Bernard Abramson, an acclaimed photographer and cinematographer for several decades, died August 14, 2010, in Santa Clarita, California. He was 86.
Born in Los Angeles on November 3, 1923, Abramson took up photography as an adolescent.
In 1942, Abramson joined the U.S. Navy as an aerial cameraman and was the first to photograph the Japanese fleet at the island of Palau. He received a number of decorations for his aerial photographs after they resulted in the sinking of more than 50 Japanese ships and the destruction of 150 of their aircraft. In 1945, his plane was shot down and he spent two-and-a-half days in the ocean before being rescued by the USS Bowers.
After being released from a Naval hospital and at the end of the war, Abramson became a photographer in the motion picture industry.
He worked as a still photographer on such the productions as Some Like It Hot, West Side Story, The Alamo, Cleopatra, The War Wagon, Donovan’s Reef, The Wild Bunch, Five Easy Pieces and Dirty Harry. In addition, through his work on Ocean's Eleven, he became friendly with Frank Sinatra and the Rat Pack, who often invited him — with camera — to their private functions.
In 1977 Abramoff turned to cinematography with the film Up the Sandbox, starring Barbra Streisand. He went on to shoot second-unit photography on the films McQ, All the President’s Men and Star Trek: The Motion Picture, among others.
On television, he worked as director of photography on the acclaimed Primetime Emmy-winning 1988 miniseries War and Remembrance.
He is survived by his son Stuart, a key grip whose credits include numerous feature films as well as such television series as CSI and Monk.