Editing Schindler's List (section)

=== Cinematography ===
Influenced by the 1985 documentary film ''[[Shoah (film)|Shoah]]'', Spielberg decided not to plan the film with [[storyboard]]s, and to shoot it like a documentary. Forty percent of the film was shot with handheld cameras, and the modest budget meant the film was shot quickly over seventy-two days.{{sfn|McBride|1997|pp=431–432, 434}} Spielberg felt that this gave the film "a spontaneity, an edge, and it also serves the subject."{{sfn|McBride|1997|p=432}} He filmed without using [[Steadicam]]s, elevated shots, or [[zoom lens]]es, "everything that for me might be considered a safety net."{{sfn|McBride|1997|p=432}} This matured Spielberg, who felt that in the past he had always been paying tribute to directors such as [[Cecil B. DeMille]] or [[David Lean]].{{sfn|Ansen|Kuflik|1993}}

Spielberg decided to use [[black and white]] to match the feel of documentary footage of the era. Cinematographer Janusz Kamiński compared the effect to [[German expressionist cinema|German Expressionism]] and [[Italian neorealism]].{{sfn|McBride|1997|p=432}} Kamiński said that he wanted to give the impression of timelessness to the film, so the audience would "not have a sense of when it was made".{{sfn|McBride|1997|p=431}} Universal chairman Tom Pollock asked him to shoot the film on a color [[Original camera negative|negative]], to allow color VHS copies of the film to later be sold, but Spielberg did not want to accidentally "beautify events".{{sfn|McBride|1997|p=432}} However, scenes with the girl in the red coat were shot in color, and later [[rotoscoping|rotoscoped]] over by hand to remove all color except for the coat.<ref>{{Citation |last=Buchanan |first=Kyle |title=How Steven Spielbergs Cinematographer Got These Eleven Shots |date=2012-11-14 |work=[[Vulture (website)|Vulture]] |url=https://www.vulture.com/2012/11/how-steven-spielberg-cinematographer-janusz-kaminski-got-these-shots.html |access-date=2024-05-15 |language=en}}</ref>