Some highlights from Steve Slocomb's career

hyperlinks are in yellow

tthis is a very long page
 

    
UCLA

     This black and white picture was from my very first roll of film back when I was an engineering student at UCLA in 1968. After graduating it only took a little over a year for me to leave engineering and go full bore into photography. I never looked back, although the engineering background did help on some of the high tech visual effects projects that would eventually come my way.
    The color images of the sodas and children are from my first roll of slide film. They were taken on a cave exploring trip to a remote part of Mexico in 1970. This trip eventually led to my learning Spanish and later living in Guatemala. Over the years I took some 30,000 slides before migrating into digital photography.

Photography of Actors and Models

    While I was working as an engineer at Hughes Aircraft I was building up a portfolio of actors and models on the side. This work was done for free. I did learn a lot about working with people and also keeping aware of the lighting.
    After work each night I would spend 3 or 4 hours in the darkroom, then on the weekends I would go out to take photographs. I was spared having to quit Hughes by being laid off due to a defense cutback.
 

Magic Mountain

     My first real paying photography job was taking pictures of the various entertainers that appeared at Magic Mountain amusement park in the summer of 1971.
     I had two performances in which to get my photos. I then developed the film in my darkroom, made prints and then they were bound into a handmade fold out book and given to the entertainers as gifts.
     These people included Phyllis Diller (pictured), Jerry Van Dyke, Frank Gorshin (pictured-as Bela Lugosi), Rich Little, Rowan and Martin, Jimmy Durante, Pat Boone and many others.
     This photography was all about timing -getting that "decisive moment" (quoting Cartier- Bresson), as motor drives didn't exist back then.

Charles and Ray Eames Design Studio

     My motion picture career really begins here. I was extremely fortunate in 1972 to go to work for this prestigious design firm. Charles and Ray were amongst the foremost designers in the twentieth century. They were known for their chair designs, multimedia productions, films (over 100), displays, and the design of their home.
    Their work still surrounds us every day -ever gone to an airport and sat in an Eames chair, or watched the Daily show? 
    The United States Postal Service has just released a set of stamps celebrating some of their work.
     This is where I learned macro, stop motion, time lapse, and cel animation filming techniques. Much of the motion picture work was in 35mm. Still photography was often "8x10" or 4"x5". The Eames were known for their quest for perfection, which sometimes made my life difficult.
    I was lucky enough to be able to travel around the country with Charles, often with both of us taking 35 slide images for the various projects.  All of our  images are now housed in the Library of Congress.

  King Khalid City

     In 1974 I traveled to Italy to shoot material for a film on King Khalid City in Saudi Arabia. This was at the foundry north of Rome that was making a commemorative bronze.  We then went to Saudi Arabia to gather other elements for the film, including photos of Saudis that would be made into 6" high prints and cut out to be used in a miniature that was built in Santa Monica.

Guatemala: The Jungle & Antigua

    I spent 1976 in Guatemala. I briefly ran back up to the states to buy a 16mm movie camera, and get married. The night I returned, the horrific earthquake that killed 25,000 people hit. My wife and I stayed on in Antigua as all the tourists left and helped out in a hospital for a while. The hospitals were emptied of people and supplies and moved out into the streets  because of the danger of aftershocks....of which there were several.

       

    We then headed out to the Peten jungle to do wildlife photography. On the way we passed a young girl selling live "food", something we passed on, but no doubt delicious. We stayed in an old hunting lodge..if you can call it that for six weeks. The whole wildlife filming thing was basically a bust. I hadn't realized that most animals are nocturnal, moving quietly through the thick jungle. There is a reason you never see documentaries about tapirs or jaguars (except those done with captive animal in enclosures).

          

    We then headed back up to the highlands to Antigua When Semana Santa (holy week) arrived I was able to film the amazing processions that take place... without any tourists cluttering the images. This picture shows me in a crowd scene with my 16mm Bolex camera. 

    There are many processions emanating from the churches in the area. Each procession has an incredibly heavy "anda" or float carried by chosen parishioners-sometimes as many as 80!
    Atop each anda resides a statue of a religious figure that has been removed from the church. The processions led by the andas trample through the intricate sawdust carpets that have been created in prior days. The air is filled with the pungent smell of incense and sounds of marching bands. It was a truly breathtaking experience.

