Cinematographer vs. DP

That would be Director of Photography rather than Double Penetration.

Film pros: What’s the difference between a Director of Photography and a Cinematographer?

Well, I suppose this should wait until a real “film pro” turns up to answer this, but the IMDB Glossary offers this distinction:

Thus, in the most common case (where there is only one cinematographer working on a film), there doesn’t seem to be any real difference between the two terms. I note that other websites seem to use them interchageably. For example, this page starts off a definition of “cinematographer” by saying

Cinematographer/DP chiming in here.

They are exactly the same thing.

There is much discussion on this at www.cinematography.com in the forums. Some say there is a tendency for european crews to say DP and american to say cinematographer… or maybe that was the other way around. :slight_smile:

They are the same job, though.

The only real difference I can think of is that I don’t remember ever seeing the title “Cinematographer” in a movie credit. It’s always “Director of Photography” (or I know sometimes in Europe, “Cinematography by…”)

This is from memory and I’d be happy to hear exceptions to this (though trusting the IMDB in this regard would be a mistake).

IMDb has an “Ask the Expert” column where they have three working professionals respond to submitted inquiries about their jobs. There’s a screenwriter, a director, and a cinematographer. The cinematographer is Oliver Stapleton, who has shot a number of movies you’re all familiar with. This exact question came up within the last few weeks, and his response matches FilmGeek’s: There is no official difference between the terms.

Unfortunately, the site seems to be down at the moment, so I can’t link to the column in question. Whenever it comes back up, though, the column can be found off the archive link on this page:

http://us.imdb.com/Indie/Ask/

Site’s back up, here’s the link.

Didn’t they used to call them “Lighting Cameramen” in the UK?

Actually, you will very occasionally still see that title. Kubrick used it on Eyes Wide Shut, for example, mostly because he was so hands-on with the shooting that he didn’t think it was appropriate to give somebody full credit as cinematographer. Kinda egotistical, maybe, but if anybody can justify it it’s him.