American cinematographer (Jan-Dec 1963)

an example of the unusual camera techniques possible with the Portadolly. For one shot, the boom was swung to the side and dropped close to the ground. Then the mower ap¬ proached the camera in a direct frontal shot. As the mower reached the camera, the camera was raised, allowing the mower to pass directly beneath for a most unusual angle shot. Rough Country Shooting: During filming in the Kansas oil fields, the Porta-dolly was placed in the rear of a station wagon, with the dolly’s front wheels hanging over the tailgate for added stability. In filming drilling operations at scattered locations, the camera was never removed from the station wagon which became, quite literally, a mobile camera platform. When a camera position change was necessary, the station wagon was sim¬ ply moved, with obvious savings in set-up time. Mobile Shots: To make moving camera shots from a car usually re¬ quires tying down the tripod. When a Porta-dolly was used, CountrymanKlang cameramen found it sufficiently steady to permit shooting from the moving wagon with the front wheels of the dolly just hanging over the tail gate. By swinging the boom to one side, it was also possible to shoot straight ahead. Although the Porta-dolly was de¬ veloped primarily for the use of smallto medium-sized film operations, it has been found that larger firms find it useful as a second dolly, especially where a highly portable dolly is de¬ sired. For television use. the TV cam¬ era head is removed from its pedestal and mounted on the Porta-dolly. Great¬ er variety of camera movement and lower camera angles are claimed for this unit than are otherwise possible with the regulation TV camera assem¬ bly. Through use, Countryman-Klang dis¬ covered a couple of applications they hadn’t even thought of when they de¬ veloped their dolly. First, because of its light weight (320 pounds) and portability, it makes an excellent rental unit. Second, it saves a lot of time and muscle on locations in transporting lights, cable, camera and sound equip¬ ment. With its ease of movement and ample, unobstructed platform space, the Porta-dolly is simply loaded with equipment and used as a hand truck until time for its normal use. ■ LAB PROCEDURE FOR COLOR Continued From Page 165 GFL. 35mm color negative is processed daily, the negative then immediately edited to remove lakes not to be printed, and the remaining negative delivered to the printing department. Printing of Dailies: The producer has several choices in ordering dailies from his color negative. He may order fully corrected dailies, which will give him 35mm positive color footage of release print quality. Naturally, since this requires the greatest amount of time, and must achieve a top quality of color correction, it is the most ex¬ pensive product of this type. Or, he may order color dailies which will have so-called “simple corrections,” and this will deliver to him corrected dailies which will cut together to make an acceptable edited work print. Or, some producers order black-and-white dailies, as a money-saving device. However, the producer who orders black-and-white dailies should have some basis on which to judge the color quality in his negative, and should also order color prints from at least one scene in each separate camera setup or sequence. At General, color dailies are ready for delivery or pickup by early after¬ noon on the day following the night¬ timeprocessing. Black-and-white dailies from color are available by 10:00 a.m. of that day. Editing the Dailies: The producer goes through the various stages of editing, using the dailies, until he ar¬ rives at an approved edited workprint, with scene order and scene lengths the same as they are to appear in the re¬ lease prints. (Obviouslly, this does not rule out future editing changes.) Opticals: 35mm color negative may he cut into A&B rolls so that fades and dissolves may be provided in normal printing. However, majority practice is to have optical dupe sections printed, to provide fades and disolves as well as wipes, super-imposures, and other types of special effects. If optical sections are to be made, the producer should order from the lab 35nnn color interpositives of those scenes to be projection-printed to create the effect wanted. In the projection (or optical) printing process, this will then result in a 35mm color internegative section incorporating the effect — and this internegative section will be cut into the 35mm edited camera color negative. We’re well equipped . . . AMERICAN CINEMATOGRAPHER, MARCH. 1963 1