Photographic Section

I. Some Navajo of Pine Springs meet in the chapter house to hear the authors ask permission to carry out their project.

2-3' Two frames of the seesaw sequence filmed by Maxine Tsosie. She cut the sequence apart and reordered it so that the motion of the two boys remained the same as in the unedited film.

4. On the first day of filming, Al Clah painted words on the ground and other objects and photographed them. He said that they represented ideas for his film and he was "just trying them out."

5. One of the frames casually exposed in running up the first five feet of film in the camera during the first instruction. When the first rushes were screened, all the students were struck by this footage, saying that they clearly saw a snake in the grass. Worth, Adair, and Chalfen had difficulty understanding the students' comments because they had disregarded the footage as meaningless.

6-11. Frames from John Nelson's short film, Navajo Horse. Johnny asked, "What happens when I take bits of a horse and cut them apart and put them in between shots of a whole horse?" 7 and 9 were made on the first day of filming; 6, 8, and 10 were made at the squaw dance the next day and intercut in editing with the "pieces of a horse." 1 1 is the shot taken at the end when horses and riders dashed across the field. At this

point the drumstick held by the lead horseman broke. Because of this shot, Johnny was asked to pay a fine or return the footage to the family.

12-14. Close-ups of some of the students taken by Worth on the first day before he realized that face close-ups were not something the Navajo did. 12 is Mary Jane Tsosie, 13 is Maxine Tsosie, and 14 is Mike Anderson.

15. The face close-up of John Nelson made by Al Clah as he began his film Intrepid Shadows. It follows the action of poking a stick at the spider web. Seeing this shot in the rushes, Johnny refused to act further in any film by Al Clah.

16-21. The only face close-ups made by the Navajo. 16-20 are from "I am thinking about the design" sequences used in two of the films. 16-17 were made by Susie Benally and were on the screen for about two seconds. 18-20 were made by John Nelson: there was about one second of 18, followed by a half-second of 19 before the head turned down in 20. 21 was made of Sam Yazzie by Maxine Tsosie for her film Spirit of the Navajo. Most of the audience at the world premiere giggled or whispered at seeing it. In

the film, the grandfather's eyes sweep back and forth to avoid looking directly into the camera.

22-25. Frames from three different shots edited into one walking sequence by Mike Anderson for his film Old Antelope Lake. (They follow the scenes shown in 56-60.) 22-23 are from one long pan following the boy as he moved behind the tree and emerged on the other side. In editing, Mike jump-cut from 22 to 23 so that the boy vanishes on the left side of the tree and appears on the right. See the full discussion of this cut in chapter 10. In the film, shot 23 continues until the boy reaches the end of the

frame, then 24 continues the boy's walk to the end of the frame, then 25 continues until the boy is about three-quarters across the frame. There the walking sequence ends.

26-30' Frames from the film by Susie Benally, A Navajo Weaver, about her mother, Alta Kahn. The title (26) was written with yarn on a factory-made (not a hand-woven) blanket. The film opens, as do the others on crafts, with the artist at work (27); then preparations for the project are shown. 28-29 represent the many comings and goingsgathering yucca roots used to make soap to wash the wool, digging roots and gathering berries for dye. 28 is typical of the dozens of walking shots discussed in the text; 29 is a recurrent shot used by Susie to separate sequences, showing her mother always returning to the hogan. 30 shows the warp being put on the loom to begin the actual weaving.

31-34. Frames from the film by John Nelson, A Navajo Silversmith. 31 is from the title shot. 32 is similar to the walking sequences in A Navajo Weaver (28); here the silversmith looks for sandstone to make his mold. Note that in most of the walking shots, the actor faces away from the camera and walks toward the horizon, usually toward trees or woods. After thinking of his design (see 18-20), the silversmith carves it out of the sandstone block with his knife (33). The figures are cast in the sandstone mold and cooled in a jar of water (34)·

35-40. Frames from The Spirit of the Navajo by Maxine and Mary Jane Tsosie. 35-37, made by Maxine Tsosie, represent the jump-cut sequence discussed in Chapter 10 of which she said, "But everyone will know that if he's sitting and then walking, he got up in between." The film cuts from 35, Sam Yazzie gathering herbs, to 36, kneeling to gather herbs, to 37, walking with Mary Jane, to 38, Sam walking alone.

39 is one of the shots made by Mary Jane when Worth asked her to take close-ups of Sam's face as he worked on his painting. Seeming to comply, she photographed her grandfather from above, not showing his face at all.

40 is one of the close-ups the girls felt permissible, of Sam's hand applying color to the sand painting. (See 21 for the facial close-up the girls did take and use.)

41-43.Frames from Shallow Well Project by John Nelson. 41 is the opening shot, showing the kind of well used by the Navajo before they learned the new technology-dirty, fly-infested, and unhealthy, according to Johnny, contrasting with 43. the completed new well. 42 is one of the close-ups of construction meant to show Navajo skill with technological objects.

Johnny asked Worth to pose for 43. saying, "You haven't been in any pictures so far." Worth thought Johnny realized he needed a working shot of the well but felt he could not ask any of the workmen, who were not relatives, to come back to pose for it.

44-47. Frames from the untitled film by Alta Kahn of her daughter, Susie Benally, weaving a belt. In 44. Susie is spinning; a

basin for dying yarn is in front of her. In 45. Susie weaves on the loom in her mother's house, the same loom and location shown with her mother in A Navajo Weaver. Both women presented the process in the same way, but Susie did not think it necessary to sit or dress like her mother: she

sat on a metal chair in western-style clothes. 46 is a close-up of Susie weaving.

In 47 the finished belt is shown, much as finished blankets were shown in Susie's film. In the background Dick Chalfen makes his own record.

48-55. Frames from the film by Al Clah, Intrepid Shadows. In 48, "the intruder" (johnny Nelson) walks through the field toward the spider web (50, made by Al from cotton thread). In 49, he pokes at it with a stick. 15 followed in the filming, the face close-up that offended Johnny Nelson and led to Al Clah devising ways for himself to appear in his film as "the intruder."

51 shows the wheel

rolling through the landscape: in early sequences the shadow is short, and longer and longer shadows were used in later scenes. In

52, the Yeibechai is walking and searching across the landscape. Al made the mask so that the eyes could move back and forth, almost imitating the Navajo way of glancing back and forth to avoid direct eye contact. Note the movie-film-like stripe in the center of the mask, a design unknown in traditional decorations.

53-54 are from the sequence in which Al shows the search for and the finding of his own shadow. The shadow is first short, and at the end it is long and strong.

55 is from the last shot of the film, of the shadow of the wheel spinning, spinning, until it is met by the actual wheel itself, seen entering the frame in the upper left corner. The shot is meant to represent everything coming out all right, being peaceful, the shadow and its object reunited.

56-60. Frames from the film by Mike Anderson, Old Antelope Lake. 56 is the title card. 57 is the first shot made of the lake, showing the source. Mike then filmed sun-wise (clockwise) around the lake. 58-59 represent the sequence discussed in Chapter 10, in which the shot of the footprints of a horse going into the lake (58) must be followed by a horse in the water (59), and footprints of sheep leaving the lake (not shown, but similar to 58) must be followed by shots of sheep

in the distance (6o-one of Susie Benally's many shots of sheep, borrowed by the other filmmakers). Worth

did not notice the footprints during the filming but thought Mike was photographing mud and trash at the water's edge. For another sequence from this film, see 22-25.