American Cinematographer - February 2008 - (Page 58) Forward Thinker to shoot inserts — they included [ASC members] James Wong Howe and Ernie Haller.” But in 1967, Edlund’s hair started getting too long for the union business agent’s taste, and Westheimer kept bugging him to cut it. “I finally did, but when I showed up at the Local 659 for an inspection, Herb Aller said, ‘It’s not short enough!’” recalls Edlund. “I took a stand and gave Joe notice.” By that time, he had bought a Nikkormat camera and shot numerous compositions of a friend’s rock group on a drydocked ship in San Pedro, and the proof sheets had found their way to Mark Gordon, manager of The Fifth Dimension. “So my second photo gig was to fly to Vegas and shoot an album cover for The Fifth Dimension!” says Edlund. This led to steady rock ’n’ roll jobs shooting movies and album covers. “I was a working hippie!” Edlund’s love of string instruments led him to design and build the first Pignose amplifier, an idea that hit him when he spotted a Japanese mini-amplifier the size of a cigarette pack at an electronics store. “I put the pieces together with a 9-volt battery pack in an English Leather cologne box. It was like a found invention, and it liberated the electric guitar from huge amplifiers. Warren Zevon immediately used it in the studio to record his second album. I then made 65 Pignoses and got them to all the great guitar players, including Keith Richards, George Harrison, Terry Kath and Frank Zappa. We thought we’d quickly create a legend. I never made any money from it, but I learned what not to do in the world of business! And they’re still being made, so I consider it like having a bastard son out there in the world.” Itching to get behind a camera again, Edlund joined Robert Abel, whose studio was producing TV commercials and network Above: Edlund (right) looks over a setup for the first action sequence in Return of the Jedi as cast and crew stand by. Below: The VistaCruiser camera, which Edlund codesigned with Bill Neil, ASC, hovers over the surface of the Death Star as Edlund inspects the model during the filming of Return of the Jedi. the base,” says Edlund. “So for each sequence of operations, I’d cut to the actor flicking that same switch in close-up, then cut to the actor running to start the next generator. I didn’t know what I was doing; I was teaching myself. That’s how I got into making movies.” After Edlund’s tour of duty ended, he returned to Los Angeles and enrolled in the University of Southern California’s film school, attending classes at night and working during the day. He completed his first three years of college in two, but when he heard industry people wouldn’t be that impressed by a cinema degree, he decided not to com- plete the required courses to graduate. He left a résumé with the camera guild’s employment department and started knocking on doors, hoping to land a job. Joe Westheimer, ASC, who ran his own optical house, found Edlund’s résumé and got in touch. “He was looking for someone who could shoot inserts, opticals and titles, and we hit it off right away,” says Edlund. “He hired me on the spot.” One of his early jobs was rotoscoping the fly-by of the Star Trek starship Enterprise when it went off the bluescreen. “In the four and a half years I was there, I learned a lot from Joe’s colleagues who came by 58 February 2008
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