Cinematography

A Study Guide

What is Cinematography?

photography + time = cinematography

What is a Cinematographer?

* visual storyteller
* creative collaborator
* manager

Who is credited with inventing the 1st modern motion picture camera?

The Lumière Brothers

Which early films created advances in storytelling?

* **The Great Train Robbery 1903**
* **A Trip to the Moon 1902**

Who helped shape modern cinematography?

Griffith & Bitzer

What was the studio system?

As film proved to be a popular and profitable art form in America, large companies, the Studios, formed to make films on an industrial scale with star power, dedicated staff, established looks and vertical integration.

Which film redefined the Cinematography and Director relationship? What technical advances did it make?

Citizen Kane.

Notable for use of deep focus techniques to keep foreground and background objects in focus at the same time. Used and invented optical techniques for effects that have been lost and no one can figure out how they did it.

What is the Three Strip Process?

The Technicolor three-strip process included a beam splitter and prism to expose three separate strips of black and white film.

Color Film Layers


1. Clear protective layer
2. Blue Sensitive Halide Layer
3. Yellow Filter
4. Green Sensitive
5. Red Filter
6. Red Sensitive Halide Layer
7. Base Layer

What is the French New Wave?

By the late 1950s a group of French cinema critics who were against the homogenous single styled way movies were being made (akin to the Hollywood studio system) began making their own films.

What is Modern Cinematography?

The current cinematographic technique is built upon the work of innovators. The processes that have become standard or even oppose the standard are combined.

Innovation and experimentation are still prevalent, but on-set working relationships have been fine-tuned and extremely efficient.

Standardized technique.

Describe the Chain of Command

What are the goals of Cinematography?

* Guiding the eye
* Creating the reality
* Setting mood and tone
* telling the story

What is Cinematography all about?

Everything or every choice in cinematography is based on the story/script.

What are the 3 fundamental tools for cinematographers?

* Framing/Composition
* Lighting
* Movement

What are the goals in Composition?

Defines the concrete visual elements within a shot and uses graphical techniques to connote meaning and importance. Organizes visual information for the audience. Provides context of relationships and enviro to the viewer. It tells information to the viewer.

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**What does the audience need to know, and when do they need to know it?**

What are the Elements of Composition?

* the subjects position within frame
* size of the subject
* Positional Relationships (Where are visual elements positioned relative to one another?)
* negative space

What is Unity in composition?

The sum totality of elements within the frame works together to convey a complete visual message. Make sure everything belongs, and nothing is missing.

What is Balance in Composition?

Use the visual weight of elements within the frame to work with or against one another. Remember, a frame can be purposefully unbalanced to make a point.

What is Proportion in Composition?

The size of one element relative to others communicates a lot to an audience.

How do you determine creative choices in composition?

How a frame is composed is guided by the needs of the story.

Why do you want to build a 3D space in composition?

Filmmaking is inherently a 2D medium. One major role of the cinematographer is determine how the 3D space of the real world will be captured and presented to the audience.

How do you build a 3D space in Composition?

* Depth
* Contrast
* Visual contrast is how elements differentiate themselves from one another—color, texture, and brightness.


* Framing Elements
* The camera frame defines the edges of the image, but visual elements within the image can create sub-frames for other elements.

What is Depth in Composition?

Visual cues of size and position that indicate to the audience how close or far elements are from the camera and each other

One of the major cues to three dimensional space on a two dimensional screen is relative size of objects.



The aperture and its effect of in focus and out of focus areas can easily manipulate an audience’s perception of depth

What is the vocabulary to describe the framing?

How do you create meaning in composition?

* start with a goal
* context creates meaning
* perspective

What are goals in Lighting?

Sets the time and place of the setting. Controls visibility of actors and other elements. Used to create mood and ambiance. It established the reality of the story.

What are the elements of Lighting?

• Source

• Brightness

• Shadows

• Contrast

• Hardness / Softness (light quality)

• Motivation

• Color

• Exposure

What’s the relation between Lighting and Composition?

