Quotes

We try to tell the story with light, and the director tells it with action.

[on his photographing Greta Garbo] I didn't create a "Garbo face". I just did portraits of her I would have done for any star. My lighting of her was determined by the requirements of a scene. I didn't, as some say I did, keep one side of her face light and the other dark. But I did always try to make the camera peer into the eyes, to see what was there.

[on how he got into the movie business] I managed to land a job at the age of 15 with the Triangle Film Corporation/Kay-Bee; they needed an assistant cameraman, and of course I knew nothing about it, but they gave me a job anyway. I got twelve dollars a week. I carried a camera and held a slate. We loaded the film magazines and the still camera and carried all of the equipment to the set. My first job as an assistant was on Gloria Swanson's first dramatic film. When the company failed, I went over to Universal, and worked on some of their serials. After a year they let me become full photographer, on a one-reel Bert Roach comedy, then I did more comedies and more serials, while working alternately with [Erich von Stroheim] on his big pictures.