Elmer G. Dyer [1892-1970] emerged as an aerial cameraman in his own right and through the 1940's and 1950's there was rarely a picture that didn't have his name attached to it.
MGM's epic 'Test Pilot' [1937, Victor Fleming; ph: Ray June] starred Clark Gable, Spencer Tracy, Lionel Barrymore and Myrna Loy. It starts out with Gable's character attempting a transcontinental speed record. Later he enters the Thompson Trophy Air Race in Cleveland, Ohio. Actual footage was shot during the race, and on the day after, a mock race was created using some of the actual race pilots. Albert Paul Mantz [1903-1965] was the chief pilot for the aerial filming unit.
Mantz, undoubtedly the most famous stunt flier in Hollywood history, and Dyer teamed up many times in years to come on aviation films including 'Flight Command' [1940, Frank Borzage; ph: Harold Rosson] and 'I Wanted Wings' [1940, Mitchell Leisen; ph: Leo Tover]. The last picture they worked on before reporting for active duty in the Army Air Corps was 'Air Force' [1942, Howard Hawks; ph: James Wong Howe]. Mantz and Dyer used several aircraft as platforms for their jobs including a Lockheed Orion, Stinson Model A and a Boeing 100.

In 1961, Paul Mantz joined up with pilot Frank Tallman [1919-1978] and created Tallmantz Aviation Inc., based at Orange County Airport. Mantz and Tallman's collaboration did not last long. In 1965, the two men were working on the movie 'The Flight of the Phoenix' [dir: Robert Aldrich; ph: Joseph Biroc] when Tallman, who was supposed to fly a landing sequence in the Arizona desert, shattered his kneecap during a fall at home, and Mantz took his place. On July 8, Mantz was performing the landing when one of his aircraft's wheels hit a small, sun-baked, mound of sand and caused him to lose control. The aircraft 'nosed in' killing Mantz instantly. A few days after Mantz's crash, Tallman faced his own individual tragedy when doctors amputated his leg because of a massive infection that had resulted from his broken kneecap. Despite the loss of his leg and his close friend, Tallman retaught himself how to fly using only one leg and returned to stunting. In subsequent years he worked on several big pictures, e.g. 'Catch-22' [1969], 'The Great Waldo Pepper' [1974], and 'Capricorn One' [1977]. On April 15, 1978, Tallman lost his life during a routine flight when he failed to clear a ridge near Palm Springs, California, due to poor visibility.

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Introduction of the Helicopter

For the next fifteen years there were few advancements in aerial photography even though there were several major aviation films made each year. The aerial cameramen's assignments were pretty much exclusive to those aviation related post WWII films and by today's standards the cinematography was limited in style and technique. It was to be the introduction of the civilian helicopter that changed aerial cinematography. The first time a helicopter was used in a feature film production was in April 1945 in the film 'The Bandit of Sherwood Forest' [d: George Sherman & Henry Levin; ph: Tony Gaudio, William Snyder & George B. Meehan Jr.; a specially designed helicopter with camera mounts in the cockpit was employed to film the scene in which Robin's men seize the castle]. In 1955 the TV series 'Highway Patrol' [1955-59; ph: Curt Fetters, Robert Hoffman, Monroe Askins, a.o.; helicopter pilot: Bob Gilbreath] introduced the helicopter to the public.

In 1957 the series 'Whirlybirds/Copter Patrol' followed.

Later in the early 1960's the TV show 'Ripcord' [1961-63] featured more hand-held camera work from helicopters.

Aerial Cinematographers [1960 - 1980]

Prior to utilizing helicopters as camera platforms, aerial shots were always on the move, with no ability to start a 'dolly' move nor end with one. The helicopter allowed directors and cameramen to design crane shots as they would for ground cameras but on a much larger scale. One shot that stood out in its day was Nelson Tyler's close up on Barbra Streisand's face while she stood upon the bridge of a tug boat on the Hudson River for the film 'Funny Girl' [1968]. This shot, which ended the film, set the standard for all aerial cameramen and those who could not achieve similar abilities were 'weeded out of the pack'. Tyler however did have an advantage back then with his newly developed Tyler Major Mount.

