The Cine Technician (1943 - 1945)

Record Details:

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Ill THE ('IX E T E CHNICI A N November-December, l'.'l another headache for the cutter as well as myself. Although our camera equipment was coa with water-proof canvas, salt water and salt atmosphere permeated everywhere, corroding viciously. Nearly every <la\ the pungent smell of cur ealWes and plugs shorting, with smoke issuing from our electrical gear told us that our salt water gremlins were having fun again, and we must dry the connections either by heating them with matches or lighters, or clean them under a waterproof while spray splashed in derisively. The Technicolor camera is the swank; apotheosis of movie machines, bred in million dollar Hollyd, delicately coloured, with superb high-precision machinery and a prism which is set to a fraction of an inch and diligently watched for the most microscopic speck of dust, which would show as a large coloured blob on the screen. This prism is always placed, with tense caution and hated breath, into the camera, keeping a perfect balance while doing so. This meticulous operation was a sight to be remembered in a lifeboat on stormy Reloading the camera with fresh film was always a nightmare, with the ubiquitous gremlins having glorious fun, making the boat heave right over and throwing gallons of water over us as we si iggered drunkenh about, lifting the blimp off and threading up the film somehow under a flapping tarpaulin. Seas, oi course, were never the same, either in character or in colour. On one day the wa would tower monstrously in the true Atlantic manner : then on the next da\ the sea would be as fiat as the Serpentine, and the colour changed every few hours, from deep blue to grey-green. One day fleecy, cumulus clouds : next day a completely cloudless sky. Ad these changes were typical of the ever-changing conditions at sea. but the difference can be glaringly seen when assembled together in the final cut film, with the whole sequence only supposed to he of five minutes' duration. Our sail also had to he right for continuity on • starboard tack — that is. with the wind coming from our left side — hut the wind changed manv times in a day and we had to jib around so much that either the sun was in our lens or land came in the picture. One day everything went off perfectly from the start. The weather was right; so was the sea. the wind, and all the rest of our ever-changing conditions. Tt was quite quiet, and so perfect for us thai it was all rather uncanny. Our nautical nlins must have taken the day off — so we imagined. I checked the light reading from my photometer twice to make sure; the focus was also double-checked. 1 set my exposure smugly : fhe light was perfect. One rehearsal and the actorseamen were magnificent. Pat Jackson and T looked at each other a little nervously and warily. Drawing a deep breath, Pat said: " It's too g to be true: let's put the sail up." We both grasped the halliard and pulled exuberantly until the sail billowed gustily in the breeze, and hung on until it was made fast by i seaman. Suddenly, the mast snapped loose ai the base, the sail and mast were blown over into the sea. with Tat and me clinging in dazed bewilderment to it over the side. We went hack for the day in silence, with se" faces The most deadly burden of all was seasickness Even some of the veteran sea men themselvi often horribly sick, so it was not surprising that most of the unit went through the ghastly misen of nausea nearly every day for many months Sometimes our lifeboat looked as though ; machine-gun had raked the whole crew down. Ever; wr< tched victim — except the few who wen never sick — would he inertly all over the boi I hang limply over the side heaving spasmodically like captured fish in a bucket. Our director was one of the heaven-blessed ; he was not seasick once, hut imagine how difficult it was for him t< direct a scene when nearly all his crew v pathetically hors de combat. With a sympathetic look around, he would say: "All right, let's try ami get this scene bi the sun goes in." Someone points f< Roland, the sound man. over the side, only his rear and twitching lei^s to he seen. "Well. IT take the mike." says Pat. " Ready everybody?' But my assistant hasn't taken the focus, onh his tape measure is left swing dramatically fron the side, and a horrible choking vomit peculiar i Eric, explains his ahsence. "All right, I'll take the tape out," says Pit desperately. " 1' v : i t two inches, is that right •Jack?" I have just returned from the side, and my head is sunk down on my chest like a dead man: ni\ blurred vision tries to envisage Pat as I say something like. " Egggmmmph." " Right." says Pat grimly, "turn 'em over." B I now the actor-seaman himself suddenly rises with a stifled gurgle and falls purposefulh over the side. We wait listlessly-. He comes back Eric returns, looking very white and battered Roland, the sound man. crawls painfully hack in position and buzzers are pressed weakly for tlu recordist on the drifter I I the machinery in motion: but after a dreary, burping delay, it is learned that Charlie, the American recordist. wh< works down an evil-smelling hold on the drifter, ibusily vomiting into a bucket which he bi down with him every day. In answer to feverish enquirif \ t •lie 'phone Charlie pants indignantly, between heaving " Can't a guy have time to puke once in a while'1' Our staggering setbacks would have strained