Bruno Delbonnel on playing with depth of field

BandPro recently conducted a socially-distanced interview over Zoom with legendary cinematographer Bruno Delbonnel in which they were talking about ‘playing’ with depth of field in film. Check out an extract of the full interview below.

Watch Bruno Delbonnel interview

Bruno talks about using his favourite 27mm wide lens which allows him to get a wide shot but also a close up with either a deep or shallow depth of field. He had a revelation when he realised that he is able to also play with the depth of field and change it in shot: Starting the scene with a very deep depth of field and as the scene gets more intense he is able to gradually transition to a shallow depth of field.

Our Cinefade VariND allows cinematographers to achieve precisely these type of shots. A cmotion cPro lens control system controls the iris motor to vary depth of field and is slaved to the variable ND filter. The Cinefade VariND automatically keeps exposure constant as the depth of field becomes more shallow or deep, allowing for a seamless transition. The system works on any camera and cine-lens and is very easy for any AC to setup and operate.

Find out more about our Cinefade system at www.cinefade.com.

Watch the full interview on the BandPro website to hear their whole discussion about using depth of field as a storytelling tool in film and let us know in the comments how you would use a variable depth of field in your own work.