Book Review: The Five C's of Cinematography by Joseph Mascelli

It's not that often that I'll go out of my way to review or promote a book, but I was going through my shelves recently and came across and oldie but goodie that I hadn't looked at in a while.

I was quickly reminded what a useful beginners' tool / professionals' review book I had in The Five C's of Cinematography by Joseph V. Mascelli.

If you're experienced in the area, Mascelli still does a good job of reviewing things in a digestible way. If you're just starting out, he introduces concepts and principles that will largely form the basis of your cinematography work. It can be an especially useful read if you don't come from a strong still photography background and are therefore not heavily versed in shot composition, form, mass and the like.

Mascelli provides a wealth of relevant illustrations of each concept, framing and lighting actors and capturing the images that represent his principles in movie "screen capture" format. The book has been around for some time, and while techniques have evolved somewhat since the first printing, the fact remains that these principles do form the foundation of modern cinematography. You can't do trigonometry if you never learn arithmetic.

The New York Times review on the back states that "Mr. Mascelli provides the attentive reader with the equivalent of a complete course in filmmaking." While this may be a slight overstatement, it is true that there is great value for the time and money to be had within these pages, and especially so for the attentive reader. But attentive reading is generally required for all instances where you are reading to learn, rather than reading to escape. And Joseph Mascelli does a pretty good job of making it easy to remain attentive from cover to cover.

In case you want to take a glimpse inside the covers or at some samples of the writing, the link is available below.