Bass. First there’s the idea of a woman being made into what a man wants her to be, which is what Scottie does with Judy. Bass starts by putting the woman together piece by piece. The camera moves across different parts of her face, one part at a time, finally settling on her right eye. Here, Bass turns to the other central idea in the film, the disorientation of vertigo. First the word Vertigo appears out of the eye, followed by the Lissajous spirals.

The animated dream sequence (sorry, no screenshot) was done by an artist named John Ferren, who had previously painted the pictures done by the John Forsythe character in the Trouble With Harry. He created a detailed sketch which was approved by Hitchcock, Bumstead and others, and then filmed it during the post-production period. All of the different colors were specifically chosen to evoke certain emotional reactions in the audience.

Lighting

It may seem at this point that I have given short shrift to Robert Burks for the cinematography of Vertigo. And that is certainly not my intention. Alfred Hitchcock was very involved in all aspects of the cinematography and was the guiding light of the look of the film, but he certainly didn’t light it or film it himself. Hitch may have known how he wanted it to look, but it took the extraordinary talent of Robert Burks to pull it off in practice. In my opinion, Hitchcock and Burks share top billing for the cinematography of this film.

Consider the following scene where Judy’s transformation becomes complete.

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As she emerges she is first a mere ghost in the ethereal light that surrounds her, without really affecting the rest of the room. I think it is important to remember that this film has essentially a realistic look. This light comes from a neon sign outside Judy’s window as has already been established earlier in the scene. It is green of course, staying with the color scheme.

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As Judy comes forth she slowly solidifies into Madeleine, and Scottie’s dream is fulfilled. This is followed immediately by their rotating embrace. As the camera pans in a circle around them (there’s that symbolism again) the background changes from her apartment to the livery stable (see the first screenshot of this paper) and back again. This was accomplished by rear projection, something Burks was very adept at. As a matter of fact, before becoming a DP, he had started out working in special effects.

The camera actually doesn’t move for this shot (except for a slow tracking back and then forward again). Stewart and Novak were on a turntable and it was they, along with the transparencies that moved. At the end of the shot, since the camera wasn’t moving, the actors had to slide down out of the shot. This was done by having them lean further and further forward, which wasn’t such a bad thing symbolically, cause it implied they were lying down to have sex (see the earlier description of this scene as it was originally designed in the screenplay, ending with a shot of the bed). Unfortunately, on take 2, Stewart slipped as he was doing this and require a short trip to the studio doctor. They were 5 takes filmed, with the last one used, but they never really managed the ending, and as you can see the take fades out without them really pulling it off.

Another great accomplishment by Burks is the lighting of the inquest scene.

This was filmed on a soundstage, not on location. And Hitchcock made life difficult by insisting on a ceiling that wasn’t wild (removable). This constricted greatly how Burks could light the set, and yet, as you can see below, it looks very much like it was filmed on location.

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Another scene that was remarkably lit, as well as requiring great process photography was the Argosy bookshop. The process photography was overseen by Farciot Edouart, who had just finished all of the process work for the Ten Commandments. This scene begins with Scottie and Midge in the well lit bookshop.

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As the dark story is told, the lighting gets dimmer and dimmer within the bookstore, perfectly matching what’s going on in the rear projection as the day gets more and more overcast.

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Finally as they walk out into the street from the reverse angle, we see the bookstore lights come up behind them. It is photographed so well, that it looks like it was all on location, not on a soundstage.

Fog Filters

In truth, there doesn’t appear to be a lot of use of special filters in Vertigo. The film for the most part keeps a realistic look about it, and most manipulation and implication of a dreamlike or vertiginous state is done through lighting and camera movements. However, the scene where Madeleine jumps into the bay does make use of fog filters to invoke a more dreamlike state of her trance as she jumps in (Burks would have had a hard time achieving this through lighting in this outdoor location ). Then again, this can still be argued as realistic, because San Francisco Bay has been known to be occasionally foggy. Below is the scene without a fog filter

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and later in the scene with one

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I don’t have screen shots, but notice how Scottie is filmed with a full fog filter when he watches Madeleine stare at the water, and how it switches to no fog filter after she jumps in and his dreamlike lust for her turns into real world terror as he rushes over to jump in and save her.

The Vertigo effect

The Vertigo shot has become one of the most famous, and has been used in lots of other films, including Goodfellas, and perhaps most famously, Jaws. It consists of a forward zoom while the camera moves backward at the same time. Hitchcock and Burks put their heads together trying to figure out how to do it, but although they came up with some ideas, they did not think of this technique. It was the idea of Irmin Roberts, a second-unit cameraman who didn’t even get mentioned in the credits. These shots were actually filmed during post-production using miniatures since it would have cost too much to do it on the full size sets.

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This is the beginning of the Vertigo shot in the tower stairwell

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and this is the end. It is, of course, better to watch the sequence on the dvd to see the effect. This particular miniature was built on it’s side, and the camera was on a dolly that tracked backwards as the camera zoomed forward. Although I don’t know that there’s any particular symbolism to the stairs, it was one of Hitchcock’s favorite images. A flight of stairs occurs in every film he ever made except for Rope & The Trouble with Harry. However, they were rarely as important as they are in this film.

Sustained Unsustainable Beauty (aka Pretty pictures)

As I mentioned at the beginning, the overall look that attracts me to Vertigo (and the other Hitchcock films) is the beauty of the film, realistic except that it is maintained throughout the film, something that doesn’t occur in real life. Here are 4 of the many, many beautiful images from Vertigo, although the screenshots don’t really do them justice.

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This is Madeleine arriving at the Mission Dolores. Her car was selected to fit in with the color scheme.

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Here is Madeleine outside the art museum. Again, the green lawn fits in with the color scheme.

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This is Scottie trailing Madeleine. Lots of green, and of course the red Golden Gate Bridge in the distance. Also, notice how Scottie is driving downhill. That is the only direction he ever drives in the entire movie. Again, part of Hitch's use of height related to Scottie's vertigo.

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This screenshot really doesn’t do a good job, but if you watch this scene, it’s quite a pretty display of city lights. And the focal point is the street light in the middle with red, green, and yellow, matching the color scheme quite nicely.

Restoration

Robert Harris and James Katz had absolutely nothing to do with the cinematography of Vertigo, no more than you or I. However, without them, and their pain-staking restoration, none of us would be able to appreciate it the way we can, and we wouldn’t be having this discussion. We owe them a tremendous debt of gratitude.

Well, that’s it. Pull out your Vertigo dvds, give em a spin and let me know where you disagree with me, any questions you have, and if by some miracle I got any of this right. Most of all, enjoy the film, it’s one of best ever made. And if you don’t own this dvd, rectify that ASAP.