Heimerdinger: Yes, there’s only one shooting and no rehearsal.

Daniels: And what instructions do you give? Before the actors appear before the camera, do they get a page of notes – or is everything just improvised? Heimerdinger: I talk as much as possible with the actors about my ideas beforehand.

Daniels: So all the preparations are oral and you never use written instructions.

Heimerdinger: No, the changes are too minimal for that. It was really amusing with Wolfram Berger, though: while he was waiting to perform, we had to think of ways to keep him in front of the camera. So all of us acted – everyone but him. The cameraman pretended he was positioning the lights and so on. And while Berger just stood there, we gave him instructions: Remove your jacket, please; look over there, etc. Daniels: Are actors ever influenced by knowing your work – when they know and can guess what’s about to happen? Is there something like an expectation attitude among actors that you have to outwit? Or do the actors try to get around that?

Heimerdinger: While collaborating with the Berlin actor Martin Glade, the influencing was mutual. He and I had completed several works together. Meanwhile, he

even approaches me with his own ideas and tells me how he would like to appear in my work.

Daniels: That’s precisely what should never happen, in so-called objective research: that the researcher alters his subject.

Holschbach: That is also the basic conflict in works by portrait photographers: the subjects of portraits have an image of themselves in mind and usually want to see it confirmed, while the photographer uses every technique and trick imaginable to attain the supposedly real in front of the camera. Great portrait photographers are thought of as managing this. I won't discuss at this time the question as wether this is a myth. Concerning the work, the other possibility I arrived at is what I call ‹authenticity through duration›: duration is an essential element for breaking through poses. The photographic and the filmic always deal with the problem of the pose and ‹authentic expression›. Here the work done with duration shines out as a method for achieving that expression nevertheless – simply over the passing of time.