The Three Hunters OR A Short Musing on the Cinematography of The Lord of the Rings
I’m sorry. I’m talking about The Lord of the Rings again. Wait, no I’m not sorry.
This is the last week of my video and audio editing class so I wanted to make one final post specifically about film (for now, at least).
...And also because there’s this one scene in The Two Towers that keeps coming to mind. Instead of sounding like a total nerd I should probably just refer to it as the “They’re taking the Hobbits to Isengard!” scene and everyone will know what I’m talking about.
There are moments in the sequences where Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli are running across the plains of Rohan, but they’ve actually stopped moving and the camera has not. The subject is essentially motionless in the frame but the background is moving behind them. This helps keep the sense of urgency. Peter Jackson even talks about those specific scenes in the Appendices (bonus material, sorry, they’re labeled as Appendices on the discs and I love it), and how he never wanted the camera to be still at any point. I don’t know if this has a name, or even really how it’s accomplished, although I have some ideas.
The camera is probably far away, but zoomed in so as it moved the subjects in the foreground move at a much slower speed than the landscape in the background. That’s not a very technical explanation, but in my head that would be how it works. Anyone feel free to comment if you know things!
If I think of it, I’ll have to test it out myself to see if I’m right.
And since I’ve been adding videos at the end of these posts here’s a special treat! ;)
I don’t know where the original has gone, but it’s over a decade old. Makes me feel old...
This is the last week of my video and audio editing class so I wanted to make one final post specifically about film (for now, at least).
...And also because there’s this one scene in The Two Towers that keeps coming to mind. Instead of sounding like a total nerd I should probably just refer to it as the “They’re taking the Hobbits to Isengard!” scene and everyone will know what I’m talking about.
There are moments in the sequences where Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli are running across the plains of Rohan, but they’ve actually stopped moving and the camera has not. The subject is essentially motionless in the frame but the background is moving behind them. This helps keep the sense of urgency. Peter Jackson even talks about those specific scenes in the Appendices (bonus material, sorry, they’re labeled as Appendices on the discs and I love it), and how he never wanted the camera to be still at any point. I don’t know if this has a name, or even really how it’s accomplished, although I have some ideas.
The camera is probably far away, but zoomed in so as it moved the subjects in the foreground move at a much slower speed than the landscape in the background. That’s not a very technical explanation, but in my head that would be how it works. Anyone feel free to comment if you know things!
If I think of it, I’ll have to test it out myself to see if I’m right.
And since I’ve been adding videos at the end of these posts here’s a special treat! ;)
I don’t know where the original has gone, but it’s over a decade old. Makes me feel old...
"It's the job that's never started as takes longest to finish." J. R. R. Tolkien
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