"Robert A. Heinlein - Shooting Destination Moon (Article)" - читать интересную книгу автора (Heinlein Robert A)

vertical walls. Add that the space was completely enclosed, about as
small as an elevator cage, and had to contain a Technicolor sound
camera housed in its huge soundproof boxтАФcalled a тАЬblimp,тАЭ heaven
knows why. -
I made some rough sketches. Chesley. Bonestell translated these into
smooth drawings, adding in his own extensive knowledge of spaceships.
The miniature shop made a model which was studied by the director, the
art


5
 director, and the cameraman, who promptly tore it to bits. It wouldnтАЩt do
at all; the action could not be photographed, could not even be seen,
save by an Arcturian Bug-Eyed Monster with eyes arranged around a
spherical 3600.
So the miniature shop made another model, to suit photOgraphic
requirements. -
So I tore that one apart. I swore that I wouldnтАЩt be found dead around a
so-called spaceship control room arranged in any such fashion; what
were we making? A comic strip?
So the miniature shop made a third model.
And a fourth. -
тАв Finally we all were satisfied. The result, as you see it on the screen, is a
control room which might very well be used as a pattern for the ship which
will actually make the trip some day, provided the ship is intended for a
four-man crew. It is a proper piece of economical functional design, which
could do what it is meant to do.
But it has the unique virtue that it can be photographed as a motion picture
set.
A writerтАФa fiction writer, I mean; not a screen writerтАФis never bothered by
such considerations. He can play a dramatic scene inside a barrel quite as
well a.~ in Grand Central Station. His mindтАЩs eye looks in any direction, at
any distance, with no transition troubles and no jerkiness. He can explain
anything which is not clear. But in motion pictures the camera has got to see
what is going on and must see it in such a fashion that the audience is not
even- aware of the camera, or the illusion is lost. The camera must see all
that it needs to see to achieve a single emotional effect from a single angle,
without bobbing back and forth, or indulging in awkward, ill-timed cuts. This
problem is always present in motion picture photography; it was simply
exceptionally acute in the control room scenes. To solve it all was a real tour
deforce; the director of photography, Lionel Linden,
aged several years before we got out of that electronic Iron Maiden.
In addition to arranging the interior for camera angles it was necessary. to get
the camera to the selected anglesтАФin this enclosed space. To accomplish
this, every panel in the control room was made removableтАФ тАЬwild,тАЭ they call
itтАФso that the camera could stick in its snout and so that lights could be
rigged. Top and bottom and all its sidesтАФit came apart like a piece of
Meccano. This meant building of steel instead of the cheap beaverboard-
and-wood frauds usually photographed in Hollywood. The control room was
actually stronger and heavier than a real spaceship control room would be.