In passing: Laszlo Kovacs, cinematographer

Laszlo Kovacs, a Hungarian refugee and master cinematographer whose stylistic inventions transformed cinema with such movies as “Easy Rider” and “Five Easy Pieces,” died Sunday. He was 74.

Kovacs died in his sleep, said his wife, Audrey Kovacs.

Laszlo Kovacs made about 70 movies over five decades. His work ranged from the gritty black-and-white portrayal of Depression America in “Paper Moon” to the saturated glamour of “Shampoo.”

He became interested in cinematography while a student at the Academy of Drama and Film in Budapest.

During the 1956 revolt against the Communist regime, Kovacs and classmate Vilmos Zsigmond filmed the protests with a borrowed 35mm school camera hidden in a shopping bag, according to an obituary on the Web site of the American Society of Cinematographers.

As the Russian army crushed the revolt, both men fled the country across the Austrian border with 30,000 feet of film stashed in sacks. They arrived in the United States in 1957. Some of the footage was later used in a television documentary.

Released in 1969, “Easy Rider” won international acclaim and made a name for Kovacs. He went on to shoot or direct photography for dozens of other movies, including “Ghostbusters,” “The Karate Kid,” “Frances,” “Mask” and “Miss Congeniality.” He did additional photography for “The Last Waltz” and “Close Encounters of the Third Kind.”

AUSTIN, Texas

Heather Burcham, vaccine advocate

Heather Burcham, whose battle with cervical cancer led her to urge legislators to try to keep girls from sharing in her fate, has died. She was 31.

Burcham, of Houston, died July 21, Gov. Rick Perry said.

Perry issued an executive order in February that would have required the newly approved human papillomavirus vaccine for girls entering the sixth grade, to help protect them from cervical cancer.

Burcham went to the Capitol to voice support for the vaccine in February. In April, legislators passed a bill blocking state officials from following Perry’s order.

In a May news conference to announce that he would not veto the bill, Perry closed with a video of Burcham speaking from her hospice bed.

SANTA MONICA, Calif.

Ron Miller, songwriter

Songwriter Ron Miller, whose tunes included pop classics “Touch Me in the Morning” and “For Once in My Life,” has died. He was 74.

Miller died Monday of cardiac arrest at Santa Monica UCLA Medical Center after a long battle with emphysema and cancer, daughter Lisa Dawn Miller said.

He got his professional start in the music business in the 1960s, when Motown founder Berry Gordy saw him perform at a piano bar and invited him to Detroit as one of the label’s first songwriters and record producers.

His songs have been recorded by Judy Garland, Stevie Wonder, Diana Ross and Ray Charles.

HARTFORD, Conn.

Wayne Pratt, antiques appraiser

Wayne Pratt, who appraised antiques on “Antiques Roadshow” and who figured in the corruption scandal that toppled former Gov. John G. Rowland, died Thursday. He was 64.

He died at home in Woodbury of complications after heart surgery, said Marybeth Keene, vice president of Wayne Pratt Inc.

Pratt’s business, in Massachusetts, specializes in Windsor chairs, primitive portraits, painted country furniture, mechanical banks and folk art.

He pleaded guilty in March 2004 to a federal tax charge related to his purchase of Rowland’s Washington, D.C., condominium at more than the market rate. Pratt told prosecutors that a friend, state contractor Robert Matthews, used him as a front man for the purchase.

Pratt, on public television’s “Antiques Roadshow” for six seasons, also figured in a lawsuit over an original version of the Bill of Rights.

The document was a draft that had been missing since the end of the Civil War and resurfaced in 2000 when Matthews brokered a sale in which Pratt bought it from two Connecticut women for $200,000.

After a legal battle with the FBI, which seized the document in 2003, Pratt relinquished his claim. In return, federal authorities agreed to not prosecute Pratt and dropped a federal lawsuit.

BROCKTON, Mass.

Matthew Nagle, BrainGate volunteer

Matthew Nagle, who volunteered for a groundbreaking treatment for the paralyzed that allowed him to use his brain signals to work a computer, died Monday. He was 27.

He died at Good Samaritan Medical Center in Brockton. Nagle fell into a coma July 17 and was diagnosed with sepsis, an infection of the blood. He lived at New England Sinai Hospital and Rehabilitation Center in Stoughton.

Nagle was paralyzed from the shoulders down in July 2001 after he was stabbed in the neck while trying to help friends in a brawl at an Independence Day celebration in Weymouth. He was left unable to breathe without a ventilator and nearly unable to talk after scar tissue grew over his vocal cords.

Nicholas Cirignano, who stabbed Nagle, is serving a 10-year prison sentence. The Norfolk County district attorney’s office says Nagle’s death is being treated as a homicide.

In 2004, Nagle volunteered for a Brown University experiment with a device called BrainGate, which used a tiny sensor implanted in his head to read his electrical brain signals. The signals were read by computer software that allowed him to move a computer cursor.

The BrainGate chip was later removed, and electrodes were implanted to stimulate the diaphragm, which allowed Nagle to breathe without a ventilator and control his wheelchair with his breath.