['... one would be the work of Nelson Tyler in the sixties, and in particular a sequence for the movie 'Funny Girl'. There's a very long continuous move that starts wide on New York, that finds a tugboat on the river, that goes down to the tugboat, that finds Barbra Streisand on the bridge of the boat, that goes in tight on her head and shoulders, that hits the end of the lens as she hits the high note in the middle of the song, and then goes out and up and back. You need to have a great deal of skill, and a telepathic relationship between pilot and cameraman to pull that off. And Nelson Tyler pulled all that off right back in the mid-sixties.' - Jerry Grayson]

Tyler, who came up through the studio system, got the idea of trying to isolate vibration while viewing the aerial credits on 'West Side Story' [1960-61]. They were shaky and he knew that there had to be a way to create smooth footage from helicopters. Within a year he put his new prototype mount to use on John Sturges' 'The Satan Bug' [1964]. Shortly thereafter he began production on his mounts and made them available to anyone who had the inclination to use them.
The Society of Operating Cameramen recognized Tyler's accomplishments and awarded him the coveted 'SOC Technical Achievement Award' in 1993.

Two of the first to use Tyler's mounts were John M. Stephens and David Butler. The camera of choice was the Mitchell Mark II because of its pin registered movement. Additionally its heavy weight added stability to the mount. Stephens, already a DP, worked with Tyler in the development years of the Major Mount and shot the second unit and aerials on 'Grand Prix' [1966] and 'Ice Station Zebra' [1968].
David Butler started out as Tyler's assistant and moved up to operator in 1966. Some of his aerial adventures with pilot David Jones include 'Planet of the Apes' [1967], 'The Gypsy Moths' [1968], 'Hello, Dolly!' [1968], 'Tora! Tora! Tora!' [1968-69], 'King Kong' [1976], and 'Apocalypse Now' [1976-77].
Most of David's assistants went on to become aerial cameramen including Rexford Metz, Don Morgan, Frank Holgate, David B. Nowell, and myself.
In 1977 David Butler and J. David Jones brought in some of the top pilots for Peter Hyams' film 'Capricorn One'. Frank Tallman doubled as Telly Savalas in a Stearman which eluded government helicopters through Redrock Canyon. Butler asked me to build him a platform that would enable him to sit outside a Hughes 500 with a Continental Mount and shoot straight forward or back. This, the first 'Outside Mount', worked perfectly for the chase sequences and added realism to the action. In addition to Tallman, Jones brought in Art Scholl, a national champion aerobatic pilot [1931-85; died during the filming of 'Top Gun' when his Pitts S-2 camera plane never recovered from an inverted flat spin and plunged into the Pacific Ocean], and the legendary Clay Lacy, with his Learjets and Continental Camera's Astrovision System.

Rexford Metz emerged as one of today's leading aerial cameramen and he flew with pilot Jim Gavin on most of his earlier work. Some of the films on which he was either 2nd unit and/or aerial DP include 'Dirty Harry' [1971], 'Airport 1975' [1974], 'Close Encounters of the Third Kind' [1976], and 'Courage Under Fire' [1995]. Metz utilizes the Tyler Major Mount, Gyrosphere, Wescam, Astrovision, and Vectorvision as some of his aerial tools.
Frank Holgate is another who was a product from the Tyler school of the 1960's and early 1970's. He became very popular by shooting the aerial sequences for one of the most spectacular helicopter chase films ever exposed on film: 'Birds of Prey' [1972, William Graham; ph: Jordan Cronenweth]. A helicopter TV reporter played by David Janssen witnesses a robbery where the bad guys use a helicopter for their getaway. This film is a 'must see' for anyone studying the art of aerial camera work.
In the late 1970's David B. Nowell, who earlier had assisted Metz and Butler, began operating the Continental Mounts and the Astrovision. He worked with pilot Rick Holley most often until Holley died in a helicopter crash while working on 'Runaway Train' in 1985. Nowell then began working with Holley's protégé Robert 'Bobby Z' Zajonc. David's loyalty and trust in 'Bobby Z' has unwaivered over the years since Holley's death, and their teamwork is in constant demand.
I took the step from assistant to operator on the 1982-83 season of 'Magnum, P.I.' [tv-series, 1980-88], thanks to pilot David Jones. For six months we lived in Hawaii and worked on Don Bellisario's 'Tales of the Gold Monkey' [tv-series, 1982-83] on the days we weren't working on 'Magnum, P.I.'. We then went on to another Bellisario project, 'Airwolf' [tv-series, 1984-87], which lasted three seasons. This four year association with Jones and producer Don Bellisario laid the foundation for my career as an aerial cinematographer. Because of the multitude of aircraft used on 'Airwolf' - sometimes we had up to ten helicopters - Jones introduced more pilots into the industry. They include Dirk Vahle, Kevin LaRosa, Rick Shuster, Peter McKernan Jr., and Mike Tamburro [1957-96; died in a helicopter crash], among others.