Star Trek the Motion Picture

     I worked on Star Trek for around a year and a half starting in 1976, first at Robert Abel & Associates then for Doug Trumbull.  I filmed miniatures and matte paintings.

     I took this photo at the shop where the model of the starship Enterprise was created. Here it is being examined by (left to right):

Gene Rodenberry - creator of the Star Trek series

Richard Taylor - effects director

Robert Wise - director (Sound of Music, West Side
                                    Story, etc.)

Robert Abel - Director of  ground breaking effects
                      company baring his name

    The small picture is of a super bright light source used to provide the light that would be emanating from the energy monster which would be composited in later to cover the actual bulb. The bulb emitted a dangerous amount of ultra violet light hence the welder glasses.

Magic Journeys

    This was the first Disney 3D film, made in 1979 for the Epcot Center in Florida. Disney built the 65mm cameras in their engineering department. They also fabricated the system that held two of the cameras in 90 degree positions to each other-shooting through a 50% beam splitter. 
    The picture on the right was a miniature of the Sphinx being filmed by the 3D rig skimming along near the ground.        
     The picture to the lower right was taken the first day as we were filming ocean waves at Zuma beach. A wave crashed into the specialized fluid head the camera system rested upon. That night it was sent in to be rebuilt.
    The picture below is of one of many fish that were filmed against a blue screen so that they could be composited in other scenes (like against a cloud filled sky).

THE 3D YEARS:

Friday the 13th part III
 

Man Who Wasn't There

Nightmare on Elm Street VI

    These three 3D feature films were all made at the height of the 3D craze in the early 1980's.
    Friday the 13th 3D was very successful movie. I worked with the prototype single lens 3D system. It was  extremely buggy and made for a difficult shoot. The interesting thing on teen slasher movies is all the time that goes into making lifelike prosthetics and on rigging complex effects. When the eyeballs popped out of the "actor's" head and into the lens, it made for an effective but gross  3D effect.
    The Man Who Wasn't There (not the Coen Brothers film) was a decent budget Paramount 3D invisible man comedy starring Steve Guttenberg. Unfortunately is was a  terrible movie..Leonard Maltin rated it as one of the 10 worst movies of the year...he was right (See review).    
    As the 3D craze was winding down I worked as a 3D consultant on the 10 minute 3D ending of the Nightmare on Elm Street. We used a double camera 35mm 3D system. I took this photo of Freddy..a great guy actually.
    The 3D craze pretty much was dying when I moved to Montana (except of course for theme park 3D films).  The funny this is that the 3D craze is back on now as an attempt to get people away from their high definition TV sets and into the theaters.
    I did consult on a couple of theme park 3D projects later on in my career; Time Machine of Dreams, and The Manitoba Experience.

White Fang

    I flew up to Haines Alaska to film sequences that would be used by the Disney special effects people in Burbank to construct the scene of the miners during the gold rush as they climbed Chilkoot Pass. 
     It was decided to film in Haines Alaska rather than Skagway for logistical reasons.  I used a 65mm camera to maximize the image quality as it would be manipulated in post production.
      To recreate the famous scene where all the miners are in a row ascending the pass we had to resort to some optical tricks. The shot of the row of extras was done twice, once when they were at the bottom of  the pass and then again when they moved on up. The reason for this was the production company couldn't locate enough extras in the area, so they doubled the quantity by splitting the two shots together to show what looked like a continuous line of miners.    
     Also, matte painters would be adding a tent city at the bottom and a new pass at the top.
     The extreme cold was a problem so the camera had heaters both inside the body and on the magazine. We still had problems with the film breaking so had to load the camera in a warm tent and wait till the last minute to bring it out into the cold.

1984 Summer Olympic Games in Los Angeles

    I worked for the architects and designers of the games documenting their work at the various venues. I shot both 35mm slides and 16mm film.
    In some ways it was a dream job. I could flit from venue to venue all over Los Angles, Santa Barbara and Orange counties. I even had access to the Olympic village which was off limits to other photographers.

