The American cinematographer (Jan-Dec 1963)

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are unable to service him as promptly as anticipated. It is advisable, there¬ fore to deal only with those labora¬ tories that can be depended on to help meet deadlines. Both from the standpoint of plan¬ ning and that of day-by-day execution of the production, the storyboard is one of the most valued tools of the film pro¬ ducer. The storyboard provides all con¬ cerned with a visualization of the production, sequence by sequence, in continuity form. Here the whole pro¬ duction can be studied without the need for reading the script page by page. Ideas for improving it, for delet¬ ing unimportant detail, and for cut¬ ting costs come readily from story¬ board studies. Continued from Page 33 Two different mounts are available — one for the F-86F jet fighter, and an¬ other to fit similar types of aircraft. The mounting arrangement permits ac¬ curate bore-sighting of the lens to correspond with the cross-hairs on the pilot’s gunsight — although some pilots prefer to view through a Mitchell view¬ finder zeroed in with the lens. On the F-86F the same stick button which fires the plane’s machine guns also ac¬ tivates the camera motor. In addition to shooting forward, the unit can also be completely reversed to film the results of bombing, strafing and napalm runs. One version of the wing-mount accommodates two 16mm cameras — one pointing forward, the other backward — so that both aspects of a run can be filmed simultaneously. During the series of A-bomb tests made at Eniwetok several years ago there was need for a rugged housing that would permit cameras to be set up as close as possible to the shot with¬ out being destroyed by the lethal blast. The Lookout Mo untain engineers tackled the problem and came up with a weird looking device officially called a Remote Camera Housing, but more familiarly known as “The Monster.” It consisted basically of a four-foot length of metal pipe 12-in. in diameter and with walls one-inch thick. One end —the bottom — was sealed off by a l/£inch steel plate. At the other end a steel disc 18 inches in diameter with a 12inch round cut-out was welded to provide a flange. This unit constituted the bulk of the housing and the bottom Storyboards can be of two types: composed of photos or sketches of the basic action in each sequence, or of brief word descriptions typed or let¬ tered on small cards. Whether pictures or typed cards are used, they are ar¬ ranged in sequence on a large panel for study. As changes are made, new cards or illustrations are made and sub¬ stituted for the discarded material. (See “Plotting Camera Angles With Storyboards,” December, 1962, Amer¬ ican Cinematographer. — ED.) No matter how much time is in¬ volved in pre-production planning, it is worth it many times in the better pro¬ duction, finer photography, and — most important — the greater profits that result. ■ three feet of it was buried in the ground on location to insure stability. The top section of the housing con¬ sisted of another 14-inch length of 12-inch pipe edged with an identical flange and capped at the other end by a l^-inch steel plate. In this section a hole was drilled into which was in¬ serted a short section of 4-inch pipe to form a port for the lens. The opening was covered with 14-inch safety plate glass and secured by a retaining lock ring. Three L-shaped brackets were welded to the inside of the bottom section of the housing, and a circular plate at¬ tached to the brackets to form a base for a Mitchell ProJunior tilt head mounting a Bell &: Howell Model 70 Eilmo Camera. Another version of the housing accommodated a K-25 aerial camera, which shoots 4x5 color stills at the rate of three frames per second. Once the camera was mounted in¬ side the housing, the top "hat ’ section was lowered onto the base section and the two flanges securely bolted together. Concealed in the base were the bat¬ teries and relays needed to operate the camera’s 24-volt motor. A photo-elec¬ tric cell picked up the flash of the atomic weapon which triggered the relay and started the camera. This system was used because frequent post¬ ponements of the shots made the use of conventional timers impractical. In this way, each unit would be self-suffi¬ cient without the need for wiring or trim circuits. During an actual atomic shot a timer inside the housing auto¬ matically shuts off the camera motor after a three-minute run. Lead bricks were placed around the “Monster” to shield the film from damaging radia¬ tion. Cameras were checked out with a strobe-light in dry runs simulating the atomic flash. Several of these camera units were set up on various islands and atolls at Eniwetok. It was merely necessary to dig a hole, bury the base of the hous¬ ing, boresight the lens of the camera, and leave the unit in place to be trig¬ gered off by the blast itself. The cam¬ eras incidentally recorded some spec¬ tacular footage, including scenes of birds Hying during period of the shot. “It’s improved her acting 100 percent!’ FITTING THE CAMERA TO THE JOB 48 AMERICAN CINEMATOGRAPHER, JANUARY, 1963