Art Direction for Film and Video Read online

  WISH YOU’D STAYED ON THE FARM?

  Nothing is going according to plan. The 120 gallons of specially mixed paint is the wrong color and the director has decided to shoot the biggest set a week earlier than scheduled. Things work out somehow, and the shoot finally wraps. Don’t be surprised if you have to help unstick the elves. After all, art directors are supposed to know a little bit about everything.

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  The next chapter will take you on a tour of the environment where you will put all the qualities and skills in this chapter to work.

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  THE PRODUCTION ENVIRONMENT

  The television environment presents many challenges to the production designer. Whether the recording medium is film or tape, the designer needs to know how the systems work, how to cope with the limitations, and how to exploit the medium’s advantages. However, what the designer envisions and what the viewer at home or in the theater sees may differ dramatically, even though the design team has carefully controlled the set elements placed on the stage or at a chosen location. This chapter describes what basic physical elements designers work with on the stage, how they work, and the picture limitations.

  LINES AND DOTS

  The amount of fine detail a video camera shows is more limited than the amount a film camera can show. The American video system uses 525 lines of picture information, compared to most of European video, which shows 625 lines; however, motion picture film contains millions of grains of picture information in each frame and can present a very large picture with much detail.

  A clumsily attached doorknob plate is about 2 inches wide on the face of a television screen, but can be 8 feet in diameter on a 30-foot-wide motion picture screen. Designers should never allow sloppy craftsmanship to slip by because it’s just for television – they should demand the maximum quality that time and budget allow. What if the director decides to use a very tight closeup of a badly fastened doorknob plate?

  DIFFERENT PERCEPTIONS

  Home receiver adjustment is a major video variable. We have all entered someone’s living room when the television set is on. We think: How can they watch such an unrealistic picture in exaggerated colors? Well, they must prefer hot color and low contrast. We have no control over individual taste.

  As designers, we must remember that colors usually appear more saturated and brighter to the camera than to our eyes. A guiding rule is to choose paint tones that are a step down in saturation from the color you want perceived on the screen.

  HOW DOES THE VIDEO PICTURE GET FROM HERE TO THERE?

  The following list describes the way a picture goes through many systems that alter or transform the original source.

  • The camera lens focuses light reflected from the set onto the face of a picture tube or digital sensor.

  • The picture tube or chips translate the light-dark values and color variations into electronic information sent to camera control equipment.

  • The mixer assembles videotape, digital disk, and live camera information into a signal that can be broadcast or recorded.

  • The electronic information goes via cable or microwave transmission to a transmitter, where it is transformed into a signal broadcast to a satellite receiver, cable system microwave dish, or home receiver.

  BOLD IS BEST

  Look at some wallpaper books. When you leaf through the samples, your eyes are just a few inches away from the color and form. Walk across the room and look at the same sample again. Does the color read as a definite color, or does it turn into an indefinable tone? Does the pattern come across or does it become a mushy texture? When choosing colors, textures, and forms, select the definite statements that tell their stories at a glance. Remember how far they have to go.

  Now that we have seen some of the system’s limitations, and how video pictures get from here to there, let’s get acquainted with the environment in which our sets will stand.

  THE PRODUCTION STAGE

  The production’s stage home is a barnlike building containing a lot of empty space. Stages come in many sizes, shapes, and locations, the choice of which depends on the production’s needs. If the producer works on a lot with many stages, the production is assigned an available stage. An independent producer shops around for space on lots that offer rental stages. Ideally, the producer consults the art director when reserving stage space. If this does not happen, the art director frequently has to fit the sets into a space that is too small.

  A Sound Idea

  Soundstages are quiet, peaceful places when empty. Thick sound-absorbent padding covers the walls and ceiling to keep out unwanted sounds. While filming or taping is in progress, warning bells ring and lights flash outside the stage doors.

  Did You Pay the Light Bill?

  The lighting designer needs an adequate supply of electricity, places to hang the lights, and a control system. One way to ensure good lighting is to use the traditional motion picture system – suspended platforms above the sets with lighting instruments secured to the hanging platforms. Lights on stands clutter the stage floor, but lighting people frequently use them to supplement the overhead lighting.

  Another way, more commonly used for video production in which the cameras need to move freely about the floor, is to hang the lights from a permanently installed grid of pipes suspended from the stage ceiling. The lighting technicians use ladders to take the lights to the grid where they are fastened.

  A convenient system is to use pipes suspended by cables from pulleys fastened to the stage ceiling. The lines pass over the pulley wheels to the stage walls, where they are attached to a counterweight system that allows the pipes to be lowered to a few feet off the floor. The lights are fastened to the pipes – a much more convenient system that eliminates ladder climbing. The light-bearing pipes can then be raised to their working height above the set.

