Cinematography : What is the most advanced skill you have acquired as a cinematographer? by Lewis Martin Soucy

Lewis Martin Soucy

What is the most advanced skill you have acquired as a cinematographer?

Inevitably, cinematographers have theoretical knowledge of film and practical camera skills. For many, it’s developing a better poor hand-eye coordination or a destructive inner struggle to collaborate with others.

What about you? Reveal your skill level, experience, or highlight the potentially weak areas you faced as a cinematographer. Let's get naked!

Luciano Mello

I could say it was something technical, there is so much that we need to learn and master well to do the job, maybe now I kind master the art of DIY :) but I think the skill that I developed the best was in the area of semiotics, translating ideas, words, and feelings into images, searching for meaning with the cinematographic language is something I enjoy studying to learn as much as I can.

Karen "Kay" Ross

WHEW! I love this question, thanks for asking, Lewis Martin Soucy! I've learned to find the best angle when using practical lighting (always shoot on the shadow side). I also love finding those moments to incorporate movement, especially into an entrance. It's not written into the script, but it elevates the moment.

I love lighting, though, so of the two, I feel like I really LOVE discovering new ways to change the setup first, and think about ways to change up the shot second. I'd love to learn more about color saturation.

Lewis Martin Soucy

Luciano Mello you nailed an excellent one: "semiotics, translating ideas, words, and feelings into images, searching for meaning with the cinematographic language." This is probably what helps directors the most. It's such a challenging couple relationship. I wish cinematographers and directors developed this aptitude more. I've suffered a lot from not being able to get what I wanted when I started. Sometimes from not being able to explain my ideas properly, sometimes from working with someone not getting it.

Lewis Martin Soucy

Yeah, you can never go wrong when you backlight Karen "Kay" Ross and Kyler Boudreau! But I like "shooting on the shadow side" better lol!

Karen "Kay" Ross

What a beautiful description Luciano Mello, I love that! Yeah, Kyler Boudreau I learned that from Full-Time Filmmaker himself LOL! This was one of the videos I used for my students: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZ5hpcn6tIM

Seriously, learning how the camera interprets light versus Cameras or Lighting has been the biggest "AH HA!" of any of my cinematography!

Vital Butinar

I don't know if I would say that I developed any special skills for cinematography but as far as filmmaking in general I've developed a lot of skills in a bunch of different areas from cinematography, editing, sound and even writing.

The funny thing is that among other things I'm a salsa dance instructor and used to be a performer and choreographer. I think that the skills that I picked up as a dancer and instructor are actually the ones that helped me evolve into a better filmmaker because I developed the ability to communicate something to other people in order for them to understand what I wanted and at the same time present things to others in a way to get them to go along with what we were doing.

As far as I'm concerned every skill I learn is beneficial somewhere and I love learning new stuff.

Of course as mentioned above knowing how ti do something yourself or teach yourself a new skill is key when making films.

Just this Friday while shooting a commercial we were laughing with the producer how it's really funny when we disassembled two different display cases to get room to shoot in a clients office and at the same time disassembled a totally different display case just so that we could use a part of it to shoot trough the structure and get a great shot.

Lewis Martin Soucy

Vital Butinar that's such a great example of how any experience is good experience for something else. You never know when you'll expand your skills through something completely unrelated.

Vital Butinar

Lewis Martin Soucy exactly. I always try to look at things that way and the funny thing is that trying different things and knowing about different stuff is something that has helped me a lot in filmmaking and also in other places.

Other topics in Cinematography:

register for stage 32 Register / Log In