Captain Eo

     This 3D theme park production starring Michael Jackson was produced by George Lucas and directed by Francis Ford Coppola. The first picture shows the double 65mm camera 3D rig on the end of a crane arm. On the ladder is Angelica Huston, Francis is behind the camera on the right, and I am seated. As is typical of these special effects intensive films there is quite a bit of "hurry up and wait" time.  It was said that it was the most expensive movie per minute that had ever been made.  I was responsible for the operation of the camera system, and then in post production was the director of photography of the stop motion  robot transformation sequence.

Disorganized Crime

    I was the still photographer in 1988 on this Disney produced comedy. It was shot in my home town of Hamilton Montana. There was an eclectic cast of characters including Fred Gwynne, Lou Diamond Philips, Corbin Bernsen and Hoyt Axton.
     Quite a bit of the action took place at night which made my job difficult. I shot with both black and white, and  color film. 

Pee-wee's Playhouse

I was, for a short time in 1989,  the director of photography on the clay animation sequences for Pee-wee's Playhouse. These included the Refrigerator People (aka "Food"-pictured), Penny, and the Dinosaur Family. I set up something like 8 or 9 stop motion (frame by frame) camera systems for the various characters being manipulated by the animators.  No, I never got to meet Paul Reubens.

Architectural Miniatures

    Off and on for several years I was involved with photographing miniatures for architects and designers. Much of the architectural photography was for the visionary architect Jon Jerde .
    This was painstaking work involving specialized equipment. We came up with a system utilizing an overhead array of mirrors that could be illuminated with a single light source.
    If you notice, the images of the display for IBM has realistic looking people. They were actually still photos that were cut out and had a T pin affixed to the back side to push into the floor to hold them.

Solar Crisis

    I was the the publicity photographer for this 55 million dollar (best forgotten) film starring among others Charlton Heston and Jack Palance (pictured).
     The exteriors were mostly shot north of Las Vegas in the desert. Giant "Ritter" fans were to to create the ever present dust storms (think Mad Max). This made for a highly unpleasant experience.
     This disaster plagued production started with the inadvertent burning up of a "robot truck". This happened the first day! I don't know if the film was ever released in the United States.  (reviews)

Muppetvision 3D

  The 1991 theme park film Muppetvision 3D still plays at California Adventure (next to Disneyland) and at Disney Florida.  I worked on it with Jim Henson (Kermit the Frog) and Frank Oz (Miss Piggy) at the Disney Studios in Burbank. I was responsible for the operation of the 3D 65mm camera system.
     One of the things I found interesting is that Jim Henson and Frank Ox didn't get out of character when there was a break to load film into the  magazines. It was weird having Kermit and Miss Piggy carry out conversations with each other and with crew members in the area.
     It was truly delightful experience...thank god I was done with slasher movies! This is one of the highest rated attractions in the parks.
    Unfortunately this was one of the last projects Jim worked on before his untimely death.
     The photo of Jim and Steve was taken the last day of production just after they gave out the T- shirts. I just added some of the Muppet characters to the photo. The lower picture shows 4 puppets being manipulated by puppeteers for the grand finale of the program.

Some Montana Movies:

Far and Away

Ballad of Little Jo

Holy Matrimony

    I worked on the Montana filming of these movies, but only for a week or so in each case.
      It was cool working for nice guy Ron Howard on Far and Away.
     Ballad of Little Jo featured the "wizard" Ian Mckellen (Lord of the Rings). It was based on a true story of a woman passing as a man in the old west.
     Leonard Nemoy was the director on Holy Matrimony and was as stern a person in real life as when he played  Mr. Spock on Star Trek. The movie took place in the Great Falls area and revolved around a Hutterite colony.

      
 

Total Recall

Predator

    On Predator I supervised the alien creature blowing itself up scene. This was filmed  near the Maya ruins of  Palenque, Mexico, at a waterfall known as Misol-ha. The whole Predator costume had been a major problem as the first costume was too heavy to wear and needed cables from above to support it. This second one was at least wearable by Kevin Hall (seven foot 2.5 inches tall). When I flew down to Mexico City from Los Angeles I hand carried a pair of tennis shoes for him. They had to be custom made and were size 23 The face on the Mexican Customs agent as he opened the box and looked at the shoes in wide eyed amazement was precious.
    For Total Recall I was a camera operator for the blue screen sequences at the end of the film. They were done at Churubusco studios in Mexico City. It wasn't a very pleasant place, all run down and with dangerous bare electrical wires poking out of the walls. Also, everyone on the production came down with dysentery at one point or the other, myself included. So much for the glory of working in the business! The picture on the right has Arnold coming up the stairs.

