In special features on the DVD, Kathryn Bigelow partially describes how the foot chase scene was filmed (did she say that it was done by one cinematographer?; I think she said that).
That photographer then describes his camera and what he had to do, but I really didn't understand all he was saying. Whatever it was, the end result was awesome!
Can anyone help?
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They could've been using a Steadicam. It's a camera device that you strap around your person. It allows you to move quickly with little to no shaking of the frame thus not ruining the intention of a scene.
shareNo, it wasn't a Steadicam; that would have been too bulky and probably too heavy for rapid transit thru narrow alleys and into/through buildings. Bigelow said it wasn't a Steadicam.
Because it couldn't have been one take due to the length of the chase, the cinematographer said part of the time he was following behind, then in front of, the runners, etc.
The camera would have had to be compact, very light, and still give the photographer the ability to keep the image in frame while running. Film rate thru the camera may also have been varied to emphasize running speed.
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This scene kinda reminds me of it, at 7.35: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1N5unMZMabI
Double. Whammy.
That youtube chase scene doesn't appear as complicated as the one in PB.
Running thru extremely narrow spaces between PB buildings, into/through/ and out of homes, camera in rapid backward motion in front of runners racing toward camera, etc. must have posed some really tough filming challenges in that film. But, seeing that kind of filming expertise in a Kathryn Bigelow movie is not surprising; she's a stickler for details.
The technical problems of filming the PB chase remind me of the creativity of Hollywood films from the 1930s-1940s, where audiences asked, "How could they do that?"
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Very true. It's a shame that kind of innovation comes along all too rarely nowadays. Some directors e.g Christopher Nolan do manage to make my jaw drop now and then. Speaking of which, Inceptions on-foot chase was very nice, but Point Break's is still breathtaking and unsurpassed. It really takes you with the characters and keeps the pace non-stop.
Double. Whammy.
What about Michael bay's Foot Pursuit in the first bad boys.
Amplified with the epic Score from Mark Mancina.
From an article on Yahoo movies:
The frenzied foot chase through houses and yards of Los Angeles was filmed with a specially made rig, dubbed the “Pogo-cam.” It was a camera mounted on a stick with a gyrostabilizer on the bottom. Camera operator James Muro ran behind and in front of the actors, pointing the camera at them with as much accuracy as he could muster. “What excited me about that is how absolutely alive it made the frame,” Bigelow told the New York Times in 2012.
That sounds like a good description of how it was done. The one part I still don't understand is the camera operator running in front of the actors.
The operator would have had to be running away from them, so how did he keep them in frame [pretty much] doing that? Some real clever camera work with 1991 technology!
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