American Cinematographer - October 2019 - 14

SHOT CRAFT

By Jay Holben

In this still from The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945), the arrow above actor George
Sanders' head points out the use of a gobo known as a Stradling Wheel, named for the
film's cinematographer, Harry Stradling Sr., ASC.

The Dark Side
In the spirit of the spooky season, it's time to talk about
the things that lurk in the dark - or rather the things that
create the darkness and shadows. The art of lighting, in my
opinion, is more often than not about placing shadows rather
than placing light. It is the shadow, more so than the light, that
defines the shape and texture of your subject. It is the shadow
that adds dimension and depth to the subject, or to the entire
scene. When the world is white and fully lit, it can feel dimensionless and flat. Shadows bring the third dimension into the
image, and tell our eyes and brains about the shape of a subject.
In the fine-art world, there's a term for this interplay
between light and shadow: chiaroscuro, which is defined by
Merriam-Webster as the "pictorial representation in terms of
light and shade without regard to color."
In a recent post on the AC Instagram feed, I talked about
my personal study of the great master painters Michelangelo
Merisi da Caravaggio (1571-1610) and Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn (1606-1669), and lessons that can be learned
from how light is rendered in their work. Both of these virtuosos
used shadow brilliantly, and finessed their light sources to offer
the perfect angle and quality needed for their imagery. I also
mentioned similar work from Hendrick Terbrugghen (15881629) and Gerrit van Honthorst (1592-1656). The discussion
that followed on Instagram also brought up Johannes Vermeer
(1632-1675), among others.
All of these artists painted hyper-real imagery and had
masterful chiaroscuro. A deep study of their work is a wonderful
way to inform your own lighting choices. There's even some
October 2019

The Gobo
While many crewmembers may know "gobo" in regard
to the circular "gobo head" at the end of the ubiquitous C-stand
and its extension arm, not all crew know that the term comes
from what the head is supposed to hold - a gobo or "gobetween" - and not the head itself! A gobo, by definition, is
any object that casts a shadow when placed in the path of a
light. This is a moderately vague definition and it covers a lot of
territory. A gobo is an opaque or black object (cloth, plywood,
foamcore, metal, cardboard, etc.) used to cut off light and/or to
hide lights or cameras. Thus, technically speaking, a flag or
cutter is a gobo, and so is a set of venetian blinds placed in front
of a light source to create a shadow pattern on the wall. If you
put a tree branch in front of the light, it becomes a gobo.
With certain fixtures, namely ellipsoidal reflector spotlights, you can place a small metal cutout pattern into the light
fixture, and it will project out the light/shadow defined by that
pattern. Those small metal cutouts are most often what is being
referred to when using the term "gobo."

ASC 100th Anniversary

Photos courtesy of Jay Holben. Illustrations by Daniel DeFabio.

argument that some of these master painters used camera
obscura or lens projection to paint their images - compelling
evidence can be found in David Hockney's Secret Knowledge:
Rediscovering the Lost Techniques of the Old Masters and Philip
Steadman's Vermeer's Camera: Uncovering the Truth Behind
the Masterpieces, as well as Penn and Teller's documentary
Tim's Vermeer. If these theories are true, then these paintings,
in essence, are our first photographic imagery.
Creating shadows isn't always about where you place the
light; sometimes it's about how you cut the light off of subjects
and parts of your scene. This month I'd like to concentrate on
discussing many of these types of light-shaping tools.

American Cinematographer - October 2019

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of American Cinematographer - October 2019