This is a shot from 2001: A space odyssey that I really like for a multitude of reasons. I like the contrast between red and blue lights, along with the reflection of curved bars on the helmet. The shallow focus really makes the colors pop and the background and the helmet reflection give a good idea as to what the room looks like.
This is a shot from Bob Fosse's All that jazz. I like the highlights in the eye sockets yet the sheer blackness of the background. I also like the lighting on the mannequin heads, which make the heads appear more mysterious and surreal.
This is a shot from Apocalypse Now. I really like the use of lighting in this shot, as it comes from overhead which makes the outline of Kurtz stand out, to the point where his figure feels enormous. I also like the way the light shows his hands, which draws your attention to the book that he is holding in a very natural way
This shot from 8 1/2 demonstrates how costuming can play into shots, since having Guido on a neutral background and making his costume composed of very sharp whites and blacks helps him stand out in the scene, and the highlight on his hair draws attention to his face, while the shadowed sunglasses suggest a mysterious, shrouded aspect to this character.
This shot from 2013's whiplash uses darkness to make the character more eerie and mysterious, and the overhead light above him makes him seem very ominous. The two lights behind him not only draw attention to the face, but also give depth to a shot that is mostly too dark to see much in.
This shot from Alexander Payne's Nebraska manages to use character placement to convey a lot, as well as various shades of black and white to give each character their own personality. I also like the lamp placement, which separates the right side of the shot from the left side in a very natural way. The highlight on Bruce Dern's hair (left of the lamp) also makes him stand out, fitting since he's the focus of the story.
This shot from Once upon a time in the west uses depth to convey the vast openness of the landscape, and the use of silhouettes make the characters loom large in the shot, as well as stress the iconography of the western genre. The texture of the wood floor shows the scale of this area, and the lines show the direction that our eyes should look towards, by basically pointing to the cowboy in the back.
This shot from Seven Samurai uses fog and silhouettes to make the scene feel more ominous, as if the character has just seen a tragedy, which he has. The fog also helps to distinguish the standing samurai from the bloodshed that is going on in the foreground, and the focus is on the samurai in the back. The division between the light, top half of the screen against the dark, bottom half also make the samurai stand out.
This shot from the seventh seal uses lighting very well in my opinion, by making Death in the foreground lighted with a soft, overhead light to make him seem foreboding, while Max von Sydow behind the cage is being light more directly, but the bars on the confession window hide his face, suggesting he too has something to hide. The way the lighting creates shadows on Sydow's face is also quite effective, especially with the shadows of the cage being shown in such a manner that his eye is directly visible, making Sydow appear more visible in the shot while also keeping him in the shadows.
I decided to count all these shots from The Passion of Joan of Arc as I think they show two things very, very well. They demonstrate the effectiveness of shapes, as the shapes are often vague, shadowed, and simple, which along with the black and white cinematography and the use of negative space, makes all the objects seem both monstrous and dangerous. The use of shadows on the face is also especially effective, as the close-ups and harsh, contrasting shadows help give each character shot both visual flair and substance in their lighting. Considering that this is a silent film, the characters cannot use their words to speak, but rather their actions, and the lighting and use of shadows on the characters helps to convey the emotions of both the characters and the scene in a way that I feel is visually apparent to anyone watching the film, and to be fair, this comes from someone who doesn't like silent films all that much.
I'll admit, I mostly like this shot from Tree of Life because I know it was done using practical effects, which I think adds to the realism and wonder conveyed in this shot and makes it look less like a screensaver and more like a genuine galaxy. I don't know how this shot was accomplished by I like it.
This scene from Capote uses the prison bars to great effect. The bars are black on Capote to show that he is being deceitful in this scene, while the bars are white on the prisoner, to show that he has some innocence to him. The framing of the bars is perfect, as it displays the point of this scene without distracting from the action on screen.
This shot from Upstream color uses the technique of light sky-darker ground like in the shot from Seven Samurai, but also dresses all the characters in dark clothes to make them distinguishable from both the skyline and the pigs below. The placing of the gate also draws your eyes towards the middle, where all the important information in the frame is conveyed.
This scene from Boogie Nights spends the first few moments of it establishing the space, the characters and the situation pretty quickly and effectively in order to stage what ends up being a pretty elaborate shooting, but uses constant angles and smart framing in a way that prevents the scene from being confusing. The white suit Don Cheadle wears also makes the blood pop out, the mise-en-scene conveys that it's Christmas time, and overall, I think this scene demonstrates how cinematography can be used to visually tell a story without pandering to the audience.
This shot from Punch Drunk Love is notable for both the way it uses natural light to create a beautiful landscape, and for how the car crash simply blends into the scene, in a way that I feel creates a surprise for the audience. This is a good use of simple tech; all the do is pan left, but it creates a type of shot that I don't encounter too much in movies.
This scene from west side story also uses a foreground barrier to create ellipses that make the characters stand out in a scene full of dancing teenagers. It creates what I feel is a very convincing love-at-first-sight sort of feeling, and the cutting between the two suggests both love between them and that they come from different worlds, worlds that would normally never interact, and that a barrier separates them both literally and physically, yet they can still see the real person past that barrier.