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Camera Mounts

In the 1960's, a Canadian subsidiary of Westinghouse developed a gyro-stabilized 35mm mount as a battlefield surveillance tool for the Canadian military. In 1974 Westinghouse decided to divest its defense division and allowed managers [including the chief designer J. Noxon Leavitt] of the unit working on a stabilized camera system to go off on their own with a company they called Istec Inc. The product line was a system which allowed an aircraft-mounted camera to be held steady despite the inherent instability of the aircraft. By 1994, the company was renamed Wescam [= Westinghouse camera] and the former owners sold out to then-president Mark Chamberlain. In September 2002 the Canadian success story was taken over by U.S. defense contractor L-3 Communications. The Wescam Entertainment Group was sold to Pictorvision in 2004.
Wescam's 'ball mount' was four feet in diameter and weighed far more than today's version. One of the first feature films the 35mm system worked on was 'Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice' [1968] and 'Tora! Tora! Tora!' [1968-69] with Jack Green [a founder of the Society of Operating Cameramen] as the Wescam technician.

In 1972 Ernst 'Bob' Nettmann, formerly of Tyler Camera Systems, branched off to create Continental Camera Systems. While at Continental, Nettmann helped develop the Kenworthy Snorkel System, and invented the Continental Mount, and the Astrovision System in 1974.
Astrovision changed the way we shot planes and jets. It is a dual periscope system which mounts in Clay Lacy's Learjets; one looking through the floor and the other through the roof. They pan in excess of 360° and tilt 45°. No longer did one have to mount four separate cameras in the nose, tail and sides of a B-25.
Nettmann departed Continental Camera and formed Matthews Studio Electronics in 1982. At Matthews, Bob developed the Vectorvision System which was an improvement over his older Astrovision by adding a 3-1 zoom and faster and sharper optics. Some of Bob's other developments included the Cam-Remote and the Gyron, the most advanced camera stabilizers and line of sight camera positioners. The product is being used for sports event coverage on fixed wing aircraft and on helicopters for TV news coverage.

Ron Goodman, a native of Canada, who briefly worked at the Wescam factory, went to Europe in 1971 and worked with a Wescam in the Netherlands. There he reworked the electronics, and began marketing it as the X-Mount. In 1973, using the X-Mount, he shot the longest single shot in any feature film to date - an 8 minute continuous shot in 'Professione: reporter/The Passenger' [dir: Michelangelo Antonioni; ph: Luciano Tovoli]. He also shot aerial sequences for 'Superman' [1977], 'Escape to Athena' [1978], 'The Empire Strikes Back' [1979], a.o. In 1984 Goodman moved to Hollywood to forward his career in the growing field of aerial cinematography. He made some additional improvements to the X-Mount and with Howard Preston marketed it as the Gyrosphere. Preston added a fourth gyro and the Gyrosphere made considerable inroads, however less than a handful of Hollywood's aerial cameramen were allowed to use it. The gyro stabilization added a steadiness that became a standard for many scenes, especially when head or tail credits are super-imposed over the stable image. Today, virtually all aerial credit sequences utilize a gyro-stabilized 'ball' mount.
Istec Inc., impressed with the Gyrosphere's improvements began redesigning the Wescam and vastly improved it. They did away with the Plexiglas viewing strip and replaced it with a tracking optically coated port hole. The big changes happened when the company was sold to some young businessmen and investors who took further interest in the company.
In the mid 1980's the Gyrosphere was the only ball mount based in Los Angeles and most all of the veteran aerial cameramen were not allowed to use it due to Ron Goodman's business policies. On a chance meeting at the 1985 SMPTE convention in L.A. with J. Noxon Leavitt, I mentioned to him that I'd like to represent his equipment here. In early 1987, Pasadena Camera Rental [Dan Wolfe & Stan McClain] introduced the Wescam to the United States. Using Bob Nettmann's and Nelson Tyler's business practices and ethics, Pasadena Camera invited all of the existing aerial cameramen to add this piece of equipment to the tools of their trade. Rexford Metz, Frank Holgate, David Butler, and David Nowell, are just a few who became proficient in its use.
Ron Goodman stayed with Gyrosphere for only three years, but, noting Wescam's rapid growth, decided to start from scratch with a new design and built the SpaceCam. He eliminated the reflection generating window, added larger and more powerful gyros that increased pan and tilt speeds, added a fiber optic video tap, and created a constant center of gravity film magazine. In addition he made an assortment of side, nose and rear facing brackets for a variety of helicopters. SpaceCam's versatility also allowed it to be mounted on cable rigs, camera cars, boats and cranes.

