Bored Camera Operators...?

[Tarser]

When I used to watch television years ago, the camera was always on an interviewee's face and the latter looked at the camera. These days, the interviewee or presenter now seems to look off camera sometimes, gazing into the distance and then back to it in another shot. Also, the camera will suddenly go in very close to the eyes or mouth and to the hand movements. Sorry to be a grumpy old man but this is so irritating, pretentious, meaningless and pointless..... anyone else noticed this nonsense and been irritated by it?

[Cloverjo]

It's to aid editing. They go to a shot of the hands or a different angle to enable the editors to cut things out making it obvious. It's always been done. I think they used to go to a shot of the interviewer more to enable the cuts.

[Cloverjo]

^^^"cut things out WITHOUT making it obvious"

[douglas9401]

It may be from the same box of tricks as needing two people to read the news, one sentence each in strict order then crossing to a 'correspondent' for breathless detail.
I think it's designed to hold the attention of younger people who have never been shown how to concentrate on something.

[atalanta]

I think a lot of camera operators are going mad for "novelty" shots, probably just trying to be different from everybody else. Instead, the "shots" just make it look as if the camera-person is drunk. Have you seen all those twisted angles? as if the person holding the camera is too blotto even to know where upright is ? And angles from the ground, as if the camera-operator was too drunk even to stand up, and had had to put the camera down on floor or road. I don't find it original, just ridiculous. Then I change channel.

[Tarser]

Thank you for your responses. I agree with atalanta. Daft camera angles don't suggest a way of making editing easier. More like some sort of new 'art' perspective in filming that allows the camera operator 'self expression'....BS that viewers have to put up with.