Quotes About Cinematography

My favorite way of making films - and what has allowed me to get key scenes in 'Cartel Land' and 'City of Ghosts' - has been when I've been able to operate alone.

Part of the reason why I love to operate is because I find that so much of what we do is instinctual. It's dancing with the actors and responding to their body language, and you feel what the right place for the camera is at any given moment.

Yes, if I had it my way I would do all the shots myself - I used to do that when I was just a cameraman, an operator - but there's no way; you can't do that anymore.

I think from an early age I was aware of how a camera can tell a story, how a movie camera can affect how the narrative is told.

The camerawork might be shaky, the plot might have holes, the audience might not even know what the film is about, but if your actors are compelling you can still keep people in their seats.

Everything a director does must help the story and the performances. Otherwise, it is useless.

McQueen is an astonishing film maker. He uses really unusual shots and builds incredible dramatic tension.

That is always really fun when you get to work with a director you understand and uses references you can identify with.

My cameraman and I devised a method, which we started using from my second film, which applies mainly to day scenes shot in the studio, where we used bounced light instead of direct light. We agreed with this thing of four or five shadows following the actors is dreadful.

I was at the National Film School and was a cinematographer there. I got quite a lot of experience on documentary film-making and with directors who were interesting - maybe they weren't using scripts or were using non-actors.

I always loved Japanese movies. And they had an enormous impact in France - the Nouvelle Vague took so much from them. It taught us how the camera was placed in the centre of the action.

I work primarily for the camera-it's not something I really talk about a lot, but it's part of the way I am as a movie actor. The camera is my girl, as it were.

If the guy behind the camera is not good, the pictures are bad. It's still you, and it's the same lines and everything, but it doesn't work.

In my films that I've directed, and my work in commercials and videos, I've rarely used handheld. It's just not something I'm drawn to, but I've seen it done very well.

A lot of movies try to set up a world with cool sets, costumes, camera work. In Brick, the world is born from the words.

Sometimes I want to work with a DP, sometimes I want to work myself. I go to 35mm, 16mm, it's all the same, but it depends on what you want to tell and what are the tools you need.

I would love to work with Adam Sandler. Because then all I'd have to do is just turn the camera on and off.

Kissing in the movies is a real art - figuring out where to put your heads so it looks good on camera. I have had other co-stars who couldn't work that out, which made it a lot harder for me.

I think digital. I think digital and I was terrified about it for a long time. But I think digital because it gives so much more freedom to work with the actors.

I think I have much more appreciation for directing and movies overall versus a performance or an actor. Their body of work is more interesting.

Guillermo del Toro. He's in his pure artist's stroke. He's just hitting it out of the park. I would go anywhere to work with him. He's a real artist.

3D doesn't work quite so well with quick cuts and I probably would have done some longer takes had I really taken that information onboard.

I never storyboard. I hate it. I don't understand why so many directors want to make comic strips of their films.

The body moves through space every day, and in architecture in cities that can be orchestrated. Not in a dictatorial fashion, but in a way of creating options, open-ended sort of personal itineraries within a building. And I see that as akin to cinematography or choreography, where episodic movement, episodic moments, occur in dance and film.