American Cinematographer - May 1992 - 49

Bale and the
rest of the

kick up

boys
their

heels.

with the camera has been
short of brilliant."

nothing

Laszlo enthused about
new

a

piece of equipment he

was
able to utilize on several key scenes.
"We've had an opportunity on this
picture to use a device called the
Technocrane. Essentially it's a re¬
motely operated camera on a crane,
but it also has a jib arm that lets it

telescope in and out. It's operated
a
joystick and it doesn't re¬
quire tracks. It can go around the
statue in our park set, for instance,
from

which

we

could

never

have done

without major construction for
tracks. This rig has it all over any of
the others I've used, but at this time
there's only one of them in the
United States. After the experiment
that we did we found out particu¬

larly what it could do for dance."
Ortega added, "We had it
for a couple of weeks and it was
incredible. It's given a different look
to the picture. But you have to
know how to use it, and Jeffrey
proved to be a real virtuoso with it."
The Technocrane was in¬
vented in Germany by Horst
Borbulla and Gyula Mester and six
of the machines have been built by
an

Cameras, Ltd. One-and only one
was
brought to Hollywood in

-

English company, Technovision

March
1990
by a former
Techno vision technician, 26-yearold Simon Jayes, who first operated
it on a number of commercials and
music videos. It has now been used
to

notable effect in several recent

features, the first being in concert
and courtroom scenes of The Doors.

Stephen Goldblatt, ASC
utilized it to great advantage in For

the Boys. Robert Richardson found
it invaluable for a variety of scenes
in the courtroom sequences of JFK.
It also provided some of the un¬
usual points of view evident in The
Fisher King.
The lighting level on the

stage seemed remarkably low, even
for a night effect. Today's lenses
and film stocks have effectively
written finis

to the days when hot,
blinding lights made sound stages

virtually intolerable.
"For the interior work and
for night exteriors we use
Eastman's 5296 emulsion, and for
the exterior day work we use the 97

and the 48," Laszlo said. "I find that
even
came

though the 97, when it first
out, was thought to be

somewhat different

May 1992

as

far

as

the

tonal qualities were
a

concerned, it's
great emulsion. It's a lot more

forgiving, in

my opinion, than
of the other emulsions, in that
we can mix all kinds of
lighting
with daylight and it will give good
results. I found in particular that
because of the filtration that we're
some

giving this picture in order to help
the 'period look,' the tonality of the
97 is a plus rather than a hindrance.
"The 48 of course is mar¬
velous when we get out there on
the backlot and find that the sun is

burning. With 97 we'd be shooting
in the high T-stops and loading it
down with neutral density filters
on
top of the three pieces of glass
that are already in front of the lens."
Later, during a break,
Laszlo showed us an interior on the

stage in which he would be
photographing a sequence the next
day. "This room supposedly be¬
longs to a young man who is an ace
war
correspondent who partici¬
pated in Teddy Roosevelt's cam¬
paign at San Juan Hill. He comes
upon the kids starting the strike
action, finds out what's going on
and takes up their cause. He helps
same

them win the strike but loses his
own

job. This is where he lives. The

American

Cinematographer

47
American Cinematographer - May 1992

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