Jack Cardiff: Fake Snow

From the article, Jack Cardiff's VistaVision Venture by Derek Hill, American Cinematographer, December 1956

"My experience in shooting 'Scott of the Antarctic' proved highly valuable when it came to shooting many of the scenes staged in the snow and snow storms," said Cardiff. "I'd become familiar enough with various snow scenes to be able to recreate the effects I wanted. But sometimes I was just lucky with the location. When we shot on the banks of the Arno river, for instance, there was a slight fog which offered wonderful pictorial possibilities. But we also had to create snow and winter aspects for some of the scenes. Actually, a large proportion of the film was shot during the height of the Italian summer, when almost every Roman desserts the capital to escape the relentless heat. To photograph an important winter scene at this time, it became necessary to scatter powdered plaster over a square-mile location site to give it the appearance of frost."

"In August," Cardiff continued, "we couldn't get the Cine Cita stage space we wanted, as Metro-Goldwyn Mayer had booked it for its production of 'Ben Hur,' which had not yet even been started. So we were obliged to take space in a tiny studio across the road. It was so small that our one set came to within a foot of the walls on every side. Luckily, fire restrictions in Rome are less severe than in Britain."

"By this time we'd lit this set, the temperature was practically bursting the thermometer. And on top of this, the interiors we were shooting were supposed to be mid-winter scenes in which members of the cast had to wear fur coats and appear to shiver in the cold! The floor was literally soaked with perspiration before we began rehearsals."

In all the 'exterior' snow scenes which were actually shot in the studio, Cardiff used a panel of glass, sprayed white, plus a pale green filter before the lens in order to impart a slight mist effect to the scenes. One sequence in the picture, which has attracted much praise for its photographic excellence, is the action of the duel in the snow. Many expert photographers have unqualifiedly declared these scenes actual exteriors. The fact is however that they were shot on Stage 5 at Rome's Cine Citta studio. To achieve the very real effect of dusk on a wintry night, Cardiff used a glass before the camera with sky painted on the upper portion, as the wide-angle lens used in covering the great sweep of the set took in too much vertically.

Though this is a technique which Cardiff has used before, it was new to the Italian technicians, who were rather dubious about the outcome. For a sun effect in the same sequence, Cardiff employed an original trick of directing a lamp onto the sky area of the painted glass mounted before the camera lens. A combination of colored filters plus a fog filter gave Cardiff the effect he sought, and resulted in one of the most talked about scenes in the film.

James Wong Howe: Happy Accident

From "The Outrage"-Off-beat Photography Is One Of Its Virtues by Herb A. Lightman, American Cinematographer, April 1964:

A happy accident occurring on the set led to an effect which turned out to be valuable in conveying this feeling of excessive desert heat. Because it was impossible to mount the required filters on the camera for one scene, Howe's assistant held three of them in front of the lens. After a while his hand became tired and he could no longer hold them steady, and the quivering of his hand resulted in a shimmering refraction that produced an illusion of pulsating heat waves-- an effect that was readily incorporated into the style of the photography.

Sadly this effect is not seen in the trailer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zt9xrEjQZPg
^ If the story seems familiar, look no further than the classic film Rashomon directed by the legendary Akira Kurosawa.

Owen Roizman: SFX Words Appear on Skin

From American Cinematographer, Demonic Convergence by David E. Williams (August 2008)

One particular special makeup effect relied on a simple camera trick. After opening Regan’s nightshirt, Karras is shocked to see the words "Help Me" appear as raised letters on her heaving stomach. Roizman reveals that the girl’s belly was actually a foam latex prosthetic; prior to shooting, a reactive chemical was painted onto it to create the raised letters. With his camera running in reverse, the cinematographer shot a close-up on the two words, which gradually receded as the chemical evaporated. When the footage was cut into the final film, the plea seemed to mysteriously arise from the girl’s flesh.

Joe Viskocil: Fire, Explosions & Miniatures

From American Cinematographer, Tearing up the Town by Ron Magid (December 1998)

"Originally, [ID4's visual effects supervisor] Volker Engle wanted to do teh Wall of Fire with a cloud tank effect coming toward camera, which looked good but not real. [Director] Roland Emmerich was adamant about having a tidal wave of fire going down the city blocks. I said, 'The only way that fire is going to do that is if we fudge the set.' Fire has only one way to go, and that's up. So we locked the camera onto the ceiling and just tipped the street set sideways so this fireball would come right at the camera."

- Joe Viskocil, Miniature Special Effects Supervisor on Godzilla


"If it's really flimsy, you're going to get a lot more information on film, because you can use a small charge-- small in the sense that it's not a really fast explosion. The slower the explosion, the more information you're going to get on film and the more detail you're going to see. You also have to keep it all in frame!"

- Joe Viskocil, Miniature Special Effects Supervisor on Godzilla