‘What are those blue lines that keep running across the screen?’ my wife asked whilst we were watching JJ Abrams latest blockbuster, Super 8. I was enjoying Abrams’ evocation of Steven Spielberg’s early suburban sci-fi ventures (and had no desire to hit the pause button), so gave the short answer:

‘That’s lens flare’.

Thankfully this satisfied her, and I didn’t have to  expand further on the type of lens flare (anamorphic; a result of using widescreen lenses) or what causes them (I’d have burbled something about direct sources of bright light refracting through the lens, and anamorphic lenses not being circular, so they stretch the light out and…. then I’d have looked it up properly on wikipedia whilst she edged towards the door, sighing and shaking her head. Again.)

As you can see in the shot from Super 8 above, lens flare can be pretty obtrusive. Abrams took a lot of flak for his ‘ridiculous’ and distracting flare-addiction in his previous film, the Star Trek reboot. But he’s hardly alone in overusing this trope, in an age when every advert on TV seems intent on distracting you from what you should be focusing on. So why do film makers persist with it, when it’s easily avoidable in the modern age?

Watch a home movie or documentary from those times however, and lens flares abound; as the camera operators either didn’t have the equipment, time or desire to keep them out of shot.

So this quite beautiful effect that can be achieved by pointing a film camera  with a glass lens at a strong source of light, became tied to notions of ‘authenticity’ and ‘integrity’. And when those values became key to the countercultural uprising in the 60s, the look and feel of cinema was revolutionised in accordance.

Suddenly, lens flares were all over cinema like a glowing, circular rash. They helped give key films of the era such as 1969′s Easy Rider a spontaneous, sun-kissed edge that chimed with the times. The great pioneer of American independent cinema John Cassavettes used flares brilliantly in the opening scene of 1976′s The Killing of a Chinese Bookie (one of few films whose title should really come with a spoiler alert). Not only do they enhance the  vérité of the world we’re thrust into, but they also make Ben Gazarra’s character look incredibly cool. Filmmakers of the 80s were clearly taking note.

But perhaps the most important way that lens flare was deliberately integrated into the grammar of cinema was through sci-fi. Master of composition Stanley Kubrick used flares throughout 1968′s 2001: A Space Odyssey to bring to life its pioneering special effects work and make us believe that he’d really put a film camera into orbit, onto the moon, and beyond the stars. Take the flares away and his astonishing vision would look significantly more drab and sterile. He planted the flaws to deceive us.

And so, in the past 40 years, lens flares have become a key tool in convincing moviegoers of the reality that has been constructed before their eyes. Even early computer animated films such as Shrek and Toy Story added flare to scenes – and they don’t even involve cameras or lenses. But then, there’s software galore available that will artificially add lens flare to your scene, and extremely effective it can be too. We’re certainly not shy of using it here at Content is King.

In a digitally-dominated world, where work never degrades and flaws can be erased at the click of a mouse, lens flares may perhaps be the final survivors from the analogue age, thanks to to their intrinsic beauty.

Just dont overdo it, eh JJ?