  The Stage Floor

  Stages have different floor surfaces. Some have rough wood which the art director has to cover with plywood or composition material. Stages used primarily for video work have polished vinyl floors that blend smoothly into the cyclorama, a vertical surface made of plaster, wood, or cloth. To create a horizonless effect, the cyclorama – or eye for short – commonly matches the color of the floor.

  Lighting technicians can bathe the floor and eye with colored light and projections, and scenic artists can paint the floor and eye with color and patterns. Many large studios have stages devoted to outdoor scenes, complete with dirt, trees, rocks, and shrubbery.

  THE ALL-SEEING EYE (ALMOST)

  Video cameras convert light energy into electrical energy and film cameras cause chemical changes in film emulsions, but cameras don’t see the same angles our eyes do. Our eyes take in a wide angle of vision. Cameras see a much more limited field, even in wide-screen formats.

  Aspect ratio is the proportion of the picture – the relationship of height to width. The television picture aspect ratio is 1.33:1, that is, one and thirty-three hundredths units wide to one unit high. Theatrical motion picture film formats take in a wider, more horizontal field of vision, commonly a ratio of 2.35:1. Art directors need to adjust designs to the field taken in by the camera.

  Remember Close-ups and Wide Shots

  To get a sense of how much of the world a camera eye sees, cut a 3" x 4" horizontal hole in a piece of cardboard. Hold it in front of one eye and observe your surroundings. Notice how your attention is drawn to one small area at a time and how the pictures become a series of compositions. You are not, of course, aware of the whole room or landscape, just a small portion. No matter how lavish your set may be when seen as a whole, don’t forget the small areas in your $1 million set, or you may get $1.98 close-ups.

  Most camera lenses make what they see appear larger than it does to the eye. Usually, designers make a set more compact for the camera than they would for a home interior to be lived in. If the room were designed to be made life-size, it might look like a civic auditorium to the camera.

 
The Eye with Blinders

  Cameras play tricks on us sometimes as they look at small areas of a set. Watch for the crooked picture, the potted plant that seems to grow out of an actor’s head, or the high-backed chair that makes an actor appear to have sprouted wings. While you as art director stand around the set waiting for the coffee break, look at the camera monitor when the director lines up close-ups; this is the perfect time to move that plant.

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  Now that you know where your work is going to be housed and what the camera may see, we’ll look at the basic elements of set construction.

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  SCENIC BUILDING BLOCKS

  As we saw earlier, pioneering movie producers relied heavily on theatrical tradition, adapting plays and staging techniques to the new film medium. Film and video set designers built on traditional methods as well, adding more sophisticated materials and techniques as they became available.

  TYPES OF FLATS AND MATERIALS

  Softwall Flats

  In the traditional theater, where lightweight, easily transportable scenery is an asset, the basic flat, or wall surface, is a wood framework covered with stretched, painted fabric. This method of construction evolved through centuries of use and is ideal for theatrical purposes. Under a theatrical stage’s controlled conditions where the audience is a distance away from the scenery, painting and construction can be bold and lack detail.

  Early television production followed traditional construction and painting techniques in the same way that motion pictures did. Early technical equipment allowed little transmitted detail, so stage techniques served the purpose. Contemporary stage, video, and film setting construction, however, uses metal and new synthetic materials as the character of production changes and technical skill improves. The traditional softwall flat lives on in motion picture and video for ceilings and painted backings, where rigidity and durability don’t count.

  Hardwall Flats

  Durable hardwall flats can be used over and over with many surface changes. Carpenters can remove the existing skin and replace it or cover it with new plywood, masonite, composition board, or vacuum-formed plastic sheeting. Hardwalls also provide sturdy surfaces for fastening light fixtures, picture hooks, and shelving.

  Basic hardwall flats are made of a framework of 1" x 3" wood set on edge. Lumber sizes are named by the measurements of the rough wood before it is planed down to smooth surfaces. The 1" x 3" dimensions become ¾" x 2½" after the wood is finished. The so-called 1 x 3 is set on edge and made into a grid, each square measuring 24” x 24” on the centers of the lumber thickness. A skin, or covering of plywood or composition board, is nailed and glued to one side of the framework. Standard widths range from 12 inches to 8 feet and heights range from 6 feet to 14 feet.

  PLATFORMS

  Designers use platforms to create floor level changes. Platforms traditionally are made of wood, but they can be metal framed for extra durability and covered with appropriate materials such as plywood, carpet, and vinyl sheeting.

  Plywood sheets form platform tops, which are usually set on folding frames called parallels, hinged at the corners to fold for storage. Standard sizes begin at 4′ x 4′ and go up to 4′ x 10′. Parallel base heights commonly begin at 6" and go up in 6 inch progressions to 4′. Standard sizes, based on 4′ x 8′ material sheets, provide flexibility and cost-effective advantages. Practical designers combine standard sizes to form raised areas. Nonstandard platform construction escalates set costs, but cannot be avoided in many designs.