This shot from Foxcatcher is not only really, really tough to watch, but I think it's a shot so good that it convinced me to see the movie. The use of negative space in this image make it feel like the only things in this room are Channing Tatum and the mirror. The mirror itself doesn't show Tatum's reflection, but his head smashes almost at the exact center of frame, drawing your eyes toward it. The slight silhouette on Tatum and his hand movement on his face also draw you towards the top of the frame, but once his head hits the mirror, your eyes follow his movement and draw you towards the mirror, where the action takes place.
This shot from Beasts of the southern wild makes great use of scale and effects. The pig in this scene is actually a real pig with a costume on, but they blew it up to make it seem bigger, which could have looked very bad, but by placing it against a soft, light background, it not only stands out but contrasts the pig in such a way that it looks like it's actually real. Quvenzhane Wallis' eyeline meets right at the pig's horns, and her position in the frame makes her appear dwarfed by the pig, and the wood they're standing on is framed in such a way to suggest that these two are on equal ground, which further shows just how big the pig is in this shot.
This shot from Raise the red lantern has always stuck out to me because of its use of varying color temperatures. The overall blue hue suggests that it's night, but the red lanterns stick out and add depth to the shot, but also don't appear to have been adjusted to compromise the cooler color temperature. I don't know how this was accomplished, but I would love to know how to do something like this
Even though this film's camera movement is what really steals the show, this shot from In the mood for love demonstrates a very strong use of color and shadows, by attempting to give each object on screen its own unique color within each shot, which helps to make each image feel important. the green dress and the way it is lit makes it prominent in the shot, but the position of the man in the mirror draws our eyes towards him, and the direction he's looking at in the mirror seems to look at the woman, which draws us back to the woman.
While this gif isn't from a film but rather a dashboard cam on a very unfortunate day, this image has always stuck in my mind, particularly for how devastating the crash looks, but also for the way the crash comes out of nowhere. The truck can be seen in the distance but it doesn't appear to have significance, but once the black car moves, our eyes follow it due to how its dark color contrasts the snowy terrain, and as we follow the car, the truck comes into frame and hits the car. I chose this image because I think it demonstrates an exciting way to show a crash, but also how your eyes follow the entire screen from right to left in a way that, while somewhat gruesome, unfolds naturally on screen.
This is an analysis of Drive's cinematography by the youtube channel Every Frame A Painting, which shows how it uses the quadrant system to draw the viewers eyes towards 4 quadrants of the frame. While it's not my own analysis, I feel like this video explains it much better than I ever could in a single paragraph.
This shot from Ivan's Childhood uses shapes and composition to draw us towards the main character, with all the broken wood pieces of the ruined house pointing almost directly at the character, and the negative space around the character also makes his silhouette stand out as distinctly human.
This shot from burn after reading uses complementary colors in order to make the characters stand out against the simple white background. The lines of the background give the setting a very organized feel, almost as if they're in an office. The shapes these lines make also help to give more flair and help the people in the shot look completely visible. The green water bottle, which contrasts all the red uniforms, is also a nice touch.
This shot from Fargo uses very, very simple shapes and color to create a landscape that appears open and endless. The shapes also seem to have an order to them visually, making the man and the car more prominent simply because they interrupt the visual pattern. The faint tire tracks in front of the man also help give texture to the image, indicating that this shot takes place in the snow as opposed to an all white room.
This shot from Django Unchained demonstrates how to effectively use natural lighting and how costuming plays a key role in cinematography, as the blue outfit contrasts the rural look of the slave platation. The highlights on the trees' leaves is also a nice touch.
This sequence from The Diving Bell and The Butterfly uses very shallow depth of field in a very convincing way to show the perspective of a man who has just awoke from a coma. The effects used in this scene give a distorted look to the surroundings, which helps convey the hazy feeling of the protagonist.
This shot from Inherent Vice uses lighting in a creative and effective manner by having natural light bleed onto Joaquin Phoneix's face and placing a warm light on top of his hairline. This implys that the character is looking outside during the nighttime inside their house. However, this is not how this would look in real life, but because it uses the visual language to communicate the setting, it's easier to understand what is actually going on in this shot, even if it doesn't necessarily mimic real life to a tee.
This shot from There will be blood utilizes character space in a very effective way. The film is notable for how many shots follow the golden ratio rule (demonstrated below), and this shot is no exception. However, the position of Daniel Day Lewis looking down, the ropes guiding our eyes down, and the wood forming a point right on DDL guide us towards him. The use of bleeding light in this shot also helps the scene by bleeding over the other man's face, which, along with his clothes, make him blend into the background and direct our attention more towards DDL.
(golden ratio examples in "There will be blood")
This shot from Barry Lyndon uses immense depth of field to suggest the grandness of the characters actions. The position of the wall matches the position of the two dueling men, and the trees help cover up enough of the frame that your eyes are drawn towards the men in the center. It's also worth noting that no one's head peaks over the mountaintops, which helps provide the shot with both a sense of depth and a sense of scale.
