Born: 21 September 1944, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA, as Joseph Caleb Deschanel.

Education: Johns Hopkins University ['Deschanel exhibited a talent for thinking on his feet during his years at Johns Hopkins, to which he was originally drawn by the sciences. But once on campus, he tended to gravitate toward more artistic and literary pursuits: He was co-editor of Hopkins' News-Letter, a yearbook photographer, and he worked on assignment for a New York-based still photographer. Deschanel was inspired by professors like Richard Macksey, who involved Deschanel and other students in producing a 16mm film for a class, and chaplain emeritus Chester Wickwire, who organized on-campus screenings of art films. He became friends with what he calls a "fringe group" of people at Hopkins, including Walter Murch. Murch was a year ahead of Deschanel at Hopkins. He was among those who encouraged the young photographer to attend the University of Southern California's film school, which solidified Deschanel's career choice.' (Jeanne Johnson)]; School of Cinema-Television of the University of Southern California [USC] [graduated in 1968]; American Film Institute [AFI], Los Angeles [graduated in 1971].

Career: Became c.asst working for doph Gordon Willis. Worked as c.op for Wakefield-Orloff Productions and Paisley Productions. Helped to develop the Steadicam and the Skycam systems. Co-founder of the prod company 'Dark Light Pictures'. He turned his back on cinematography in 1985 ['I stopped shooting features when my kids became too old to take them out of school and on location. So I stopped shooting features for eight years. Commercials gave me an opportunity to use a lot of different tools and techniques. We were doing color correction and things like that in telecine suites long before there were DIs on movies. Directing and shooting 30-second commercials also gives you the discipline to concentrate on what's really important to telling the story. And they only took me away from home for short periods of time.'], but returned to the set in 1993.

Dir and ph music videos and commercials. The AFI gave him the honorary degree 'Doctorate of Fine Arts, honoris causa' in June 2008. His wife Mary Jo and his daughters Zooey and Emily are film actresses.

Appeared in the doc's 'Visions of Light: The Art of Cinematography' [1991], 'Realizing "The Right Stuff" [2003, Jeffrey Lerner], 'T-20 Years and Counting' [2003, Jeffrey Lerner], 'The Making of "The Passion of the Christ" [2003; Holly McClure; ph: David Minasian & Stephen Petty], 'Who Needs Sleep? [2005, Haskell Wexler & Lisa Leeman] & 'Cinematographer Style' [2005, Jon Fauer; ph: J. Fauer, Jeff Laszlo, Brian Heller & David Morgan].

Awards: As doph: NSFC Award [1980] for 'Being There'; LAFCA Award [1979], NSFC Award [1980], BSC Award nom [1980] & BAFTA Film Award [1981] for 'The Black Stallion'; 'Oscar' AA nom [1983] for 'The Right Stuff'; 'Oscar' AA nom [1984] for 'The Natural'; 'Oscar' AA nom [1996] & ASC Film Award nom [1997] for 'Fly Away Home'; 'Oscar' AA nom [2000] & ASC Film Award [2000] for 'The Patriot'; 'Oscar' AA nom [2004] & ASC Film Award nom [2004] for 'The Passion of the Christ'; ASC Lifetime Achievement Award [2009].

As dir: Berlin IFF 'Silver Bear' [1976] for 'Trains'.

1969        Lanton Mills [Terrence Malick] c; short/12m

1969        Pursuit of Treasure [Stanton Kaye] scope/c; addph; ph: Bedrich Batka

1969        THX 1138 [George Lucas] ts/c; addph; ph: Albert Kihn & David Myers; also director's cut (2004); started as a short film

                    made at USC

1974        A Woman Under the Influence [John Cassavetes] b&w; addph; ph: Mitch Breit

1976        Trains [Caleb Deschanel] c; doc/15m; + scrpl

1976        Apocalypse Now [Francis Ford Coppola] tvi/c; 153m; insert ph; ph: Vittorio Storaro; see 2001

1977        The Black Stallion [Carroll Ballard] c; 2uc: Stephen Burum; addph (+ ed): Robert Dalva

1978        More American Graffiti/Purple Haze [B.W.L. Norton] p/c

1979        Being There/Chance [Hal Ashby] c

1981        Time Is on Our Side/Let's Spend the Night Together [Hal Ashby] c; doc/91m; cph: Gerald Feil

1981        The Black Stallion Returns [Robert Dalva] c; co-addph; ph: Carlo Di Palma

1982        The Right Stuff [Philip Kaufman] c; efx ph: John Fante, William Neil, Karl Herrmann, a.o.; aph: Art Scholl, Jim Beebe, a.o.

