The international photographer (Jan-Dec 1939)

CLOSf-OPS Bob Coburn: High school pole-vaulting got him into pictures Bob Coburn grew up with photography and the motion picture industry, but what plopped him into his present position as one of Hollyywood's outstanding still photographers was entirely outside the sphere of either. As a youngster at Hollywood High School, Coburn developed quite a reputation as a pole-vaulter. His first picture job was earned on his soaring talents. In 1916, two-reel comedies, which like vaudeville have passed into the show business limbo of nostalgic dodo-ism, were being ground out on every lot, and Jack White, producing Ben Turpin comedies, called the high school to get an expert polevaulter to double for the cross-eyed comic. School authorities sent Coburn. He must have made good in more ways than polevaulting, for he spent succeeding school vacations as film-loader, assistant and all-around stooge to Billy Beckway, well-remembered by members of Local 659 as an able first cameraman. In those days the cameraman shot his own stills. Coburn had been a camera bug since his boyhood on a Montana ranch, and he showed such an enthusiasm for this branch of the game that Beckway turned the still photography over to the youngster. Still photography became Coburn's hobby as well as work, and when Local 659 was organized and the various classifications of work laid down, he chose still photography. He's been at it ever since, and pretty regularly, for Coburn is the type of thoughtful, modest and quietly competent craftsman whose talents usually are in demand. Coburn's personality is reflected in his neat offices and darkroom headquarters on the United Artists lot. The walls are shared equally by specimens of expert shooting for big game and still pictures. Photography and hunting split honors among the journals on his desk. Coburn is an unusual type, reflecting sincere artistic enthusiasm without any of the temperament and "'aestheticisms" so frequently flaunted by artistic personalities. These qualities, which enabled him to "get along" with such a pronouncedly masculine director as John Ford as his favorite still photographer for many years, probably trace back to his boyhood on a Montana ranch, from which his father, Wallace A. Coburn took the family to Hollywood during his high school days. His boyhood hunting and fishing developed into his favorite hobby while his favorite boyhood hobby photography, became his life work. At the age of ten, Coburn had a homemade darkroom in which to experiment with the shots snapped from a camera he carried on his saddle-bag. He learned his photography through the practical trial-and-error method, without picking up any of the cant and poseur technique that marks so much photography today. Coburn believes in the theory that the photographer should himself do as much of every phase of the work as possible. Working on the UA lot, under Samuel Goldwyn, a producer, who knows, not only the business values of good stills, but also their good and bad points technically to a surprising degree, Coburn and his fellow stillmen at UA are permitted to do just that. They frankly attribute the results they get as much to the system as to their own efforts. No reformer, Coburn believes the big mass production lots might benefit in their still results from switching over to some sort of more personalized unit system, such as has worked out so successfully at UA. Coburn is under personal contract to Goldwvn, and without red-apple-ing the boss, believes that other producers might well follow the examples of Goldwyn, DeMille and others of a small group of alert production minds, who personally examine the International Photographer for March, 1939 still results every morning and make it a point to know the practical, technical, artistic and exploitation angles of still photography. Such producers consider the stillman as an important part of their sales program. How right they are is indicated in the quality standing their productions have in the industry. Technically, Coburn believes in simplicity, accuracy and complete mastery of the technical aspects of photography to the point of routine so that the photographer is free to let his mind work on the set toward composition, characterization and emotionally effective still pictures. This again is a reflection of his personal practical study of photography as a boy. His regularly used equipment cbnsists of an 8x10 Ansco, rebuilt to his own specifications to insure absolute sturdiness in operation, and with a carefully selected array of lenses; another 8x10 for portraits, also with special lenses and a conveniently operated tilt-head; a Contax II; and the press style 4x5 Speed Graphic. Coburn's equipment is as devoid of accessories as possible. His insistence upon simple, practical equipment amounts almost to an anti-gadget mania. Technically, Coburn matches this equipment with careful and lengthy test of the characteristics of various films and what his favorite lenses will do with such films. Every element of photography— films, lenses, laboratory handling — have been tested to insure as much depth of field as is possible and logical for every picture. And that, in a nutshell, is why Coburn's stills stand out. They are not composed on the routine flat plane that marks so much still and newspaper photography. This technical mastery of the exact stop and speed permissible — until a routine handling of these elements is possible — permits full freedom to get the best composition, the most dramatic effect and a general roundness and third-dimensional effect that characterizes Coburn's stills. Coburn is not inclined to get involved in the purist vs. whatis controversy over photographic technique, but he obviously leans toward the group that believes the composition and general effect should be planned and determined at the time of snapping the bulb. His insistence on methodical and thorough knowledge of what the photographic equipment will do is mixed with the natural resistance of most practical photographers toward playing too much with the negative. He seldom takes a chance on revising or improving the composition or the technical factors in blowup. All of which adds up to the fact that Coburn believes that good photography is a worthwhile artistic accomplishment, and like any medium where technique is important — be it playwriting, football, golf, hunting, brick-laying or motion picture production — it can best be mastered by doing, and not by reading or talking about. Trial and error — with emphasis on the error. That's what teaches the burnt print to avoid overexposure. Surprisingly enough for so practically-minded a photographer Coburn is one of the few Hollywood still photographers who never had any newspaper experience. He grew up with the picture business, and is still willing to learn. And as a member of the magazine committee in charge of the management of International Photographer under the chairmanship of Leon Shamroy, he believes that the present discussion about Hollywood stills, started by John LeBoy Johnston and carried on by Jimmy Doolittle this month should result in a continued open forum that all readers of International Photographer should join in for the betterment of the craft. — Gib. 15