By Adam Coleman
Oscar-winning Australian cinematographer, John Seale recalls the day he decided to shoot with multiple cameras as “the day my world turned”.
Seale was doing a picture in the United States called Rainman. It was a writer’s strike and they were changing the script on restaurant serviettes.
“This was because we didn’t want the Writer’s Guild to find out people were re-writing,” he said at the SMPTE Conference and Exhibition 09 at Sydney’s Darling Harbour.
"During the filming, actors Dustin [Hoffman] and Tom [Cruise] unexpectedly began to adlib.
"So I am watching this single camera grinding away and watching the monitor and I am thinking this is madness.
“[In the past] we had to go off to the sound recorders, replay it back, write it down and then reproduce what was said in the adlib before we could shoot it. I walked over to the director and said ‘we should have another camera on this’. He looked up at me and he said ‘I wasn’t game to ask’."
Seale said he believes a single camera can place too great a technical demand on an actor.
“At times I think we made it too difficult for the actor who was more concerned about hitting their marks than they were about giving a good performance.
“So about then I thought forget the marks, put two cameras in and let’s go.”
Seale also highlighted his decision to use zoom lenses, a change to high-speed negative and a move away from keeping the eye-line right beside the lens, as career changing.
“Now we are throwing away all of that old tradition we held in reverence, that Hollywood style. We are smashing it to bits as a reality/photojournalism style is taking over.”