Lighting is a powerful creator of time, place, sense, and mood. However, it must seamlessly correspond, inform, and be informed by the other elements of visual construction at play.

* **Subjective and Objective**: convey perspective
* **Creating the World**
* **Working with Art Department**

What is exposure?

The relationship of the lighting to how the camera captures it. Light levels must be matched to the camera to capture the desired image.

What is the relationship between Exposure, Brightness and Contrast?

What are the goals in Movement?

Maintains or changes a visual perspective within a single shot over time as actors and other elements move through the frame. Conveys time. Leads audience through physical space.

What is Drama Through Perspective in Movement?

Drama is a story evolution from A to B. The camera can also change perspective if necessary over the course of a dramatic moment. A push-in can start wide and isolated and end intimate and caring.

What are the common forms of Movement?

Pan, Tilt, Zoom

Raise or Lower

Dolly Moves

Lockoffs

Handheld

Steadicam

Gimbals

Aerial

What are Aspect Ratios? What are the most common?

They are the size of the frame.



**Most Commonly Used**

__**16x9 (1.78**__**) -** Standard aspect ratio for HD and most televisions and monitors.

__**2:1**__ **-** Width is twice the height. Popular with online streaming services. Virtually the midpoint is between 1.78 and 2.40.

__**2.40**__ **-** Anamorphic or “scope.” Widest commonly used aspect. Generally used for feature films and some streaming content.

What are the main 3 types of Digital Cameras?

**Digital Cinema Camera**

* Box/brain form factor

**DSLR**

* Still camera form factor

**ENG / Camcorder**

* Its meant to be all in one

What is a Sensor?

The sensor of a camera is that captures light and converts it into signals which result in an images.

What is CMOS?

The vast majority of digital cinema cameras employ a CMOS sensor. A single chip design.

What are Photosites?

The core of a sensor is a gridded array of photo sites. Each photo site has a color filter and micro- lens. Photons hit each photo site creating a voltage.

What is the Bayer Pattern? What is Debayering?

A photo site responds to photons of any wavelength. Therefore, any color light can create a voltage but the sensor can’t discern the color. The solution: a pattern of color filters over every photo site → Bayer Pattern

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**Bayer Pattern**

* Each photo site on a sensor has a red, green, or blue color filter. Thus that photo site will react only to those color wavelengths.

In a color digital image, each pixel’s color is determined by combining the values of 3 separate red, green, and blue channels.

**Debayering**

* The process by which raw sensor data (where each photo site has information about only one color) is converted to full-color information for each pixel.

What are the common sensor sizes?

**Full Frame**

**Super 35 - APS-C**

**16mm - 2/3”**

What is the Crop Factor? Why is it a misleading term?

The DSLR revolution created a term called crop factor which is the ratio of how much smaller a sensor size is compared to full frame. Misleading because it makes people think lens work wrong.

What’s the relationship between lenses and sensors?

Not all lenses can cover all sensor areas. Be careful matching lenses to cameras. Generally “full-frame” lenses can cover the sensor area of all smaller sensors.

What’s the relationship between sensor size and resolution?

The physical size of the sensor affects angle of view relative to focal length and depth of field. Resolution is determined by number and density of photo sites.

What is resolution?

Resolution is determined by the number and density of photo sites.



Digital cinema cameras have a maximum advertised resolution they are capable of. However, this is sometimes only accessible via certain aspect ratios. There can also be lower resolution options that scale down the image from the full sensor or crop the image.

How do you choose resolution?

While the array of camera resolutions is vast and sometimes vendor specific there are much fewer standardized resolutions for standard finishing or delivery. Be aware of your deliverable when choosing a camera resolution.

What are the deliverable resolutions?

__**TV / Broadcast**__

All current broadcast resolutions are HD based thus a 16:9 (1.78) aspect frame.

