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White Rock Movie Premiere Programme
January 31, 1977


 

HARVEY HARRISON is one of a 'new wave' of cameramen bred-up in the demanding world of TV commercial cinematography and now making a reputation in feature films. His unsurpassed experience of filming actuality subjects and his genius with the hand-held camera won for him me assignment of Director of Photography on me Genesis production. In the week of me film's Royal Premiere Harvey reaches a landmark in his career with election to membership of the British Society of Cinematographers, whose ranks comprise me elite of the film industry's top cameramen.

 

 

 

It was obvious from the outset that the Genesis film would need careful 'recceing'. We would be shooting in 35mm Panavision Anamorphic, the same format as White Rock, and this immediately posed problems of mobility and short runs on magazines. I was going to have to get to know not only the group's performance but also the boys themselves because Genesis are a group who play very much to, and for, their audience and were concerned about cameras interfering with their performance on stage. I learnt a great deal about diplomacy in persuading them to our way of thinking on several points and I must say that the group, and their manager, Tony Smith, were very understanding and co-operative. But the one point on which they remained completely adamant was that I had to use their rig for lighting and not bring in any film lights. So that made a careful study of their show doubly important and made the positioning of the cameras a matter requiring a good deal of thought.

 

 

     The first recce was done by director Tony Maylam and myself in Paris. There, we selected the numbers to be filmed and made page upon page of notes. Tony then went to Germany to see the show again; and finally Tony, myself and Gordon Swire, the editor, went to Glasgow where the band was playing on the night immediately preceding their 'gig' at Bingley Hall Stafford. We took Harry Hart, one of our cameramen with us so that he and I could get some cut away shots.

 

 

 

      It had by now been decided that five cameras were needed and the crews were booked and given their call at Stafford. We made a car dash from Glasgow down to Stafford, where I wanted to be set up to shoot the pantechnicons containing the group's gear as they arrived and the setting-up of the stage by the Genesis road crew.

 

 

      The other technicians arrived and we sat down to a detailed briefing from Tony about who would be shooting what, et cetera. I gave our boys their camera positions and left them to rig their cameras while I got the lighting together.

 

 

 

      Because the concert was being held in this enormous barn, packed to capacity with about 8,000 bodies, it would have been difficult enough to run around with 16mm NPRs. With our Panavision gear it would be impossible and so the cameras would have to stay in their chosen positions. The master camera, a PVSR handled by Mike Delaney, was a locked-off shot of the whole stage which fitted perfectly into anamorphic framing. It was placed centre stage about 50 yards back on a rostrum surrounded by crash barriers. Mike had a 100mm superspeed lens shooting at T2 with 1000' loads as he was running continuously on the selected numbers which amounted to about 1 hour 20 mins out of the 2 hour concert.

 

 

 

 

      The second camera was positioned on a balcony to the right of the stage for the purpose of shooting extra close shots such as hands, faces, drums, and so on. Having used Harry Hart for this job on the Catarina Valente film with excellent results I gave him his camera with an 800mm lens shooting at T4, forced one stop.

 

 

 

      For the third camera we built a wide track across and below the front of the stage. We put an S35 on an Elemack and used a 50-500 zoom wide open at T4, forced one stop. This was the obvious camera for John Palmer and his job was to concentrate on the two lead guitarists and the lead singer/drummer. He and his assistant, Tony Browning, had their work cut out because most of the time John was on the long end of the zoom whilst the performers were leaping around, and focusing had to be by guess work.

 

 

 

      Mike Davies had the fourth camera, an Arri with again a 50-500 zoom on a tripod, shooting at T4 forced one stop. Jammed-in, as he was, on the left hand side of the stage amongst a mountain of electronic gadgetery, yards of cable and banks of speakers, his job was to concentrate on the drummer, Bill Bruford, who certainly merited his own camera. Mike was also assigned to get some profile cuts of the two guitarists, Steve Hackett and Mike Rutherford.

 

 

 

      No film is complete without the 'get-in-amongst-it' camera on the stage, my job. Initially the group was against this camera as they were worried that it would inhibit their freedom on the stage; but we convinced them it was essential for the film. So I had the Panaflex with a 35mm superspeed, a good hand-held camera but an exhausting work-out for me shooting it for 2 hours around the stage continually altering the aperture, and for my assistant Mike Brewster who followed and guided me around, through, over and under instruments and cables and pulling focus at the same time. I was concentrating on Tony Banks, Genesis' keyboard wizard who had his own speaker in front of him to enable him to hear what he was playing (but who succeeded in deafening Mike and me) and Phil Collins the lead singer and drummer.

 

 

      Re-loading the cameras was critical to the success of the shoot and, because we were shooting fairly continuously, we appointed Trevor Brooker to the office of 'central loader' to accommodate the three cameras who could get access to him at the back of the stage. He finished the night having gone through three sweat-ridden changing bags and having canned up some 20,000' of rushes.

 

 

      We had to have an infallible syncing system, so Rene Borisewitz was set to work and, needless to say, came up with an ingenious device to meet the needs of the moment. All cameras had crystal controlled motor drive. Rene set up a black and white video camera and this was used to distribute the read-out of a quartz digital clock to various suitably placed monitors on stage and in the hall, ensuring that each camera had access to one of them. At the start of each number a 'beep' was recorded and the clock registered '000'. So all the cameraman had to do was, at any point during his run, film two seconds of the monitor, which also gave details of the number being played. Syncing was done by using time as the reference and not footage. The actual music was recorded by Manor Mobile on 16 tracks with track 16 having a crystal pulse. For editing a feed was recorded on a Nagra. I think my main memory of that night was of Rene rigging and making practical his new invention.

 

 

      Finally, the lighting itself. Genesis had a well lit show but the lighting consisted of 2kw quartz sealed beams mounted in tubes about a foot long with the diameter of the lamp approximately 8". They were bright lights, all coloured, but worked separately off a computerised control panel. The rig consisted of a bank of 3 rows, with approximately 15 of these lamps in each row, at the front and top of the stage. Remembering that I had to work with their lights this gave me no back light which is important for filmic purposes. They had in reserve a couple of portable rigs with 12 lamps on each which would serve for the back light but the group was reluctant to have them used as they would shine onto the audience and reduce the audience's vision of the group. However, they eventually accepted that it would make an enormous difference to the quality of the film.

 

 

 

      The lighting was all pre-set by them and for me to alter it was a problem. But altered it had to be because it often went below an acceptable film level. I had to assure the group that although it might appear to them that I was raising their light level, on film the mood of their live concert would be re-captured. I had to study each number separately to find the low key levels in order to raise them and at the same time, for the sake of the group, try to keep as much as possible to their usual stage procedure. Through discussion, mutual respect and a lot of give and take, I believe we achieved that night what both Genesis and Worldmark were after.

 

 

      Then, following what I believe was the fastest and most efficient wrap I have ever witnessed, it was all back to the hotel where a large one would soon put to rights our dehydrated bodies. For the Sammy's drivers it was only a small one (if indeed one at all), for they had to head back to London to get the gear ready for another day's work.

 


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