Ted D. McCord(1900-1976)

Ted McCord learned his craft "on the job" as a camera assistant at Hobart Bosworth Productions in 1917. His first credited film as full-fledged cinematographer was L'Animatrice (1921), billing himself as "T.D.McCord". During the '20s he worked on a wide variety of subjects, from romantic comedy (Irène (1926)) to westerns (The Code of the Scarlet (1928)) to melodrama (The Crash (1928)). Almost from the outset, his work displayed a mastery of lighting, specifically in his use of deep shadows. He later explained that he had been influenced by the paintings of Rembrandt and by the mentoring of pioneer cinematographers James Van Trees and Gregg Toland.

Between 1924 and 1929, McCord worked at First National which later became a subsidiary of Warner Brothers. In the early '30s, he had brief spells at Universal (shooting several films for cowboy star Ken Maynard), Columbia and RKO-Pathe, before finally settling at Warner Brothers for the bulk of his career (1936-57). During World War II, he served as a captain with the US Army Photographic Unit and was among the first to enter devastated Berlin, filming inside Adolf Hitler's ruined chancellery. After the war, he was given several A-grade projects that enhanced his reputation; among them superior melodramas like Johnny Belinda, l'enfant du silence (1948) and Boulevard des passions (1949). He also won critical plaudits for his excellent shooting of John Huston's seminal western epic, Le Trésor de la Sierra Madre (1948). This prompted Elia Kazan to request his services for À l'est d'Eden (1955), which was shot in Technicolor and CinemaScope.

During the '50s and '60s McCord excelled at other Technicolor assignments: most memorable are the rich saturation and sharp detail used for the gripping outdoor western La Colline des potences (1959), and his Oscar-nominated romantic, soft-focus visuals for La Mélodie du bonheur (1965), shot in 65mm Todd-AO wide-screen format.