In September of 1991, tragedy struck. While Goodman was shooting the opening aerial scenes on 'Far and Away' a freak 150' wave caused a helicopter accident that destroyed the only SpaceCam, but fortunately both he and the pilot received only minor injuries. Two years later SpaceCam II was released. Goodman made further improvements including a gas suspension system and an articulated nose mount that allows the helicopter to bank in excess of 100°. Like Wescam, SpaceCam received an Academy Technical Achievement Award for it's individual merits.
Also in 1993, east coast aerial cameraman Don Sweeney began experimenting with Kenyon Laboratories K-8 gyros placed on the front of a Tyler Major Mount. This adaptation improved the mount's performance while maintaining the 'dutch', whip pan, and snap zoom capabilities that have made the Major Mount so versatile. In late 1994 Tyler modified all of his mounts to accept the gyros.
With the advent of the ball mounts, commercial production companies shifted their interest to them, but recently they have refocused on the Major Mount with the gyros. Most commercials have a series of one to four second shots, and with the newly added stability, the Major Mount is once again in vogue. Today Tyler's Major and Middle mounts rarely leave his facility without the new gyro package.
Aerial Cinematography has left us with some great legacies, most of who came up through the ranks of the studio system. Like most operators and DP's, we learned our craft as assistants from our generous mentors and have applied their techniques and the knowledge we gained from them in our work. [From article by Stan McClain + quotes from an article by David H. Onkst and information/photos from other sources.]

About the author: Stan McClain's introduction to aerial cinematography began with 'Jonathan Livingston Seagull' in 1972 where he worked on the aerial unit as a bird wrangler and 2nd assistant for the late aerial DP Jim Freeman. While working at Continental Camera Systems from 1974-81, he worked as a 1st assistant for David Butler, Rexford Metz and David Nowell. He has worked on over fifty feature films as an aerial cameraman and on well over two hundred commercials and has won twelve awards for his commercial work including Best Cinematography at the London International Advertising Awards. McClain has been the editor of 'The Operating Cameraman' magazine and was President [1997-99] of the Society of Operating Cameramen [SOC].

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'WINGS'

[Filming dates: 19 January - 5 April 1927]

'Wings' would become the first of many aviation films directed by William A. Wellman, who was himself a pilot and a veteran [Sgt. William A. Wellman, Cambridge, MA] of the renowned Lafayette Flying Corps/Lafayette Escadrille of World War I.
Aerial sequences were projected in Magnascope [special screen and projection system that, basically, enlarged the image from a viewing area of roughly 18x24' to anywhere from 18x34' all the way up to 22x38' - filling the entire proscenium area with a motion picture image] and, according to the Variety review, were in color, 'not natural, but with sky and clouds deftly tinted plus spouts of flame shooting from planes.' A horizontally split screen effect was used during one of the air battle scenes.
Military and civilian stunt pilots who performed in the film were Hoyt Vandenberg, Earl Partridge, Frank Tomick, Frank Andrews, Clarence Irvine, Sterling R. Stribling, Denis Kavanagh, E. J. 'Rod' Rogers and E. H. Robinson.
With the thousands of extras battling on the ground, dozens of airplanes flying around in the sky and hundreds of explosions going off everywhere, only two injuries on the entire picture were incurred. One was by veteran stunt pilot Dick Grace. A plane he was crashing was supposed to completely turn over, but it only turned partly over. Instead of being thrown clear of the plane as was the plan, Grace was hurled against part of the fuselage and broke his neck. He returned to the company after six weeks in the hospital. The other was by one of the army pilots helping out on the shoot. His crash was fatal and director William A. Wellman feared it would shut down production, but the army held the pilot, not the director, responsible.
The following people supervised the flying sequences: S. C. Campbell, Ted Parson, Carl von Hartmann [Haartman] and James A. Healy. Brig. Gen. F. P. Lahm and Maj. F. M. Andrews commanded the military pilots.
According to modern sources, the production of the film was made with major contributions from the United States War Department. The recreation of the battle of St. Mihiel was shot on location at Camp Stanley near San Antonio, TX, and aerial sequences were shot above Kelly Field. Wellman's crew spent a year in production at the ground school at Brooks Field to insure authenticity. Besides location sites, the War Department provided airplanes and air pilots from all over the country.
'Wings' is considered by film critics to be the first important movie about World War I aerial combat, and many film historians still rank its photography among the best on film. Stock footage of aerial combat from the film has been used in several other productions.

