Digital Video - March 2008 - (Page 23)

CLOSE-UP HOW GEORGE SPIRO DIBIE, ASC HELPED TRANSFORM VIDEO FROM A “MEDIUM” INTO AN ART FORM. BY JON SILBERG T he American Society of Cinematographers chose to honor George Spiro Dibie, ASC with the organization’s Career Achievement in Television Award this year — presented on January 26 — for his significant contributions to television. Dibie’s pioneering camerawork, especially in such multi-camera sitcoms as Barney Miller, Growing Pains and Night Court, helped influence the look and approach used on countless other shows since. Dibie launched his professional career in the early 1960s while working at the lowest levels of the electrical department on 20th Century Fox’s epic Cleopatra. He quickly worked his way up from best boy to gaffer, lighting for such veteran directors of photography as James Wong Howe, ASC and Harry Stradling, Sr., ASC. In the 1960s, studios were cranking out far more feature films than they do today and the economics of filmmaking were very different. Dibie notes that he often had more time to learn and experiment with his lighting than people starting out today can hope for, and that experience proved invaluable throughout his career lighting television stages. By the early 1970s, Dibie was looking to become a cinematographer himself, but at that time the union was very much a closed shop — almost impossible to get into without powerful friends or family already on the inside. Undeterred, Dibie and educator Roger Dash made a series of educational films though Dibie-Dash Productions. Dibie was essentially a one-man production crew on these films, directing and lighting. The company would eventually sell thousands of 16mm prints of their various films all over the country. It also was a proving ground for Dibie to work as a cinematographer, and he did eventually get work shooting film and video for the ABC Armchair Mysteries and lighting some massive stages for the children’s video show The New Zoo Revue. When producer Danny Arnold hired Dibie to be the cinematographer on his new four-camera videotaped comedy series www.dv.com BELOW: PHOTO BY OWEN ROIZMAN, ASC; RIGHT: COURTESY OF THE ASC A TRUE TV STAR Above, George Spiro Dibie, ASC (on right) and producer Danny Arnold on the set of their hit ABC series Barney Miller. Left, Dibie today. Barney Miller, there was really no precedent for the look Arnold was after. The shows shot on the two-inch “quad” tape of the 1970s were generally lit from everywhere — nothing was in shadow, no illumination was motivated. None of the new techniques Dibie was learning and creating in features were present in the videotaped sitcoms of the early 1970s. Many producers, Dibie explains, “would say, ‘A bright look is funny.’ And their shows had no subtlety; everything was bright.” But Dibie and Arnold saw the wry humor of Barney Miller, set in a dingy police precinct, differently. Dibie came in and completely changed the set’s lighting configuration — which had been previously used for game shows — and planned out the lighting grid carefully to provide key and fill lighting for all the actors, but also to motivate light with windows or practicals and allow some portions of the frame to go a bit dark. He also brought down the overall illumination from about 400 footcandles to about 30, which required that he open up the iris to around T2.8, rather than the standard T5.6. “Some video controllers wouldn’t work with me,” Dibie remembers. “They said the pictures were dirty because you could see some noise.” But he and Arnold liked the “noise” and didn’t want their series to have the crispness of a game show. Their tenacity and daring result set the stage for how TV looks today; not simply washed-out and flat, but expressive and in sync with the characters portrayed and stories being told. Dibie shot Barney Miller for seven years and remained one of the top cinematographers in multi-camera television for decades — using contrast and color to vary the looks of his shows to reflect the stories, rather than setting a single look for a space. In doing this, he helped redefine what could be done with the multi-camera format, ultimately redefining video itself. DV dv march 2008 23 http://www.dv.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Digital Video - March 2008

Digital Video - March 2008 Contents DV Update Q&A Fest Circuit Instant Expert LP-Micro Light Fusion F2 Drive PPFP-3N Bag Ego Digital Imaging Light KE-79CC Boom & Fuzzy Close-Up: Honoring George Spiro Dibie, ASC Food Fight Key Thoughts on Chroma key DV101 Dynamic Duos First Look: A Big Serve Cameras & Courtrooms Ad Index Production Diary

Digital Video - March 2008

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