  MATERIALLY SPEAKING

  Today’s designers have a constantly changing palette of materials, compared to earlier times when paint, canvas, and wood were the limit. Vacuum-formed plastic sheets can reproduce nearly any form or texture, and look convincing when applied to flats and expertly painted. Vacuum-form shops publish catalogs of sheets depicting commonly used surfaces such as brick, shingles, and wood planking.

  Vinyl materials can give a dazzling look to sets. Many designers design with light to bring out the reflective qualities of new materials, and appreciate the lightweight plastic sheet compared to the former plaster-and-excelsior method of presenting brick and stone.

  BACKINGS

  Designers use large painted muslin cloth areas to present scenery that does not need to be built. Commonly called backdrops, backings can be huge, covering the walls of entire soundstages, or small enough to cover open doors or windows.

  Scenic artists paint backings from designs presented by the art director or production designer. Backings can be 30 feet high and hundreds of feet long, so scenic studios have paint frames on which they fasten cloth material that can be raised and lowered for the artists standing on scaffolds or the shop floor, if it has a well into which the material can be lowered.

  Backings that hang in a straight, horizontal line roll up on wood battens fastened to the top and bottom. Large soundstage backings, which curve around the walls, are usually painted in place by artists working with spray painting equipment.

  The Difference Between Day and Night

  Some backings depict both day and night and are lit from the back or from the front. In the case of a painted city scene, for example, the daytime appearance is seen by reflected light off opaque painting on the cloth material. For the night effect, the building windows, signs, and a portion of the sky are painted with translucent dyes or paint; when lit from behind, they give a nighttime look.

  Some backings are giant strips of photographic positive film. Translucent film stock lends itself to night scenes and is lit from behind, giving a particularly realistic depiction of night lighting. Backing rental houses offer a wide variety of choices.

  Moving Backings

  Early movie makers had to rely on backings, built like giant roller towels on their sides, to depict moving scenery behind a prop horse, automobile, or train. As techniques improved, they projected motion picture film on a translucent screen to give the illusion of traveling or moving.

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  Not all scenery is made of wood, canvas, and paint Some settings exist only in digital form, as you will see in the next chapter.

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  PRODUCTION DESIGNERS USE SPECIAL EFFECTS

  With the explosive development of digital technology, many of today’s films rely on dazzling effects rather than compelling stories. In this chapter we will see an overview of effects developed from the beginnings of filmmaking, see what technology offers today, and hear from some production designers who use special effects. As visual consultant Bruce Block says, “It’s important that special effects be seamless – that they not draw attention to themselves, and that they support the story.”

  Production designers can choose to use a special effect for several reasons: cost, safety, or fantasy effect. Colin Irwin, production designer on feature films and television series, reminds us about a safety consideration.

  On Alien Nation we had a final climactic effect that took place in a steel mill. The director wanted the actors on a giant crane way up in the air. There were lots of holes to fall through—a dangerous situation. To solve the problem, we took still shots of the crane and went onto the soundstage with a blue backing and floor and matted the actors into the still shot with optical and lab work.

  For a fantasy film, Irwin designed a new world: “I was working with an illustrator doing mountains and we turned the sketch upside down as a background for a platform we built for the actors, a cost-effective solution for a fantasy situation.”

  IN-CAMERA EFFECTS

  Special effects are not a contemporary phenomenon. Many early filmmakers began experimenting with them. In 1896, Frenchman George Méliés saw that film manipulation could present astonishing results. He made a short film featuring a woman who was there on the screen one minute and gone the next! Méliés first photographed the woman in the room setting, stopped the camera, had the woman leave, and started the camera again on the empty room. When he processed and projected the film, voila! – the woman was there an
d then she wasn’t. Of course, he called his film The Disappearing Woman.

  Frame by Frame

  Filmmakers found that they could photograph objects one frame at a time and by moving the subject slightly between each frame, give the appearance of continuous movement. King Kong, the 1933 film featuring the famous giant gorilla, used this technique for dramatic effect by single-framing doll-size gorilla and human figures in exterior miniature sets and in front of pictures projected through a translucent background. A later version of the same story used large mechanically operated gorilla figures, and another gorilla film is in production with no physical models at all – the gorilla is computer generated.

  Overcranking and Undercranking

  To give the effect of speeded-up and slowed-down action, the operator can run the film slower or faster through the camera. Older films, shot at silent speed, have a comic appearance because the film moves faster through sound speed projectors. Special lenses and filters offer another means of altering straight photography.

  ¼” scale model made of plastic snow and model supplies

  MINIATURES

  Miniature settings have important advantages – lower production costs and control over weather and lighting – compared to building a full-size set or shooting on location. Skillfully made and photographed miniature settings are undetectable by most audiences. By carefully calculating perspective and dimensions, effects artists can also create hanging miniatures – portions of the upper parts of sets – which they place in front of the camera.