When I was starting out, fresh from Drafting School, all I ever dreamed of was being a Set Designer. I gathered all the tools, I was rapidly developing the greatest collection of tools and templates. This did not go unnoticed, in fact, I received several gifts to ad to my kit. One of them was a really nice Camera Angle calculator.
At first, I was overwhelmed with it, as I was undereducated when it came to understanding the camera angles. As I learned more about Camera Angles, I would pick it up and figure out how to use it.
By the time I was actually working as a Set Designer, I hadn't yet used the calculator. I had yet to design a complete set. But the day came: I was asked to calculate the backdrop needed on a set. I proudly pulled out my fancy calculator. The Art Director just stared at me. "What?" I asked.
"What are you doing?" He asked. I showed him my nice shiny calculator. He stared back, blankly and said: "And how the hell do you know what lenses and angles they are going to use?"
He had a legitimate point. In fact, I had indeed wondered that myself: It was part of the mystery of the gadget. He then educated me on the reality of designing for film & TV. He taught me how to calculate for (realistic) worst-case-scenarios. By covering every possible angle, regardless of what the camera's angle would be, the set would be covered. To this day, I use his methods. I still have my shiny calculator, and Its still never been used.
The bottom line is if you can see off the set, so can the camera.
Well, if your calculator is what I think it is and does what I think it does, I have used such a thing to sketch a specific shot from a plan. Sort of like what a Vectorworks camera object now renders.
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