CHENNAI: CJ Rajkumar happened to watch the 1986 movie Oomai Vizhigal in college. The title credit of the movie read: ‘A film by film students’ and eventually the movie’s cinematography inspired him to become a cameraman. Today, Rajkumar is one of the most sought-after cinematographers and has helmed several short films and feature films, some of which have also won international awards.
The technician, who was the first to author a book on cinematography in Tamil, Asaiyum Padam, has now released his seventh book — Camera Kangal — A Book on 100 years of Tamil Cinematographers.
Walking down memory lane, he shares, “I joined the Film Institute with the dream of becoming a film maker. After completing the course, I joined as an assistant cinematographer with renowned film maker Thankar Bachan for the movie Kaadhal Kottai (1996),” recalls Rajkumar whose second book Pixel was announced as the syllabus for Balu Mahendra’s film school, by the legend himself.
Ask him what pushed him to author his recent book, which traces the history of cinematographers in the Tamil film industry and he narrates, “My friend Thirunavukkarasu, who is the editor of a monthly magazine Nizhal, asked me for an article on Tamil cinematographers on account of the centenary year celebrations of Tamil Cinema, which I did. While researching for that article, I realised that no proper documentation of the cinematographer’s community was ever made! And this called for a structured book.”
It took almost nine months for Rajkumar to research and document information. “I would say that this is the toughest of all my books, in terms of writing. I watched many classics again in the guise of writing this book, spoke with many of my seniors about their experiences and asked them about things that should be emphasised specifically,” he shares.
His biggest challenge, he says, was collecting data, checking facts and sometimes watching certain movies for writing about a particular technology used by the cinematographers. “Collecting photographs of cinematographers was a very big task too. I had to capture some photos from old videos and those were used in this book. I have written about certain techniques used in those times where they had no precedence or resources,” shares the teaching faculty at BOFTA, cinematography department.
Interactions with historians like Aranthai Manian, who gave him details of the pioneers in the industry, writer Sivan, who had authored more than 150 books and S Sivaraman, who is the general manager of Prasad Laboratories, led him to an archive of information. “Legendary cinematographers B Kannan and Robert Asirwatham provided me the details of medieval era cinematographers...which otherwise I may not have known,” he points out.
With the science of cinematography constantly changing, the book focuses on Tamil film cinematographers right from the silent era to the current digital era, spanning 100 years. “In this digital era, CDs or DVDs are no more used; we use pen drives, which will also eventually change in the years to come. In future, movies will be viewed using different platforms. ,” he avers.
The book has information about 174 cinematographers and a special mention of about 27 cinematographers along with their select filmography in chronological order. “I have hundreds of favourite cinematographers to name. To be specific, one is Vincent ‘master’ and BS Loknath, who did remarkable work in both B/W and colour era. In contemporary cinematographers, I love Mahesh Muthusamy, Sathyan Sooryan and Sujith Sarang,” he gushes. “I hope this book throws light on some unsung heroes of this industry.”
Silent era
Silent films started as documentation of certain events like, pre-Independence movement, prevention of Cholera and farming. This led to the first feature film Keechaka Vadham (1918).
Lesser known facts
● Cinematographer NK Viswanathan filmed dual appearances in a frame by using camera movements
● Cinematographer Kichaas invented a steady rig for fluid camera movements
Camera Kangal will be available at the Chennai Book Fair, stall #383/384. For details, call: 9025775455