Story, Story, Story
If there was one singular idea, one key ingredient to being a great op, one unquestionable skill that anyone wanting to be an operator needs to know, it's this:
Know the story.
You are a storyteller–not a person who points a camera.
Every member of the set is a storyteller. The props folks are storytellers, the dolly grip is a storyteller, the wardrobe folks are storytellers, and the makeup artists are storytellers. We each have our little pieces of the pie that we obsess about, but in the end, the reason we obsess is because we are augmenting the story that is being told, making it better.
As a camera operator, I often ask myself What is the best way to tell this story? And as we continue to hone and craft and mold the shot, I continually make sure that it is not becoming ‘about’ the shot (which then takes away from the story). I often engage my dolly grip and AC in this as well as sometimes we lose sight of what we are doing. There is nothing worse to me than a shot that comes up in a film where you are suddenly aware of what the camera is doing–“Hey, that shot is still going and they went underwater.” Guess what. I just got taken out of the movie and as a result, the story was not being told. More so, the camera op, and potentially others, did not do their job.
Everyone likes to do cool shots, but in the end, if the shot doesn’t serve the story, it's not the right shot. I will often try and judge that, and if I feel it’s not the right idea, I won't pitch it. (But I will tuck it away in my back pocket for use another day.)
The key to knowing the story is reading the script. Read it during prep, read it every weekend while you shoot. Read every scene you are shooting the night before and read your sides on set before each scene. If you know the script inside and out, you will know the story. If you know the story, the shots–the way you frame things, the way you move the camera, where you put the camera–will become clear. The other thing that will happen is that you will have an innate sense of not only how you are shooting something but why you are shooting it that way. In addition, you will know what pieces of the story are important, what you need to visually emphasize, and what connects to what–without even thinking about it.
While the concept of telling a story as an op is clearly going to involve framing and camera movement, it can also be much more esoteric than that and can take you places that really aren’t a textbook part of being an operator.
I was part of the team shooting a very high concept pilot years ago that revolved around a late night sketch show. The show runner/director was a good friend and we had worked together for years. The stage that had been built was absolutely amazing and a good deal of the show took place behind the scenes of the show, backstage, as it were. In my early conversations with the director, before we started shooting, I asked him about the space because it seemed like it was a character as much as the actors themselves. He mentioned that the idea was that it was an old 1930s theater that had fallen on hard times and had been revived in the 1970s as a studio for the show. He pointed out the amazing details the designer had created like tons of cables running around tracks in the ceiling (because an old theater would never have had the infrastructure that a show like this needed), and chunks of the concrete walls and ceiling that were gouged out from moving scenery. Just a great space that totally told the story.
We were at the end of the first week. The first few days of production had all been out on the floor, the part of the stage where the fictional show is shot, and we hadn’t shot in the backstage area yet. The director, DP and I took a walk back there before lunch to talk about the day's work ahead of us and scope things out a bit. As we were walking, I was commenting on how incredible the detail was that had been put into the stage. The director said he agreed and sort of trailed off. I’d worked with him long enough to know that this was a sign that he was trying to figure out a problem. “What’s wrong?” I asked.
“I love this space, and I’ve loved it since they built it, but there’s something missing and I can’t figure out what it is.” We all talked about it for a bit and the DP said, “Historically, in the show, what was this area used for?” The director said that it was a passage way for all of the behind the scenes goings on and, also, it was where the musical guests hung out before they went onstage. As if a lightbulb went off we all looked at each other at exactly the same moment and I said, “If you are cool with it, let me grab every colored marker we can find, and when we come back from lunch let’s announce to the crew that they need to graffiti this area up with anything they want, no logos or legal things, so it looks like 30 years of drunk, bored, rock and rollers have been hanging waiting to go on. We can have the art department come in and age everything down and I think it will be what you want.”
And that’s just what we did. The director checked with the production designer, who agreed, and 30 minutes after lunch, every square inch was covered not only with graffiti, but with graffiti over graffiti. Our standby painter came in and aged everything down, and within 30 minutes to an hour, the entire place aged 40 years. My favorite was the PA who laid down on the floor like a dead person and they drew an outline around his body in the middle of the walkway. So great. It was one of the cooler things I’ve been a part of and it all happened because we discussed the story of the place.
Storytelling can come from anywhere, from anyone, and at any moment, the key is knowing what story you are trying to tell and keeping your eyes open to make sure you don’t miss those opportunities.
