[1] Batka started his career as a camera operator on the movie On the Right Track (1948).
Weiss decided to use this story as a basis for his film Ninety Degrees in the Shade.
In 1967 Batka was a director of photography for František Vláčil's Marketa Lazarová, which was later voted the best Czech movie of all time.
[2] After he emigrated to USA, he taught cinematography at the Tisch School of the Arts.
[3] Among his students and proteges were Fred Elmes,[4] Barry Sonnenfeld, Bill Pope,[5] and Ken Kelsch.