**4K UHD**

**1080P Full HD**

**720P HD**

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__**Digital Cinema Packages**__

For delivery and projection in a theater final output must fit within these resolutions.

• Flat (1.85 Aspect): **2K:** 1998x1080

• Scope (2.40 Aspect): **2K:** 2048x858

• HDTV (1.78 Aspect): **2K:** 1920x1080

• Full (1.9 Aspect): **2K:** 2048x1080

How does sensor size, resolution and aspect ratio relate?

This is important, as the aspect ratio of a camera’s sensor has a relationship with the aspect ratio of the resulting image or video it creates. Certain sensors have certain aspect ratios. Ex: full-frame sensors have a 3:2 aspect ratio

Aspect ratio describes the ratio of width vs. height, resolution describes the number of pixels in each direction. So, when you change the image aspect ratio, image resolution also changes.

What are the common Frame Rates?

**23.98**

**24 integer**

**29.97**

**59.94i**

**59.94P or 60P**

**25 integer**

Which frame rate should you use?

Many have argued what the “right” frame rate for capture and delivery is. Frame rate in conjunction with shutter determines motion blur. Higher frame rates have less blur thus crisper movement. Sports broadcasts anyone? The film industry ended up on settling at 24fps. For technical reasons digital is commonly shot at 23.98.

What is/How do you achieve **Overcranking or Slow Motion?**

Shooting at a frame rate *higher* than your project rate will result in slow motion. For example if your project is at 24fps and you shoot at 48fps the footage will play back twice as slow.

What is/How do you achieve **Undercranking or Fast Motion?**

Shooting at a frame rate *lower* than the project rate results in fast motion. For example, if you shoot at 12fps and playback at 24fps the footage will play back twice as fast.

Why should you think in stops? What is a stop?

* **A stop is a doubling or halving of light.**


* A stop only has a number assigned to it when we are referring to f-stops on the lens.
* Because stops are abstract, we can use them to define changes to exposure caused by multiple different factors.
* The easiest way to understand the effect a modification has in changing exposure is to express that change in stops.

What is the shutter?

* The shutter controls the length of time the sensor is exposed to light. They block the light from the film until time of exposure then open for a set time and close.
* The longer the sensor is exposed the more motion blur occurs. Objects in motion don’t stop for each frame and are captured at all positions they occupy during the length of exposure.
* Cinema Shutters Measured in Degrees
* 180° Standard

How Does Changing Shutter Affect Exposure?

Choosing a different shutter speed affects both exposure time and motion blur. To reduce motion blur, increase shutter speed i.e. shorter exposure. But, shorter exposure means less light thus you must accommodate be changing aperture or light level.

What’s the stop principle for shutter?

***A doubling or halving of shutter speed equals 1 stop.***

__In Degrees:__

Changing from 180° to 90° shutter halves exposure time thus reducing exposure by 1 stop

__In Fractions:__

Changing from 1/96th of a second to 1/48th of a second shutter doubles exposure time thus increasing exposure by 1 stop

What is ISO?

* The ISO rating of a camera is a measure of how sensitive it is to light. A lower ISO means less sensitive a higher ISO means more sensitive.
* Digital cameras often provide many ISO choices. However, the actual sensitivity of the sensor to light isn’t changed; only the electronic gain applied to the signal is.
* Increasing the gain of an electronic signal also increases electronic noise. Some level of noise is expected but at some point it becomes visually unacceptable. What point that is, is a creative choice.
* All cameras have a sensitivity that gives the best performance and least noise. This is considered the “native” ISO.

How does changing the ISO affect exposure?

Changing camera ISO setting changes its sensitivity. Higher ISOs are more sensitive to light, lower ISOs are less sensitive. Because the camera’s sensitivity to light changes, exposure will change if nothing else is adjusted.

Changing digital ISO can move the dynamic range because the sensor still needs a minimum amount of light to register exposure and clips after a maximum amount of light.

Whats the stop principle for ISO?

