The renowned Australian technician was speaking at a masterclass at the ongoing International Film Festival of India here.

“I’ve heard cinematographers sometimes called illusionists, that you make pictures. But is that photography?

Seale said, “It’s a big question that needs to be answered in everyone’s mind whether it’s still photography or not… but the word illusionist is too strong.”

The 82-year-old cinematographer, who began his career working at the Australian TV channel ABC, said his training came in handy in the 1960s when he was shooting Barry Levinson’s “Rain Man,” starring Dustin Hoffman and Tom Cruz acted. ,

He recalled that both the actors were ad-libbing on the set, which needed to be captured by multiple cameras to make the storytelling effective.

“I went to Barry, and I said, ‘Barry, we should cross shoot this with two cameras.’ And he looked at me, he said, ‘I wasn’t supposed to ask.’ I said, ‘Give me three minutes.’

“It helped the actors because they were able to overlap and the editor was able to cut it because there was complete continuity. All of this made me feel like it was helping make better films.”

Seale, who won an Academy Award for his work on the 1996 film “The English Patient,” also mentioned collaborating with fellow Australian and director George Miller on “Mad Max: Fury Road” and “Three Thousand Years of Longing.”

The cinematographer said that Warner Bros. Studios approached Miller with the idea of ​​making a big “3D movie”.

But the filmmaker said that he had written such shots in the film that no 3D camera made in the world at that time could capture them.

“George said, ‘I’ll build my own.’ So they started making 3D cameras that would fit through the window of the truck, or it would go down through the roof of the sky, it would fit through the window and fit inside the truck… When you change the lens on the 3D camera, You have to change two lenses, and then you have to match them optically perfectly.

“It’s a long process, taking 30 minutes to change lenses. So when George found out, he said, ‘I can’t waste that much time on the set.’ So they decided to build a 3D camera body for each lens, so there were 24 cameras, all with different lenses.”

But that came with its own problems.

Seale said, “They had a lot of electronic problems, overheating and things like that that we were struggling with. Then at the last minute George came over to 2D.”

The camera crew of “Fury Road” consisted of 27 members from Europe, Africa, the US, the UK, Australia and New Zealand, he said, revealing that one of them was a Namibian prince.

Seal quipped, “He was a young guy who wanted to work in movies, and he was really a prince. So we hit it off a lot.”

As someone who has witnessed the evolution of shooting from film negative to digital cameras, the veteran cinematographer said he finds the new medium “amazing.”

“His latitude, his ability to shoot in low-light areas, everything about him was a great way to deal with 40 years of negative film,” said Seeley, who shot “Fury Road” and “Three Thousand Years of Longing” on digital. The latter was like a dream come true.” Camera.

The cinematographer said that whenever Americans came to work in Australia, they were very happy because the local crews were easy to work with as well as professional.

“The Americans liked the loose way of shooting movies… We respected the budget, because Australian movies, they couldn’t afford any overtime. We had to do two hours of overtime with a cold shoulder at the end of the day. Beer was available..”

Australia is the country of focus at the 55th edition of IFFI, which will conclude on November 28.

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