O americano David Stump virá a Portugal receber o título «Honoris Lecturer» atribuído pela Universidade Lusófona em reconhecimento pela sua dedicação ao ensino de profissionais um pouco por todo o mundo. David Stump teve uma enorme influência num momento muito delicado de mudanças na direção de fotografia quando se deu o processo de mudança do analógico para o digital. A transformação repentina deixou muitos profissionais na altura em situação frágil para continuar e David desdobrou-se em dezenas de conferências e palestras informando com linguagem simples as mudanças de que se estavam a processar. O seu envolvimento nas diversas comissões técnicas entre elas a Academia de Hollywood e com a ASC foram fundamentais para a disseminação da informação e a criação de manuais de utilização. A sua atividade de formador na Europa deu-se com a Conferência «Digital Cinematography» em Oslo e posteriormente com a comissão técnica da IMAGO.
Eventos com David Stump na Universidade Lusófona
28 de outubro - sala Fernando Lopes - 18h - Palestra sobre Visual Effects para Cinematographers
29 de outubro - sala Agostinho da Silva - 15h - Cerimónia de reconhecimento «Honoris Lecturer»
30 de outubro - sala Auditório Q - 15h - AI in Cinematography
David Stump ASC BVK
In recognition for the dedication for lecturing for many years and passing knowledge to fellow colleagues, students and industry professionals, Lusofona University is honouring David Grifith Stump ASC BVK by assigning the title honoris lecturer on October 29th, 2024 at Agostinho da Silva Auditorium at 15h00.
David Stump was born on August 23rd, 1953, Atlanta Georgia USA. He studied engineering at Imperial Valley College and Graduated from California State University Sacramento with a Bachelor of Arts in 1977.
David Stump ASC BVK has been working in motion pictures and television production as Director of Photography, as Visual Effects Director of Photography, as Visual Effects Supervisor, and as Stereographer, (including both live action work and 2D to 3D conversion work), earning an Emmy Award, several Emmy nominations, an Academy Award for Scientific and Technical Achievement, an IMAGO Technical Achievement Award and an International Cinematographers Guild Award. He began his career in the 1970’s working at Francis Ford Coppola’s Zoetrope Studios until the studio moved to the San Francisco Bay area in 1982. He moved on to splitting his time between shooting independent feature films for Roger Corman and shooting high end VFX for larger budget features and television projects.
A young David Stump with Bruce the shark on “Jaws 3D” 1983
His credits include projects like Little Fires Everywhere, The Morning Show, The Happy Time Murders, American Gods, Immortals, Bond 22 - Quantum of Solace, Flight Plan, Fantastic Four, X-Men 1 & 2, Into the Blue, Garfield, Batman Forever, Hollow Man, Men of Honor, Deep Blue Sea, Stuart Little, The Sphere, Contact, Batman & Robin, Mars Attacks, Executive Decision, Stargate, Free Willy, Adventures in Babysitting, Rambo 3, Stand By Me, The Day After and many, many others.
He is currently co chairman of the both the Camera Committee and chairman of the Metadata Committee of the ASC Motion Imaging Technology Council. Under his guidance, the combined efforts of the Producer’s Guild of America and the American Society of Cinematographers produced both the ASC / PGA Camera Assessment Series, and the ASC / PGA Image Control Assessment Series, the first side by side comparisons of virtually all of the high-end digital cinema cameras against film. He also contributed to many volunteer community projects in motion picture imaging including ASC StEM 1 (Standard Evaluation Materials project 1), the AMPAS ACES Committee, the AMPAS Spectral Similarity Study, the AMPAS ASC Common LUT Format (CLUT) project, ASC Color Decision List (CDL), ASC Media Hash List (MHL), ASC Framing Decision List (FDL), ASC StEM 2 (Standard Evaluation Materials project 2). He is also co-chairman of the IMAGO Technical Committee (the International Federation of Cinematographers).
