Albert Whitlock - quotes
Quotations relating to Albert Whitlock...
Film Production
One of the stories that Al [Whitlock] related to me was when he showed a test one of his background paintings of Bodega Bay to Hitchcock. It was a beautiful scene of Bodega Bay in the background. Hitch thought it looked very beautiful. Without Al being there, he showed it to Peggy Robertson, his assistant. And he said, "What do you think?" And she said, "Oh, that looks like a painting." And Hitch stiffened and thought, "Oh." Then he said, "You know, of course, it's real." And she said, "Oh, I know it's real, but it's so beautiful it could be a painting." And so it was a compliment to Al's extraordinary painting skills that it fooled everybody but was still bigger than life.
— Syd Dutton (2000)
source: Documentary: All About The Birds
keywords: Albert Whitlock, Alfred Hitchcock, Bodega Bay, Peggy Robertson, The Birds (1963), and production
Film Post-Production
Michelson describing how the visual effect of seeing Dan Fawcett's empty eye sockets was achieved...
That was also a matte shot. You won't believe this, but the two eyes were painted as a matte. The makeup man would put black where the eye was and then Albert would get the print and the black part is not processed — is not developed. And he would paint whatever he had to paint for the eyes — leave holes or what ever it is — painted them on glass and then put that together, and that would be the result.
— Harold Michelson (2000)
source: Documentary: All About The Birds
