Part 1 Film Language
This week, I learned more about film language through a series of movie introduction videos – how to make movies, which includes “how to Speak Movie Part 1: The Camera”, “How to Speak Movie Part 2: Mise en Scène” and “How to Speak Movie Part 3: Editing”.
1 . Visual Language (the camera)
I. Shot length — how far the camera is from the thing that is shooting
Shot length refers to the difference in the range of the object in the camera recorder due to the different distance between the camera and the object. Generally, there are five kinds of scenes. From near to far, they are extreme close up (above the shoulder of the human body), close up (above the chest of the human body), medium range (above the knee of the human body), wide shot (all and part of the surrounding environment of the human body), and extreme wide shot (the environment of the subject). In the film, the director and the photographer make use of the complicated scene scheduling and shot scheduling to alternately use different scenes, which can make the narration of the film story, the expression of the characters’ thoughts and feelings, and the handling of the relationship between the characters more expressive, so as to enhance the artistic appeal of the film.
The larger the scene, the more environmental factors. The smaller the scene, the more emphasis factors.The further away the camera is from the object, the calmer we are when we watch; that is, the further apart we are in space, the less emotionally involved we are, which is an interesting phenomenon.
The wide shot itself has an objective effect on the scene, which is firstly because the spatial relationship in the distant shot is clear and definite. The extreme wide shot can shoot a large range, but increasing the distance will make us unable to see the details clearly, thus making the image abstract, so that the audience can only understand less things.The closer the shot is, the more distant the shot is, the closer we are to the character emotionally. This is because a small part of the environment can be highlighted, not only to emphasize something relevant to it, but also to deliberately ignore the rest.
Different scenes can cause different psychological reactions of the audience. Panorama shows the atmosphere and close-up shows emotions. The medium scene is the scene that shows the communication of characters very well, and the close-up scene focuses on revealing the inner world of the characters. From the far to the near, it can be used to express the rising emotions; from the near to the far, it is suitable to express the more peaceful, profound or deep emotions.
type: wide (far) and tight (near)
wide shot — can see the whole subject and the whole scene
meaning: let the action speak for itself
Wide shot generally shows the whole body image of a person or the whole picture of a specific scene. Panoramic pictures can completely show the body movements of the characters, reflect the inner feelings and psychological state of the characters through the performance of the body movements of the characters, and can show the specific characters through the specific environment and the specific scenes. The environment has the functions of explaining, explaining, setting off and setting off the characters.
extreme wide shot — watch the whole scene from a distance
meaning: establish a place
Extreme wide shot is far-reaching and broad, mainly showing the geographical environment, natural features and open scenes and scenes.The composition of the long-range picture generally does not need the foreground, but focuses on guiding the audience’s line of sight to the distance through the far-reaching scenery and the open vision.
medium shot — a partial body shot of the subject (from the knees of waist up)
meaning: show off a character
The medium shot is the main body of most of the screen, in terms of characters, it is the performance of adults above the knee or part of the scene, which can make the audience see the body movements and emotional communication of the characters.
two shot — two characters in a frame looking each other’s shoulder
meaning: show closeness
Two shot is usually used to establish a relationship between two characters. They can be lovers, friends, enemies or just acquaintances.
close up — complete details of an actor’s face or an important subject
meaning: show powerful emotion or lack thereof
Close up shot is a picture that shows the part above the chest or part of an object. Its content is more focused on the main body. The space scope of the picture is extremely limited, and the environment space of the subject is almost excluded from the picture. It is the main scene to show the facial expression and emotion of a character and to depict the character’s character. It can be used to narrow the distance between the subject and the audience, which is easy to cause cross flu.
extreme close-up — closer than close up, can’t see the whole head
meaning: exposition and disorientation
A extreme close-up usually shows an adult’s head above the shoulder or details of some subjects. Through extreme close-up, we can describe the special signs on the head, eyes, hands, body or clothing, the special objects in hand and the subtle movement changes, so as to show the instant expression and emotion of the characters, and show the life background and experience of the characters. The single content of the extreme close-up picture can enlarge the image, strengthen the content and highlight the details, which will bring a kind of expectation and exploration intention to the audience.