David’s experience includes live action cinematography, second unit photography, aerial photography, miniatures and high-speed photography, motion control, large format cinematography and stills photography, 3D cinematography and 2D to 3D conversion, light field cinematography and both front and rear projection process photography. His extensive credits include work in immersive media including Unreal Engine/LED wall extended reality production, circular and hemispherical VR environments, virtual cinematography, virtual camera design, light field cinematography, multi camera photogrammetry, volumetric capture and immersive training environment design.
He has lectured and taught classes in Cinematography and Visual Effects at the American Film Institute, UCLA, Art Center College of Design, Woodbury University, Arizona State University, Global Cinematography Institute, IATSE Local 600, TV Globo Rio de Janeiro Brazil, Savannah College of Art and Design, The Beijing Film Academy and the ARRI Academy in Beijing. He has spoken at many conferences and trade shows including the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB), the International Broadcast Convention (IBC), Cinegear Expo, DV Expo, the PGA Produced By Conference, the Hollywood Post Alliance Tech Retreat, the Cinegrid Conference, the IMAGO Conference, the Lisbon Film Festival, the Todos En Alta Conference in Zaragoza Spain, Euro Cine Expo and many others.
He recently taught an “ASC Master Class for Masters” for over 70 full members of the American Society of Cinematographers on the subject of Extended Reality (XR) production for shooting motion pictures using game engine technology and LED walls.
David Stump has authored numerous articles for American Cinematographer as well as for many other Media and Entertainment magazines and publications. David authored the book “Digital Cinematography – Fundamentals, Techniques and Workflows” first edition (available in both English and Mandarin Chinese) and second edition, and is a contributing author to both the “VES Handbook” and the “ASC Manual 11th Edition”.
David’s Interview by Tony Costa aip.
TC: How did you start in the movies?
DS: When I began, I had a day job in a studio, but at night I worked in night clubs as a musician and as a comedian. One of my comedy groups signed a deal to do a pilot for a major network, so I became one of the Producers. As production continued, I produced a series of filmed short subject movies until I decided that I could also take up the camera and shoot those short films as well. When the TV show finished, I had enough experience behind the camera to go out and seek work in the camera department.
TC: What made you go into VFX?
DS: I was working on small independent films until about 1979, when I landed a job working for Francis Ford Coppola’s Zoetrope Studio as a camera assistant. My first experience at Zoetrope was on Francis’ film “One from the Heart”, which was very heavy in VFX. I played a small part in some of the shooting, and I stayed at Zoetrope Studios until the Studio relocated to the San Francisco Bay area in about 1982. The studio had a job placement person, who then helped me find work shooting VFX work on a TV movie called “The Day After”, which won an Emmy award for VFX. From there on, I alternated between shooting independent features as DP for studios like Roger Corman’s Concorde Pictures and shooting VFX on very big films such as Rambo3.
TC: How did you adapt to the digital changes?
DS: Digital technology began to appear in the 1990s, and by then I had been shooting movies and doing VFX for over 20 years. Computer Graphics was intriguing to me, it seemed to offer the opportunity to put images on the screen that were never possible on film. It seemed like a natural progression to me that I should explore the possibilities that digital could present.
TC: What has been lost and gained with digital?
DS: I think a great deal more has been gained than has been lost with the emergence of digital. We now have so many new digital tools and techniques available to us, but at the same time, we still have almost all of the technology of film acquisition still available to us. I think the development of digital has greatly enriched the tools and techniques available to the cinematographer.
TC: How fast did you move from analogue to digital?
DS: I was an early adopter of digital technology, so I think that I moved into digital at the pace that digital technology evolved. In many cases, I feel I actually contributed to the evolution and development of the technology.
TC: You are a lecturer since when?
DS: I have been teaching, speaking and lecturing since about 2001, when I was made a full member of the ASC. At the time, there was no camera committee at the ASC, and when I joined, then President of the club – Stephen Poster ASC- assigned me the job of teaching digital technology to the membership. My duties at the ASC thrust me into the educational limelight form then on.