***A doubling or halving of ISO number equals 1 stop.***

For Example: \n Assume a camera is set to ISO 800. Changing to ISO 1600 will result in increasing exposure by one stop. Changing from ISO 800 to ISO 200 is an exposure decrease of 2 stops

What does it mean to re-rate ISO? How do you re-rate ISO?

ISO defines the camera’s sensitivity. That sensitivity value is critical to determining exposure values when working with a light meter. Because many camera settings and changes have exposure/sensitivity side effects, it’s easier to express the increase or decrease of sensitivity as a new ***effective ISO****.*



**How to Re-Rate**


1. Start with the camera’s current ISO setting (or current rated ISO).
2. Determine, **in stops**, the amount of exposure increase or decrease a camera

modification makes.
3. Using the double-half principal, determine the new *effective* ISO by calculating the

ISO value the difference in stops would be .

What is Dynamic Range?

Dynamic range is the range of light intensities (measured in stops) that the camera can capture. The lowest light level in the range of the camera will be recorded as black, the highest level in the range will be recorded as white.

What does clipping mean?

Light levels above or below the dynamic range of the camera are unrecordable and clipped to black or white respectively.

What’s the relationship between dynamic range and contrast?

The range of luminance values in digital is a grayscale from black to white. The dynamic range of the camera determines how much a change in exposure changes the luminance value. Greater range means greater differences in stop to create same apparent contrast as a lower range camera.

What’s the relationship between exposure and dynamic range?

Cameras can only capture a subset of all possible light levels at any given time. Dynamic range is the width of the range that the camera is able to render. Exposure is where we set the midpoint of that range given the light levels we’re working with.

What are all the parts of exposure?

How do you control exposure?

* A light meter allows you to measure the intensity of light falling on a subject. As soon as you can measure light levels, you have a reference point for setting everything else.


* Exposure is generally though about in relation to middle gray. I.E. what light level is required to expose an 18% gray card in the middle of the black to white value range. Knowing where the middle is and knowing the dynamic range of the camera give a reference point for where any changes in stop value will fall in apparent brightness on screen.

What are the elements of exposure?

Exposure is the relationship between the amount of light in a scene, the sensitivity and settings of the camera, and the aperture of the lens to the rendered brightness on the screen.

What are the standard goals of exposure (not creative liberties)?

* white is white, black is black, midtones are midtones
* you want to expose for a full range of tones. Utilize the dynamic range

What Does a Lens Do?

* establish a field of view
* chooses area of focus
* control exposure through aperture
* perspective
* compression
* expansion

What are the two lens types?

Prime Lenses and Zoom Lenses

What’s Focal Length?

Lenses are referred to by their focal length. A measurement in millimeters that describes the distance from the rear optical nodal point to the sensor.

What’s the relationship between Focal Length and Field of View?

Changing the focal length of the lens changes the field of view. That is, the angle of a cone projected from the front of the lens. Smaller lengths have wider fields of view, longer lengths are narrower.

Whats magnification in terms of field of view?

With the camera at a fixed distance from the subject, a narrower field of view appears to increase magnification of the subject while a wider field of view decreases magnification.

What’s the relationship between focal length, field of view and sensor size?

* The focal length is a fixed measurement. But, the same lens on a full-frame sensor vs. a super 35 sensor will have a different field of view.
* When comparing two different-sized sensors, for a given focal length, the field of view will be wider on the larger sensor and narrower on the smaller sensor.

Whats wide, normal and long lenses?

__**Normal Lens**__

The normal lens is considered closest to the field of view of human vision and feels natural. For cinematographers this is generally a focal length twice the length of the sensor diagonal.

__**Wide Lens**__

Wide lenses have larger fields of view than normal and shorter focal lengths.

__**Long Lens**__

Long lenses have narrower fields of view and longer focal lengths.

How does a lens change perspective?

__**Lens Length Affects Depth Perspective**__

As you change focal length, the relationship of objects at different planes of depth changes. Consider three primary planes, foreground, middle ground, and background. Changes in focal length shift the apparent closeness of those planes.

