I personally am not a fan of the camera technique, especially now that is so much of a cliche. It can look ok when done properly, such as in Children of Men, or it can be horrible such as in the most recent Bourne movie.
BSG is somewhere in between. I don't understand the purpose of the technique in most scenes. "As if a cameraman were actually there..." In a dream sequence? That drives me nuts more than anywhere else. With all of BSGs visions, dreams and prophecies, they could certainly knock it off with the hand cams. In fact, it might be a better choice, to create some kind of visual juxtaposition there. They already try to produce that effect with the lighting and colors, the camera work would just be the finishing touch.
All in all, it reminds me of Michael Bay's philosophy that the camera should never stop moving. This is just the inexpensive way of doing it, rather than Michael Bays costly camera rigs.
I'm personally ok with the occasional smooth pan during a short scene, or god forbid, static shots. Especially where it is more appropriate for the camera to be held steady. Such as when the camera man doesn't have to move. When you watch a documentary, the camera doesn't really shake that much after the camera man has picked his angle. In BSG, and other shows, the camera dips and bobs constantly even when focusing in on a single angle.
Only someone with some serious jitters couldn't hold a camera still when standing still, shooting one angle, never moving the camera. It's pure and simple "the camera can never stop" philosophy.
Where Children of Men got it right in their documentary style, was that it actually looked like someone was trying to film the action, rather than trying to avoid it. The camera work never drew attention to itself. When the camera man picked a shot, and filmed it, he held the camera still. When the camera man was running, the camera shook. When he was in a car getting rocked, the camera rocked. There wasn't any 'lets give the camera to rummy here and see how steady his hands are'.
For the record though, the camera work in the SFX shots in BSG have been done in that same style before. If you watch the miniseries a piece of debris actually hits the 'camera' and pushes it away from the action.
You also see the camera vibrate when the Galactica fires its guns, as if the camera were mounted on the ship. This isn't anything new.
This isn't even anything new about SciFi, or television in general. Most television shows have terrible camera work. Only movies have the time to sit there and work with expensive rigs and re-shoot scenes because of a little jitter. This style is often something born out of restrictions on time, location and money, not artistic choices.
Lost is a perfect example. They film on the sand and in dense foliage. There wouldn't be time to set up a tripod or a gimbal/crane and still get episodes out on time, and on budget. You can actually see the difference in the quality of photography when watching what takes place in the wilderness scenes compared to the ones that take place in civilization.
BSG chooses to do this though, and emphasizes it. Perhaps it is just RDM's experience with Star Trek, that uses mostly sets, and almost no real locations, so the cameras are all static, like on a soap opera. Most shows have moved away from this over a decade ago, and have looked like BSG (although not as shakey as BSG) for a very long time.
reply
share
senor_coconuts
16 years ago
A lot of your are missing the whole point.
It's not done to create a documentary or "the camera person is really there" effect...
It's done to mimic the natural visual response you would have. The way YOU would see something.
You don't just stand perfectly still and slowly pan your vision around. It jumps and moves as you go from visual cue to visual cue.
Also, we generally call it "free shooting" or "Shoulder shots" (as in the camera is just resting on your shoulder).
reply
share
steve7614
16 years ago
ALSO - - isn't it supposed to go unoticed? If this were a true art instead of something that annoyed the viewer you would see less complaints about it.
Your eyes will do the "moving around" on their own. I don't bob up and down with binoculars zomming in/out while looking out of the window to get a sensation of it being more real.
I just find it lame. Some guy thought of it, everyone else jumped on the bandwagon.
reply
share