TC: What personnel considerations can you tell about being a lecturer? Does that work please you? Do you enjoy teaching others your expertise?
DS: Increasingly as I become older, I can see more clearly the value that people value the information and learning that I have accumulated over many years, and I also realize that I have developed a skill for making difficult technology subjects easy to understand. After so many years of mentoring students and cinematographers I find their interest in my work to be invigorating to me, it feeds my life energy. My years of shooting must eventually wind down as I age, but the satisfaction I get from passing along my experience only invigorates me for this next phase of my life.
TC: What is your role in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences?
DS: My roles at the Academy (AMPAS) have been varied but my involvement runs deep. I served on the Science and Technology for the full-term limit allowed – 7 years. I have served on the VFX Academy Award Nominating Committee for several years, I served on the ACES Committee for several years, and I led the AMPASC/ASC Common LUT Format Committee. I have been serving on the Science and Technology Awards Committees for several years, and I am currently serving there. I am also a member of the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences as well, and there I have been serving on their Science and Technology Awards Committees for many years.
TC: What is your role in the technical committee of imago?
DS: I am one of three co-chairs, along with Phillippe Ros AFC and Alex Bercovitch RGC. We lead the IMAGO interaction with the global manufacturing community, we organise seminars and conferences such as the IMAGO Technology Summit in Oslo Norway and Eurocine Expo in Munich (among many others).
TC: What does Artificial Intelligence bring to the future of filmmaking?
DS: At this time, the future of film making in the era of Artificial Intelligence is uncertain. There are already parts of the workflow where AI is creating disruption. I have used Nuke’s AI rotoscoping utility “Copycat” to do a big part of the roto for compositing on the Italian feature film “Comandante” to great effect. Since then, at least 30 companies have announced new AI rotoscoping tools, and I expect great disruption in a global rotoscoping industry. AI is revolutionising audio postproduction, enabling mixers and engineers to separate noise from dialog, and to recognize sounds and automate mixing. Large Language Model generative AI sites like Chat GPT, Calude and Scribe produce written results that draw indiscriminately on the entire internet. AI image creation sites like Runway and Stable Diffusion are already striking fear into the studios who cannot conceive of the intellectual property and legal ramifications of their results base on access to the world wide web.
TC: You have been member of ASC since 2001, how has been that relationship evolved?
DS: When I first joined the ASC, I was one of its youngest members. Over the 20 plus years I have been a member, as I contributed more and more to the society and to the film community in general, I have seen a growing respect and veneration, and I now count the entire membership of the ASC (and a large part of the global community!) as my personal friends.
TC: in order to lecture you need to know color science and data science – how did you get to know all of these for your VFX work?
DS: I read numerous books, questioned countless educated color scientists, went to innumerable color sessions, read more books, basically I taught myself my own master’s program, just not in a school.
TC: When you work side by side with the cinematographer of the film, how do you approach the aesthetics and artistic options? Or do you just adapt to the needs of the cinematographer in a technical way? Or do you give your input?
DS: All of the above. Working on a film is a collaborative process, and there are as many ways to collaborate as there are people to collaborate with. The key to success in working on a movie is in finding a way to relate to and communicate with all the other participants.
David’s book
Digital Cinematography Fundamentals, Tools, Techniques and Workflows – 2nd Edition (published 2022) the book also has a Mandarin Edition
Synopsis "Digital Cinematography: Fundamentals, Tools, Techniques, and Workflows"
Today's successful cinematographer must be equal parts artist, technician, and business-person. The cinematographer needs to master the arts of lighting, composition, framing and other aesthetic considerations, as well as the technology of digital cameras, recorders, and workflows, and must know how to choose the right tools (within their budget) to get the job done. David Stump's Digital Cinematography focuses on the tools and technology of the trade, looking at how digital cameras work, the ramifications of choosing one camera versus another, and how those choices help creative cinematographers to tell a story. This book empowers the reader to correctly choose the appropriate camera and workflow for their project from today's incredibly varied options, as well as understand the ins and outs of implementing those options. Veteran ASC cinematographer David Stump has updated this edition with the latest technology for cameras, lenses, and recorders, as well as included a new section on future cinematographic trends. Ideal for advanced cinematography students as well as working professionals looking for a resource to stay on top of the latest trends, this book is a must read.