Ph by Harry Perry; addph: L.B. Abbott, E.F. Adams, Guy Bennett, Cliff Blackstone, Russell Harlan[d], Albert Myers, Gene O'Donnell, Paul Perry, William Rand, Herman Schopp [Schope/Schoop], Al Williams, E. Burton Steene, George Stevens & Sergeant Ward; c.op Akeley camera: Bert Baldridge, William H. Clothier, Frank Cotner, Faxon Dean, Art Lane, Ernest Laszlo, Harry Mason, Herbert Morris, Ray Olsen, Charles Riley, Harry Schapp & L. Guy Wilky.

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'HELL'S ANGELS'

[Filming dates: 31 October 1927 - late April 1930]

On 31 October 1927, 22-year-old millionaire Howard Hughes, the founder and president of The Caddo Company, Inc., put into production what, by 1930, would become a $4,000,000 film. 'Hell's Angels' broke all previous records for the amount of money spent on a single motion picture, and its enormous expense was unrivaled until 1940, when the final cost of 'Gone with the Wind' was tallied.
The idea to film a World War I aviation picture was suggested to Hughes by Marshall Neilan in the fall of 1926, and 'Hell's Angels' was begun nearly a year later as a silent film, at Metropolitan Studios. Paramount director Luther Reed was the first to direct the film, and did so for two months before quitting in January of 1928 because of Hughes' annoying interferences.
Following Reed's departure, Hughes decided to direct the picture himself. He took a special interest in the air sequences of the film, and personally oversaw the acquisition of forty warplanes, some of which were authentic World War I fighters. Hughes' fleet of airplanes constituted the largest fleet of military aircraft owned and commanded by a private individual.
Over the course of three years, the 'Hell's Angels' production was plagued with a number of fatal and near-fatal air mishaps. The film, both directly and indirectly, claimed the lives of two pilots and an assistant, who were killed in three separate air tragedies. Stunt pilot Clement K. Phillips was killed in a crash in Hayward, California, while delivering one of the airplanes to the Oakland location. Stunt pilots refused to perform an aerial sequence that director Howard Hughes wanted. Hughes did his own flying. He got the shot, but he also crashed the plane.
When the completed silent version of 'Hell's Angels' was previewed in March of 1929, Hughes, at the urging of co-director [dialogue staging] James Whale, decided to scrap the film and reshoot it in sound.
Production resumed in early September 1929. Not only were thousands of feet of film scrapped for the new production, but so was the star, Greta Nissen. Filming began on the sound version of 'Hell's Angels' without a female lead. Later, Hughes decided on Jean Harlow after being introduced to her by leading man Ben Lyon.
The final scene of the film, the battle scene involving the brigade, was shot on December 7, 1929 and involved 1,700 extras. In addition to sound, the film featured a two-color Technicolor process, which was used for the ballroom scene, and about forty percent of the film was shown in tinted colors. All totaled, a record-breaking 2,254,760 feet of film [about 560 hours] was shot and developed for the picture - the largest amount of negative discarded for a single film.

Ph by Antonio [Tony] Gaudio & Harry Perry; 2uc: Ernest Laszlo; aph: Elmer Dyer, E. Burton Steene, Dewey Wrigley, Osmond Borradaile, Charles P. Boyle, Edward Colman, Henry Cronjager, Jockey Arthur Feindel, Jack Greenhalgh, Paul Ivano, Roy H. Klaffki, Jack MacKenzie, Edward Snyder, L. Guy Wilky, Alvin Wyckoff, a.o.

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Some Contemporary Aerial Cinematographers

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