Bill Harvey: Psycho killer

In a bank holiday attempt to distract myself from the ever-growing number of scary news stories about the impact of the current energy crisis upon everything from small businesses to health and education, I spent much of the weekend watching some classic Hitchcock films.

One of the most famous Hitchcockian visual effects, prominent in the classic Vertigo, is often used to portray the feeling of panic or fear in the lead actor. You see the look of shock on the actor’s face, which remains static while the background around them seems to move further and further away. The effect is achieved by the camera rolling away from the actor on a track or dolly, while the camera zooms onto the face by an amount that neutralises any minification caused by the increasing distance. A feat that requires the most skilled of focus pullers to achieve the desired effect.