1983        The Natural [Barry Levinson] c

1984        The Slugger's Wife [Hal Ashby] c

1985        The Two Jakes [Robert Towne] shut down after several days of filming; dir in April-July 1989 by Jack Nicholson and ph by

                    Vilmos Zsigmond

1985        50 Years of Action! [Douglass M. Stewart Jr.] 16mm/c; doc/60m; cph: John Alonzo & Charles Clifton; addph:

                    James Mathers; for Directors Guild of America

1993        It Could Happen To You/Cop Tips Waitress $2 Million [Andrew Bergman] c

1995        Fly Away Home/Father Goose/Flying Wild [Carroll Ballard] c; 2uc: Gary Capo

1996        Titanic [James Cameron] s35/c; was 1st unit doph, but was replaced after the Halifax shoot by Russell Carpenter; cred

                    with Halifax ph; ph: Russell Carpenter

1997        Hope Floats [Forest Whitaker] c

1998        Message in a Bottle [Luis Mandoki] p/c; + small part

1998        The Haunting/The Legend of Hill House [Jan de Bont] announced as doph, but replaced by Karl Walter Lindenlaub

1999        Anna and the King [Andy Tennant] p/c; 2uc: Steven Arnold; vfx ph: Tony Cutrono; pyrotechnics ph: Ross Emery; animal

                    ph: M. Jin Woo

1999        The Patriot [Roland Emmerich] s35/c; 2uc: Ueli Steiger & Mark Vargo

2001        The Hunted [William Friedkin] c; aph: John Trapman; vfx ph: Martin Rosenberg; replaced doph William Fraker

2001        Apocalypse Now Redux [Francis Ford Coppola] re-edited & restored version/203m; see 1976

2002        Timeline [Richard Donner] s35/c; 2uc: Thomas Burstyn & Vilmos Zsigmond; aph: John Trapman

2002        The Passion of the Christ [Mel Gibson] p/c; efx ph: Mark Weingartner

2003        National Treasure [Jon Turteltaub] s35/c; ph New York: Mitch Amundsen; 2uc: Eric Engler; legend seq ph: Daniel Pearl;

                    aph: Michael Kelem (Utah) & David B. Nowell

2004        Ask the Dust [Robert Towne] c; spph: Stephen Vaughan

2005        Killshot [John Madden] c; splinter unit ph: Doug Lawrence; Wescam ph: John Trapman

2006        The Spiderwick Chronicles [Mark Waters] s35 + IMAX-70bu/c; aph: Hans Bjerno

2008        My Sister's Keeper [Nick Cassavetes] p/c

2010        Dream House [Jim Sheridan] c

1976        Trains [+ scrpl/ph] see Films

1980        The Escape Artist [feature] ph: Stephen H. Burum

1987        Crusoe [feature] ph: Tomislav Pinter

1989        Twin Peaks [ep #7 'Realization Time'] 29-part tv-series; 1st season, 1990; ph: Frank Byers

1990        Twin Peaks [ep #15 'Lonely Souls' & #19 'Masked Ball'] 2nd season, 1990-91; ph: Frank Byers

1998        Clapton Chronicles: The Best of Eric Clapton [co-dir: Lili Fini Zanuck; v/c/60m]

2004        Law & Order: Trial by Jury [ep #2 '41 Shots', #7 'Bang & Blame' & #11 'Day' (crossover ep of 'Law & Order: Special

                    Victims Unit')] 13-part series, 2005 (#13 aired in 2006); ph: John Thomas

2005        Conviction [ep #5 'Savasana' & #6 'Madness'] 13-part series, 2006; ph: John Thomas

2007        Bones [ep #42 'The Glowing Bones in 'The Old Stone House"] series, 2005-present; 2nd season, 2006-07; ph: Gordon

                    Lonsdale

2008        The Robbery of Ellie May [feature] pre-production

1966        Bill Graham's 'Concert New Years Eve' [pop concert at the Fillmore Scene at Winterland, Post & Steiner Street, San

                    Francisco, 1966-67] lighting

1980        Personal Best [Robert Towne] special thanks; ph: Michael Chapman