 
Season of Change

     I was the director of photography and camera operator on this 35mm feature film done in my home town of Hamilton Montana. It had a good cast including Michael Madsen, Hoyt Axton, Nicole Thom, and Jo Anderson among others.
    It took place after World War II and dealt with a father's coming to grips with the trauma of war, while at the same time his daughter was coming of age.
    It was filmed in the dead of winter giving it a nice look.
    The movie didn't get  a theatrical release although a couple of 35mm prints were struck. It aired on Lifetime channel and is sold as a DVD. (there is a music video style clip on this page of my site).


    

   
                

                  
 

The Story of the Bitterroot

     This documentary was about the bitterroot plant and its relationship to the Salish Indians and to Lewis and Clark. It took several years to make and was basically self produced with me doing the shooting, editing, writing and animation. It eventually aired on PBS stations in 5 states, and is sold throughout the country. It is shown in all the Montana public schools utilizing a lesson plan for 8th graders I produced.
     The photo with me wearing the LCD virtual reality glasses was taken one of the numerous times I went up to the Sapphire mountains to film the various stages in the life cycle of the bitterroot plant. There were quite a few special effects techniques utilized in the making of the video, including: time lapse, animation, and macro photography.
    Much of the program was derived from interviews with Salish Indian elders. There were also appearances by several scholars including writer/historian Stephen Ambrose who spoke about Lewis and Clark's first encounter with the Salish.

Network Videography

     From 1994 to the present I have been working part time as a stringer for the major networks. It was a pleasure to work for many of the network correspondents. I was amazed at their ability to conjure up things to say in a short period of time.
     I  have been all over the state of Montana and have met some interesting characters in the process. One highlight was getting the first videotape of our own Unibomber.    
    Caveat: except for Tony Hawk, these pictures of some of the people I have filmed were plucked off the Web.

United States Forest Service
Training Videos

    For 15 years I have been making training films for the Forest Service's Missoula Technology and Development Center. I shoot most of the video footage and edit it into the completed project. I also help direct and develop the scripts. This work has taken me all over the United States; from Maine to the Olympic Peninsula.
    Most of  the  videos are based on field interviews working with a staff sociologist. The subject matter has covered  such subjects as how to use a fire shelter, how to avoid violent situations, being a wilderness ranger, and how to construct mountain bike trails.
     I recently spent part of two summers filming wild land fire crews on fires in Montana and Idaho to gather footage for a video on entrapment avoidance.
    The current project just now being completed deals with illegal immigration and drug smuggling along the Mexican border. It is designed to help all the federal and state agencies alert their employees to the issues they will face working along the border and how to deal with them. It is some 90 minutes long with a section on  special problems firefighters in the area face.
    Several trips were made to Arizona to gather interview material and then back again to get B roll (visuals). We rode along with employees from many different agencies as they went out in the field to work. During this filming we had several encounters with illegal aliens and the Border Patrol.
    The project has been a real eye opener as to the severity of the problems along the border. Among other things the resource damage is enormous.

 
Still Photography...Again

    After a long hiatus, I have jumped back into still photography; documenting rural life style, nature and community events. I am currently exploring time-lapse photography made into high definition video clips with an eye to online sales.

New Directions

    Since 2008 I have been producing Virtual Reality movies for the WEB. I have taken them to a new level of quality with 360 degree spherical viewing (all the way up, down and around). The one I did of the Serbian Orthodox church in Butte is particularly interesting with its ornately painted ceiling. Others include the Davenport Hotel in Spokane, the Missoula Art Gallery, homes for sale, and more. Visit the Virtual Reality  page.

     Also, I have started producing campaign and issue oriented TV commercials. See Denise Juneau's here. I hope to do more of these as time goes on.