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CINEMATOGRAPHER · 1930–2016 · UNITED STATES

Vilmos Zsigmond

Pre-flashed, muted colour and atmospheric haze.

Born
1930
Died
2016
Country
United States
Field
Cinematographer
Vilmos Zsigmond
Portrait: Petr Novák, Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 2.5

KNOWN FOR

  1. 1977Close Encounters of the Third Kind
  2. 1971McCabe & Mrs. Miller
  3. 1978The Deer Hunter

WHY THEY MATTER

Won the Academy Award for Close Encounters of the Third Kind and the BAFTA for The Deer Hunter; Emmy for Stalin; ASC Lifetime Achievement Award (1998); voted among the ten most influential cinematographers in history in 2003.

THE LIFE

Zsigmond studied cinematography at the Academy of Drama and Film in Budapest. With his friend Laszlo Kovacs he secretly filmed the 1956 Hungarian Revolution and escaped to Austria, and the two arrived in the United States as political refugees in 1958. After low-budget work he shot Robert Altman's McCabe and Mrs Miller, John Boorman's Deliverance and Steven Spielberg's Close Encounters of the Third Kind, which won him the Academy Award. He won the BAFTA for The Deer Hunter and an Emmy for the HBO miniseries Stalin.

Source: Wikipedia

Also born in 1930–1959

1931–2014 · United States · Cinematographer

Gordon Willis

Top light and deep underexposure that earned him the name the Prince of Darkness.

The Godfather, 1972Source: Wikipedia

1934–2001 · United States · Cinematographer

John A. Alonzo

Naturalistic, cinema verite-inspired photography of the New Hollywood.

Chinatown, 1974Source: Wikipedia