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of feature films in a substantial way. My first encounter with digital video cameras was in the aforementioned Anniversary Party in the summer of 2000. I have photographed in several digital video formats including a feature film in NTSC with Werner Herzog, Incident at Loch Ness, made with my two still-hearty Panasonic DVX100s. At the time of writing this foreword, June 2012, I am prepping my third digital video feature film this year. I call it “my Alexa hat trick.”

      The question one must ask, the question any young and emerging cinematographer, writer, director, editor, or production designer must ask, is “What now?” Although filmmaking technology has been in constant, sometimes confusing and erratic, flux since the Lumière Brothers introduced their Cinematograph in 1895, the primacy of storytelling and character have remained constant elements, as has the capture medium of film. Now, the very nature of movies is changing. Recent camera and editing technology is altering the century-old tradition of how feature films are shot, edited, and exhibited. A younger audience raised on the fluid dynamics of information and visual media possible in the laptop, smart phone, tablet age finds traditional media, even traditional filmmaking, wanting.

      I find myself straddling two worlds. On the one hand, I treasure the continuity of the era of the great cinematographers such as those profiled in this book, artists who exposed images one day and saw the results the next, practicing a kind of flying by the seat of their pants, albeit very well tailored pants. I feel a visceral connection to the pioneers and masters of celluloid such as Billy Bitzer, Karl Freund, William Daniels, James Wong Howe, Boris Kaufman, and Phil Lathrop. I have known all of the cinematographers interviewed in Masters of Light, and even worked as camera assistant or operator with a half dozen of them. I see several more regularly at the ASC and other industry events.

      On the other hand, I love the ease and portability of the newest HD cameras and look forward to “filming” with the Sony F65, which I have tested. And Panavision will soon introduce its own follow-up to the Genesis. In digital video, the current “game-changer” camera itself keeps changing. I look forward to the exciting but uncertain future of cinematography, even as I cringe at its devolving status in the digital age. The hoary cliché that “the past is prologue” is, nevertheless, appropriate as our art form faces the future. Yes, I do long for the next time I can return to 35 mm film in the anamorphic aspect ratio. I have made dozens of movies in that format. Anamorphic aspect ratio and film are, for me, still the gold standard for image creation.

      John Bailey, ASC

      June 2012

      1. When the book was initially published (in 1984), there were no women in the professional union. That situation is changing dramatically, but we have chosen to retain the term cameraman, using it as a gender-neutral synonym for cinematographer.

      Preface

      Almost thirty years have passed since Masters of Light, a series of interviews with more than a dozen cinematographers, was first published. At the time, we hoped that the interviews would be interesting, important, and relevant to aspiring cameramen as well as everyday filmgoers and movie buffs.¹ What we did not anticipate was that the book would become a classic, remaining in print all these years, to be read by an entire generation of students, aspiring cameramen, and professional cinematographers throughout the world.

      In the initial review of the book in The New Republic, the film critic Stanley Kauffmann commented that the work of the cameramen presented in the book probably represented the high-water mark of cinematography as we know it.

      Coincidentally, many years later, in December 2011, the director Christopher Nolan gathered together many of the most important filmmakers in America at the Directors Guild, ostensibly for a screening of the first six minutes of his new film, The Dark Knight Rises. Once the directors were assembled, however, he made a plea for saving 35 mm film. The Dark Knight Rises was shot on celluloid, he explained, and he wants to continue to shoot on 35 mm film, the dominant format of the movies for more than a century.

      But the digital age is encroaching on film and traditional cinematography: in 2012, the majority of theaters are showing films in the digital format. By 2015, it is expected that only 17 percent of theaters will be projecting celluloid, and thus 35 mm film, for all intents and purposes, will be dead.

      That evening, Nolan encouraged filmmakers to assert their right to choose the format for their films. If enough directors strongly make their wishes known, he believes, film will have a better chance of surviving in this pervasively digital age. To boil it down to its essence: 35 mm is the gold standard of filmmaking; nothing else looks quite like it.

      So perhaps, looking back on it now with the perspective of time, the late twentieth-century period covered by Masters of Light was actually, as Kauffmann presciently suggested, the golden age of cinematography. Many of the films discussed in the book are now considered classics, and many of the cameramen featured in the book are considered some of the best and brightest who ever stood behind a camera. For many years, their work represented the high point for the electrochemical process known as 35 mm motion picture film cinematography.

      At present, only three of the cinematographers interviewed here are still making films; many have retired or passed on. In this reissue, we refrained from making any changes to the original text; some of it is now dated or even archaic and probably becoming more passé as days go by. But these interviews are like snapshots in time, capturing what it was like to be a cinematographer during that period. The challenge of being both an artist and a craftsman in that time are discussed in detail, as well as how those problems were resolved with insight and creativity. If, in the twenty-second century, someone wants to know how movies were made back “in the dark ages,” the cinematographers profiled here paint a portrait of their work in their own words.

      We do not remember who said something to the effect that we will long remember those who have gone before us. Our addendum to that truism would be that anyone who gets behind a camera today is standing on the shoulders of the giants in this book. We feel both honored and privileged to have documented the lives and times of these cameramen, and we will always feel a special bond with them and their work. They are truly “masters of light.”

      Larry Salvato

      Dennis Schaefer

      July 2012

      1. As mentioned in the foreword, when the book was initially published there were no women in the professional union. That situation is changing dramatically, but we have chosen to retain the term cameraman, using it as a gender-neutral synonym for cinematographer.

      Introduction

      The aim of this book is to explore the everyday working world of the feature motion picture cinematographer in his own words. As these conversations indicate, the cinematographer’s workday is a demanding one. He does not just direct the operation of the camera at the proper time and punch out at the end of the day. When he is working on a film, the creative cinematographer eats, breathes and lives cinematography twenty-four hours a day.

      “Cinematography,” says Mario Tosi, “is more than just making pretty pictures.” A successful cinematographer (also known as director of photography) is just as familiar with the history of the visual arts as he is with the light sensitivity of film emulsion or the electrical intricacies of rigging a huge sound stage for a big production number. He takes orders from the director but he is also his collaborator and confidant; he must help and support the director in getting exactly what he wants even when the director is not fully able to articulate it himself. He must deal on a daily basis with art, set, property and costume departments of the production to assure that their contributions are consistent with the overall tone and style of the film. In addition, he is the personnel manager and chief motivational force of the film production crew. Their response to his direction can determine whether the film stays on schedule and on budget; more importantly, it determines the quality of what finally ends up on the screen. The assistant cameraman, electricians, gaffers, grips and gofers (see Glossary for explanation of these terms) look to him for leadership and direction. He hires, fires, cajoles, counsels, and amidst all this, he creates. Outside of the director, he is normally the single most important force on the set. He must maintain firm control of all aspects of the shooting process in order to meet time and budget

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