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Unit Still Photography


Tim Hall

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I recently sent this e-mail to a group called the Society of Motion Picture Still Photographers or SMPSP, in truth it was sent to the contact address posted on their site. And I never recieved anything in return, to be fair they might be just to busy to answer my questions. Anyway, I thought I would post it here in the hopes that all of you D.P.s and 1st cameramen and other pros could help point me in the right direction. Do any of you know of any Unit Still Photographers that I might be able to talk too?

 

Thanks

 

 

From: Timothy J.Hall <thallca@earthlink.net>

Date: Thu Oct 7, 2004 5:01:08 PM US/Pacific

To: lanicola@aol.com

Subject: Unit Still Photography Information

 

Hello;

I am currently the chief photographer at the Pomerado Newspaper Group (www.mylocalnews.com) located in Poway, CA just north of San Diego. We publish three weekly newspapers plus a monthly magazine. I have, on occasion, had the opportunity to act as the unit still photographer for a number of small independent projects filming in the San Diego area over the past couple of years and it has been a great deal of fun and a lot of hard work. I pretty much just covered them the same why I would cover any other news event which was the only way I could think of to do it. I didn't really know what all the requirements where for the position (still don't), kind of just flown by the seat of my paints thing.

 

My problem is I cannot find very much information, in print or on the internet, about this position. There seems to be tons of information out there on almost every other aspect of filmmaking. I can find out everything I ever wanted to know about gaffers, grips, loaders, 1st cameramen, directors of photography, you name it, it's there, but nothing about the still photographers.

 

Do you know of any resources out there on the web where I can find more information on unit photographers? Such as; Do they just act as a photojournalist, providing a visual documentary of the production? Do they work for the director, producer or publicity department? I have a bunch of questions on the subject and the sad part is I have no idea where to ask them!

 

Any help would make me a happy man!

 

Thanks

 

 

Timothy Jay Hall

Chief Photographer

Pomerado Publishing

13247 Poway Road

Poway, CA 92064

(858) 748-2311 ext. 229

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You can contact them here:

 

Society of Motion Picture Still Photographers

 

Also look at the message boards at:

 

http://www.cameraguild.com/

 

I've worked that job a bit myself and I can tell you, you pretty much do all you can. The more varied and dynamic work you do the more you can sell them.

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You can contact them here:

 

Society of Motion Picture Still Photographers

 

Also look at the message boards at:

 

http://www.cameraguild.com/

 

I've worked that job a bit myself and I can tell you, you pretty much do all you can.  The more varied and dynamic work you do the more you can sell them.

 

I did send the e-mail to the contact person on the SMPSP website, and didn't get anything back. I thought it would be better to use the contact person first instead of just contacting the members out of the blue. Maybe thats my only option?

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Yeah, I was meaning you should contact their members. I think it's a relativaly new group. You have to click around on the cameraguild site. I think the boards are under Technical info or something.

 

To answer a few of your questions; you are working with the Producers and/or PR people. The director doesn't direct or manage you, (but he may yell at you.) :P Usually you shoot all kinds of stuff, documentary of the production, shots of the actors from the camera view point (they sometimes do a stills take for the scene, right before they roll.) portraits of key people and actors and sometimes it might involve mimicking the work of the DP.

 

Some guys use camera blimps and others (like me) use a whisper quiet leaf shutter camera. That still may not be quiet enough though. If you got into it full time you should get a blimp.

 

As far as rights, most of them try to retain them just like you would do in any type of stills photography. I think copyright retention is a big mission of the SMPSP. It's funny that they keep control of the rights of a shot of a DP's lighting setup and the DP doesn't. Some DP's aren't happy about that.

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As far as rights, most of them try to retain them just like you would do in any type of stills photography.  I think copyright retention is a big mission of the SMPSP.  It's funny that they keep control of the rights of a shot of a DP's lighting setup and the DP doesn't.  Some DP's aren't happy about that.

 

I shoot digitial so I would have to get a blimp. The shutters on modern day digitials from Nikon (which I use) and Canon are rather loud. I have a cloth type muzzel that I use when I cover the courts because the judges get a little tick-off if they hear a high-frame-rate camera going off.

 

As for copyright I think the DP's work and the still photographers work are two very different things. The DP's work is owned by who-ever owns the film, be it a studio or after many years someone like Ted Turner and his networks. But the still photos, if not owned by the photographer that took them, tend to get filed away, many times never to be seen again, by the studio PR departments. I would love to retain the rights to any major film projects that I would be lucky enought to shot. If nothing else than to make a nice "making of" or "behind the scenes" type coffee table book.

 

I don't think the still shooter is making as much money as the loader or 2nd assitant camera person is, so this might be seen by the "Money People" as a perk for the still guy. So he won't complain that much about the pay. Besides, the loader or 2nd doesn't have to have $25,000 to $30,000 of his own equipment to do the work.

 

I think that the ownership of copyright my the SMPSP members is a good thing. And on the small shoots I have done, I have kept my copyright.

 

Tim Hall

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