Garrett Brown

Garrett Brown ( born April 6, 1942 in Long Branch ( New Jersey)) is an American cinematographer, who is especially known by the development of the Steadicam. His son Jonathan Brown is also a cameraman.

Life

Development of Steadycam

Brown's invention revolutionized the mid-1970s the use of cameras in film and television productions. The Steadicam allows a cameraman to film while it continues to move on foot, without the image as usual when using a hand-held camera shake through the steps. The Steadicam system was first in Hal Ashby's movie This land is my land (1976 ) used, who received an Oscar nomination for this technique. After the system has been used in movies such as Rocky, in which the running and training sequences were filmed in this way. Also in the film The Return of the Jedi Steadicam was used. For a characteristic scene of the film Garrett walked with the Steadicam, which recorded with a film exposure per second, through a forest. This led later during the movie at normal speed to the illusion of high speed from the subjective perspective of the speeder bikes. The system has been extensively used in Stanley Kubrick's film The Shining (1980). Brown's Steadicam system was now in hundreds of movies and commercials used.

Other camera developments

Brown has continued the SkyCam ( for football games), DiveCam (by divers to pursue under water) and the MobyCam developed (by professionals to pursue swimming under water).

Awards (selection)

He was honored with the Academy Award for technical merit in 1999. In 1978 he received the Academy Award of Merit. In 2006 he received the Academy Award for science and development.

The American Society of Cinematographers honored him in 2002 with the ASC President's Award.