AWARDS;
Academy Award for Science and Technology 2001- Camera Data Capture
Emmy Award for Visual Effects 1983 – The Day After
Emmy Award Nomination 2017 – American Gods
Emmy Award Nomination 1999 – Stephen King’s Storm of the Century
IMAGO Extraordinary Science and Technology Award 2019
International Cinematographers Guild ECA Award
David Stump working with Rob Reiner and the crew of “Stand By Me”
to shoot a scene of four kids on a train trestle bridge.
Stand By Me Director Rob Reiner and a much younger David Stump discussing a shot.
A miniature shot for “Stephen King’s Storm of the Century”.
I was nominated for an Emmy Award for the show, but this time I did not win…
Making of “The Day After”.
Bluescreen of a cloud tank atomic bomb cloud (above),
and the resulting composite shot (below). The show won an Emmy Award.
The cover of Newsweek magazine from November of 1983
with my shot from “The Day After”.
David Stump while shooting the “Fly in the Graveyard”
sequence in the original “Beetlejuice”.
David Stump on an LED wall stage during filming of “Gods of Mars”.
More minatures spaceship shooting of MGMs “Ice Pirates”
Setting up a shot for “The Coneheads”.
In addition to my work as a Cinematographer and a VFX Supervisor,
I also own and operated a motion control and visual effects rental house (MCRS) for 20 years.
Shooting miniatures for “Ice Pirates”
I shot an independent feature about cold war fighter pilots, Russia vs USA.
Got to fly in some cool planes!
On the set of James Bond 22 – “Quantum of Solace” with
Roberto Schafer ASC in a vertical wind tunnel in Bedfordshire UK.
At a trade show with Timothee de Goussencourt of EZ track,
proving the value of the “Comandante” metadata driven workflow.
Prepping for a photogrammetry shoot for the television series
“American Gods” in Toronto Ontario Canada.
Grid shooting to map lens distortion and shading characteristics of lenses.
I shot a series of Gallo beer commercials in Guatemala. During the shoot our helicopter went down in Antigua Guatemala, four people had broken backs. Everyone survived. For this particular trip, I stayed on the ground to operate the Phantom high speed camera, so I dodged a bullet
Posing with the lead puppeteer and the lead puppet character
from the Henson film “Happytime Murders”.
Lecturing for Sony at NAB, National Association of Broadcasters.
International Digital Cinema Technology Forum in Beijing China
Receiving an award for technology at the Beijing International Film Festival
Receiving an award for technology at the IMAGO Awards in Serbia
An early photo of me shooting an independent feature
using Roger Corman’s Mitchel BNCR camera.
Ready to roll with a Mitchell 35 R high speed camera
Lying on the hood of a car to get a tracking shot of
actress Heidi Hagman with an ARRI IIC circa 1978.
Loading a blimped VistaVision sound camera for a commercial.
The things we do to get the shot.
Photographing background plates for a science fiction movie with a large format still camera.
Shooting high speed VistaVision plate for “Free Willy” in Astoria Oregon
Reading the meter for a film exposure requires focus and attention.
Shooting a music video of “All Roads Lead to Rome” with “The Stranglers”
Lecturing at Hochschule der Medien Stuttgart (University of Applied Sciences)
along with my friend Jost Vacano BVK
The drydock at Taranto Italy where we constructed a floating submarine set for “Comandante”.
A panel on LED wall Extended Reality production at
National Association of Broadcasters convention 2023.
Associação de Imagem cinema-televisão Portuguesa
Fundada em 2 de junho de 1998
Pela Arte e Técnica Cinematográfica
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