- Cinematography is--
I sound really bored or sleepy or something, don't I?
I think it's the Quaaludes.
[board clicks] [camera beeps]
Hello, I'm Tom Sigel,
and I've been a cinematographer for the past 40 years.
Today, I'm going to be focusing on how filmmakers
achieve the desired mood as it relates to lens choices.
For instance, what's the difference between
a wide lens, a normal lens, and a telephoto lens?
You may have noticed some changes just then.
At the moment, we're on a very long lens.
The camera is very far.
Now, let's take a look again.
Do I look different as we change focal lengths?
You may not notice a huge difference now,
but just hold on 'cause we're getting there.
I should start by mentioning that
the visual power of any given shot or scene
is determined by three principle factors:
composition, lighting, and camera movement.
Lens choice impacts each one of these.
We describe lenses in terms
of something called focal length.
But hold on, don't move.
[upbeat music]
Okay, so when light rays pass through a lens,
they converge to form a picture,
on what we call the image plane.
That could be film, it could be a digital sensor.
This is how every image you see on a screen is born.
The distance between the optical center of that lens
and the image plane is called focal length,
and it's usually expressed in millimeters.
So here's one way to think about it.
The longer the focal length,
the more narrow your angle of view.
The shorter the focal length,
the wider your angle of view.
The longer the focal length, the shorter the focal length,
the more narrow your angle of view.
The wider your angle of view.
It'll make more sense in a bit,
but for now, let's talk about this angle of view thing.
When you have just one subject, like me,
against a blank background like this,
it's hard to see the difference.
So we're going to need some set dressing here
to understand angle of view.
It's often mixed up with field of view.
It's not exactly the same thing.
Our choice of lens will not only affect the way I look,
but also how much of the world you see behind me
and how much you see in front.
Remember, the telephoto lens, which we're in now,
has a narrow field of view.
So you don't see a whole lot behind me.
But back in the wide lens, I'm the same size,
but you can see much more behind me.
To do that, we've had to move the camera much closer.
So a director may want more background in a shot,
or maybe not, but that's an example
of why lens choice is so important.
And a blah, blah, blah.
[camera beeps]
Let's look at some examples in film
of how these techniques are used.
[static buzzes]
So this a clip from the movie Drive,
directed by Nicolas Winding Refn.
Nicolas likes wide lenses,
and one of the effects that is has in particular
when you have the singles like this
where you only see Oscar and you don't see Ryan,
is it creates a feeling of space between them,
that they're very far apart
and they're not really connecting.
At the same time, the audience feels their proximity.
You know by this lens choice that you're close
to these people, that you're close to those actors.
You can feel it, so it creates a kind of intimacy
between the viewer and the performer,
even though you're not in a big close-up.
A very different feel than if these has been
on long lenses where you feel like you might have been
a third party observer or an objective fly on the wall.
- Why the [beep] do you wanna know who they are?
- This a moment in Drive where we used a telephoto lens
to really create a feeling of alienation.
He's about to make a very radical decision,
and we wanted to give the audience a view of that
from a more objective,
or shall we say voyeuristic, point of view.
So the long lens gives the audience
a feeling of being farther apart,
and the shallow depth of feel
isolates Ryan from the background.
- Could you act in a more professional manner, please?
You're making him crazy.
- This is another example of the use
of a very wide lens in close proximity to the actors.
Once again, it creates a feeling of subjectivity,
and being right into the physical space
where the actors are performing.
One of the interesting things about this sequence
is that the scene following this is actually
done with very long lenses.
- I'm trying to help you out,
and if you play your cards right--
- These shots that you're seeing now are very close.
They're close-ups, and yet they don't have
the same kind of intimacy that a shot has
where the camera is literally inches
from the subject with a wide angle lens.
- So do it right.
- But right now, we're going to talk about the normal lens,
or what some people call the standard lens.
Now, this lens is called normal because typically
it creates a less stylized image,
and what we accept as normal human vision.
- You've changed.
- This is a scene from Bohemian Rhapsody.
It's meant to be a romantic scene.
It's really meant to show how much
these characters love each other.
And it's predominantly done with normal lenses.
The camera is relatively close to the actors,
but not intrusive, and the relationship
between the two of them,
the size of their head in the frame, is fairly similar.
Neither one of them is dominating
or predominating the other,
and you get a very naturalistic feel of a normal lens.
- You're going to do such great things.
- Now, when setting up a shot,
all cinematographers have to ask
how do we want the audience to feel
about the character we're shooting.
Do we want the viewer to like them, empathize with them?
Do we want them to feel uncomfortable, claustrophobic?
Sorry about that.
My point is that different lenses can create
a completely different feel with the very same subject.
- How can we help you?
- This is a scene in Three Kings
where Mark Wahlberg has just been rescued.
And the scene begins with sort of more normal lenses,
even slightly telephoto.
So the space between these characters seems quite close.
The audience feels like they're watching
from the outside looking in a little bit,
and the relationship between foreground
and background tends to be very similar.
There's moments when the character of Nora is wounded,
and when George Clooney goes into action here,
for a moment, we come back to a more subjective,
wide-angle point of view.
We're now starting to get right in there.
We feel like we're right up close to the characters.
We feel like we're in the middle of the action.
- Hey Chief, we need your help.
- Lens choice can also make two people
look right on top of each other or a mile apart.
A wide angle lens will inherently appear
to have more perspective than a telephoto.
For example, the wide angle lens
makes our sound mixer feel a lot farther
from me than she actually is.
But what if we want her to be right in my face?
Let's look at a telephoto version of the same, exact setup.
Notice how with the telephoto lens
it compresses the space between us.
It makes us look closer together.
She's bigger in frame,
but our heads are more the same size,
relative to one another.
And this is what it looks like on a normal lens.
And the distance between the sound recordist
and myself feels a little more natural
and it's a little more true to the actual space.
[funky bass music]
- You gonna be all right.
- Here you see an example with a long lens,
the movement is quite exaggerated,
and now, Mark Wahlberg's going to get hit.
And from this moment on,
the action is going to become very, very subjective.
And this is a good use of an extreme wide angle lens.
The camera is extremely close to the actors.
And you'll notice that as characters leave and enter
the frame that movement is greatly exaggerated.
You really feel Ice Cube leaning in there.
You really feel Clooney coming from afar,
and coming right into the lens.
You really almost feel like it's your point of view.
These were done with a specialty lens
called a Frazier lens which was designed
to make wide angle lenses have an extreme depth of feel
and to be able to get the lens
into a very close proximity to the actors.
This is from Bohemian Rhapsody.
The opening is a big, wide, swooping in,
as you can see, to the stage.
Here you see him taking his moment,
as the band members aren't sure what he's going to do.
The camera continues to come around him,
and we're still in this wide lens.
So as we come around, you can see that
the audience is very far from him.
But now he's beginning to come into his own.
The audience is coming into it.
And by using the dolly zoom,
we're bringing the audience closer and closer and closer.
Freddy's not getting any bigger in the frame,
but the audience is getting closer
simply by changing the focal length of the lens
and the proximity of the camera to the subject.
Hopefully this video has given you some insight
into different lens characteristics,
and how they're going to impact your storytelling.
Give four cinematographers the same lenses,
the same subject matter, and I guarantee you
you'll have four different results.
And that is the beauty of cinema.
[light music]
[camera beeps]
You don't just put any [beep] lens on!
Come on.