That camera 'bump' in Punch-Drunk Love explained

[Marty McSuperfly]

FROM AN INTERVIEW WITH ROBERT ELSWIT HERE....

http://www.fujifilm.com/JSP/fuji/epartners/MPBehindTheScenesDetail.jsp?dbid=MP_BEHIND_SCENES_508114

'At one point Sandler's character is being followed by the Steadicam as he
talks on the phone. During a take, the front of the camera bumped into a
table and knocked the camera briefly, causing the shot to jump from Sandler to an image of an out-of-focus piece of the set and then quickly re-adjust.
"Most directors would probably not even print that take," says Elswit, "but
Paul loved the effect and wanted to do it again. So we did more takes and
right at the same point in the dialog, I'd sort of smack the front of the
matte box to re-create the look."'

I love knowing shit like that!

[soixante]

That was a fascinating interview.  I can't wait to study PDL on DVD.  The f-stop adjustment in the middle of a shot is something I didn't notice on first viewing in a theater.

[Redlum]

Thanks for the link. It's nice to have an interview that goes into some technical detail.

The websites for the film stock always have great interviews. Nice photo too.

Good Roger Deakins interview on the links on the left aswell.

[Satcho9]

Thats funny. Elswitt says he shot on Fuji Film stock...if I remember correctly on PTA's commentary for Boogie Nights he says Fuji sucks. Can anyone else remember this??

[tpfkabi]

every time i've seen i've wondered if that camera movement was supposed to be telling me something.

the whole f stop thing......i don't know camera terms.....can you give me a scene example of when this happens?

[Ghostboy]

I don't remember precisely, but I know it happens a lot when he walks from indoors to outdoors (and sometimes vice vera). Basically, the aperture on the camera is set for the amount of light indoors, so when it follows him outdoors, the image gets blown out and has to be adjusted.

[sphinx]

every time i've seen i've wondered if that camera movement was supposed to be telling me something.

the whole f stop thing......i don't know camera terms.....can you give me a scene example of when this happens?

when the camera adjusts to the amount of light in a scene.   for example, if a man was standing in the doorway of a house, and it was a bright sunny day outside, a regular home video camera would adjust the f-stop to suit the majority of light in the shot, in this case, outside.  the iris would close, and the light outside would be balanced, but the man standing in the doorway would be a silhouette.  alternately, the iris could be opened so we can see the man standing in the doorway perfectly, but all of outside appears white.  this occurs many times in punch-drunk, most notably at the beginning when lance opens the door to the warehouse and barry comes to speak with him---all of the outside appears white.

in films like 'speed', where a lot of action takes place inside a closed space with windows, the shots inside the bus have to be lit equally to what outside looks like, or the audience would never see what was going on outside of the bus, it would just appear white.  this doesn't happen much in punch-drunk love, the characters are either in silhouette or embraced in light.  one of the examples when the f-stop changes during a shot is when barry runs out of the warehouse alongside the red truck driving by.  i'll try to post some screenshots so you'll know what i'm talking about.

[sphinx]

couldn't get great examples, but here you go.





2 fo sho

[Pubrick]

that's hot.

[©brad]

good article. elswitt seems like a cool dude. a lot of cinematographers just light to impress other cinematographers rather than doing whats right for the movie.

[82]

Think of it like the pupil in your eye.  Its an apature allowing light to enter the eye regulated by the iris.  The brighter something is, the more your pupil closes (smaller apature - higher fstop) and the darker it is the more the pupil opens (wider apature - lower fstop)

[tpfkabi]

ok. thanks for the examples. i didn't know it was a cinematic no-no. i just thought it looked kinda cool. is this the kind of thing people who have studied film would look at and say, "that's wrong?"

[Cecil]

is this the kind of thing people who have studied film would look at and say, "that's wrong?"

probably. theyd be like "yeah did you notice the bad cinematography? it shows that pta guy didnt go to film shcool."

[snaporaz]

wait...i'm a little confused...

if there were noticable f-stop changes in the film, why didn't these changes accommodate the differences in lighting?

i would think that by not changing the f-stop, it would give those really bright/silhouette effects.

personally, those warehouse scenes don't seem bad to me at all. i'm not saying you guys think that, i'm just talking about how this is unusual or otherwise "wrong". i mean, if it was a bright day and i was in that warehouse myself, my own eyes would see that affect as well.

i'm not a cinematographer...maybe that have rules about having the film look more like a movie than real life. i don't know.

[snaporaz]

oh yeah, i saw punch-drunk love again at the dollar cinema a few days ago and was thinking of making a thread asking about that particular camera bump. i initially thought it was an accident and they decided to keep that exact shot.