**Wide Lenses**

Wide-angle lenses exaggerate the apparent distance and proportion of elements at different distances from the lens.

**Long Lenses**

Long lenses compress the apparent distance and proportion of elements at varying distances.

What is the aperture?

A lens aperture is generally an **iris mechanism** with an adjustable diameter that increases or decreases the amount of light allowed to pass through a lens.

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**It’s the primary method of setting exposure and depth of field.**

What does the aperture control besides light?

Aperture also change the depth of field. That is, the range of acceptable focus in front of and behind the focal plane.

What are F-Stops?

An F-stop is a dimensionless number that is the ratio of the focal length to the entrance pupil. The entrance pupil is the diameter of the aperture as measured through the front element of the lens.

What does setting the stop mean? (aperture)

Choosing the stop on the lens is essentially setting the midpoint of exposure. That is to say, for the rated ISO of the camera and a set stop on the lens, a gray card lit to the same stop will render as middle gray on camera.

What does working stop mean? (aperture)

To maintain consistency in depth of field from shot to shot, cinematographers generally choose a working stop that gives them the aesthetic they’re looking for and adjust exposure by other means.

What does a lens focus ring do?

A lens focus ring is marked with distance measurements, and the lens itself is collimated to ensure the accuracy of those distance markings. Because not everything is usually in focus at once, setting the focus distance sets the point of sharpest focus and moves the depth of field range.

What does it mean to set a focus?

Selecting a focus distance not only sets the plane of critical focus, where elements will render the sharpest but also sets the depth of field.

What does it mean to change focus?

The principal plane of focus is the plane that is in focus in a 3D environment. By changing the focus of the lens wht you are actually doing is shifting the 3D image backwards and forwards.

What’s the difference between plane of focus and depth of field?

Depth of field is not fixed in the same way focus distance is. While a lens always lets you set the critical focus point at a specific distance. Depth of field is variable at different distances, apertures, and focal lengths.

What’s the relationship between Depth of Field, Distance, and Focus?

* At a given focal length and aperture, the depth of field expands as the focus distance increases.
* As DOF increases with distance, the ability to create separation with focus is lessened for elements farther away from the camera. Part of getting a blurred background or creating focus separation isn’t just opening the stop but setting elements apart in physical space, so the depth of field range does not cover everything.

What’s the relationship between DOF and Aperture?

For a set focus distance, adjusting the aperture will increase or decrease the depth of field. Reducing stop (opening the iris) decreases DOF range. Increasing stop (closing the iris) expands the DOF range.

What are the three types of lens filters?

* Neutral Density Filters
* Polarizers
* Block light outside the polarization angle set by the filter. Reflected light becomes polarized. Polas can filter out reflection glare, reduce haze, and increase sky contrast.


* Creative Filters

What are ND Filters?

NDs enable us to cut light without having to sacrifice depth of field or motion blur. However, they can only reduce exposure.

What effects exposure?

ISO, Shutter, Aperture, ND FIlters, Lighting

What are the three principle planes?

Visual elements are generally sorted into three principle depth planes. This helps us to think about relative size of objects as well as any visual overlap. The closest camera facing element tends to have the most visual importance.

How does camera movement affect filmmaking?

Movement is composed of style, trajectory, pacing, and timing. It add subtext and emotional content independent of the subject.

How can camera movement define perspective?

A certain composition defines an audience’s perspective on the current moment in the scene. But what if the moment changes? Camera movement allows us to follow subsequent moments or create new ones ourselves.

How does immediacy relate to camera movement?

Camera movement gives us control of the immediacy of an image. We can create restrained objective viewpoints as well as in the thick of it frenetic views, along with everything in- between.

What’s pan?

Whats tilt?

What’s Dolly In/Out or Push/Pull?

What’s Boom/Ped/Crane?

What’s tracking?

What’s Roll?

What’s zoom?