The Revenant and Scandal Take Top Honors At The SOC Awards

Cinematographer Caleb Deschanel accepted the camera operator of the year award for feature films on behalf of P. Scott Sakamoto.
Sakamoto could not attend because he was on location, but cinematographer Caleb Deschanel read a statement from the operator. “The Revenant was probably the most challenging movie in many ways, but also the most rewarding in many ways. I want to give a special thanks to Chivo, who was not only my inspiration for doing The Revenant, but a wonderful collaborator and contributor to the camera’s visual language of the movie. My career has been influenced by many great DPs, but tonight, I want to single out Haskell Wexler. He brought me into this business and was a dear friend. He always attended when I was nominated and must have some pull up there because I won. Thank Haskell. May your voice never be forgotten.”
The heartfelt message reminded us of the loss of one of the great cinematographers who passed away in December. The SOC looked back in memorandum at Haskell’s legendary career along with another industry titan who we lost, cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmond.

Steve Fracol
During the entire evening you could feel the members of the SOC are a family, especially when honoring Stephen Campanelli, SOC with the lifetime achievement award for camera operator of the year. Clint Eastwood took the stage to present Campanelli with the honor saying, “My operator Jack Green was moving up to DP and I asked him who is going to be able to do this? Scott said I got a guy named Stephen Campanelli. I said he’s Italian so he can’t be too bad. That was 21 years ago. Eighteen films later I’m still hanging out with him. The secret to making a great film is to get a lot of people who are good and then let them make you look good. Steve is one of those guys.”

Clint Eastwood (left) with lifetime achievement award winner Stephen Campanelli.
Bruce Doering, now retired after 30 years from being the national executive director of the International Cinematographers Guild was honored with the President’s Award. “The first SOC awards I attended was in 1986. I can’t tell you how much the SOC has grown. I’m proud to be standing here tonight.”
Also during the ceremony, the SOC presented several lifetime achievement awards. As previously announced, the honorees were Jack Glenn, mobile camera platform, Gregory Irwin, camera technician, and Murray Close, still photographer,

Gary Lucchesi
Steven Manios, Sr., of Precision Optics was honored with the distinguished service award and the technical achievement award was presented to Cartoni for their Lambda Head.