In one scene from Alfred Hitchcock’s 1958 thriller Vertigo, lead character John “Scottie” Ferguson (James Stewart) is shown following Madeleine Elster (Kim Novak) up a bell tower.

Scottie is afraid of heights. So when he briefly stops and glances down, he experiences a wave of vertigo. The stairwell distorts, seemingly stretching into the distance below him – a potent reflection of his dizzy and panicked state.

This scene is the first ever example of the “dolly zoom”, a dynamic visual technique achieved through camera movement and a zoom lens.

Also known as the “vertigo effect” or the “contra zoom”, it requires significant skill. The subject must remain the same size within the frame, while the background distorts by either stretching or compressing.

Most of us have a list of our favourite films and TV series of all time. But do you ever wonder how these were made? In this series we go behind the scenes to reveal the ingenious tricks and innovations that have transformed screen production over the course of a century.

Another famous........

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