II. Angle
One of the basic tenets of film art is: no picture is allowed to have any neutral place. It must be expressive, with posture and shape. Each shot has its angle, and the angle of the shot will guide the audience’s perspective and lead to the audience’s evaluation of the subject in the shot.
eye level — look straight, at the level of the actor
Eye level angle can create a sense of neutrality. Because in most cases, we see the world in this way. So flat angle photography is not easy to produce any special meaning. That’s the point, that is to say, in fact, eye level angles don’t make the audience notice the existence of angles themselves. But the other two perspectives will bring us different impressions, which will affect our feelings of actions or characters.
high angle — look down at the subject
meaning: make people seem small and kind of silly
In contrast to the low angle lens, the high angle lens looks down at the subject from a high place, thus making the subject look low, in trouble, easily deceived or weak. Directors often shoot victims at a low angle, and they also like to shoot cowards and losers in this way.
low angle — look up at the subject
meaning: make people seem large and menacing
Low angle lens is usually given a certain meaning. Through this perspective, the characters in the film can appear extraordinary, threatening, conquering, frightening, confident, or in control of events, depending on the dramatic environment. Of course, the specific meaning must be combined with text analysis. In action adventure movies, it is inevitable to use the tilt angle lens.
dutch angle — tilted angle
meaning: make everything seem strange
III. Focus & Lenses (depth) — how much it is in focus
deep focus — a long depth of field, everything in the shot is in focus
shallow focus — a short depth of field, part of the shot is in focus
rack focus — change the focus mid shot
meaning: draw the eye to the important things and details
title shift — selectively blur the part of the image
telephoto lens — compress space
wide-angle lens — give a space more depth
fisheye lens — make some disturbing images
IV. Movement
handheld — hold the camera
meaning: give more freedom to the camera man, but less controlled
steadicam — have a rig stabilize
pan — swivel the camera on a tripod horizontally left or right
tilt — swivel the camera vertically up or down
zoom — the length of the shot is changed by adjusting the lens from wide to tight quickly or from tight to wide slowly
dolly/tracking shot — move with the subject or without from left to right or back to front or a curve, raise above the subject or brought down to the subject
dolly zoom — the camera is dollied while zooming changing the depth of the shot
2 . Mise-en-scene
Mise-en-scene comes from French, meaning “put in place” or “put in the scene”. It is an expression used to describe the design of drama or film production. In essence, it refers to “visual theme” or “story telling”, which is expressed in a poetic way through the visual art techniques of split lens, film photography and stage design, and by the director. It is also often used to refer to multiple single scenes in a movie to represent the film.
Scene Design
An important element of “scene layout” is the layout of the scene and the setting of objects (props) in the scene. Setting design can be used to amplify the character’s emotion or dominant emotion, including the physical, social, psychological, emotional, economic and cultural significance in the film. One of the most important decisions made by art directors and directors is whether to shoot on location or on set. The main difference between the two is that the setting and props must be taken into account when shooting on set. However, on-site shooting is more commonly used than location shooting because of its cost-effectiveness.
Cinematography
The intensity, direction and quality of lighting can affect the audience’s understanding of characters, actions, themes and emotions. Light (and shade) can emphasize texture, shape, distance, mood, time of day or night, season and charm; it will affect the way color is presented in tone or depth, and can make the audience focus on specific elements of composition. For example, highlights can evoke attention to shapes and textures, while shadows often hide things, creating a sense of mystery or fear. Therefore, the lighting must be thoroughly planned in advance to ensure its expected effect on the audience. It’s an important part of the process because it coordinates the camera and the light.
Space
The performance of space affects the reading of movies. The depth, proximity, size and proportion of scenes and objects in movies can be controlled by camera placement, lens, lighting, and setting design, so as to effectively determine the emotions or relationships of elements in the story world.
Visual Arts
The organization of objects, roles and spaces within a framework. One of the most important concepts about film composition is to keep a symmetrical balance. This refers to the uniform distribution of light, color, objects, or graphics in a shot. The unbalanced composition can be used to emphasize certain elements of the film that the director wants to pay special attention to. This tool works because viewers tend to focus on imbalances because they look unusual. The role position of the director will also vary according to the importance of the role.
3 . Shot Dialogue
I. Sequence Shot
Sequence shot refers to a relatively long time (some as long as 10 minutes), a scene for continuous shooting, forming a relatively complete lens paragraph. As the name suggests, it is a shot that takes up a long film continuously over a period of time.
- Fixed long lens: it is formed by taking a scene continuously with fixed position
Lens, called fixed long lens. - Depth of field long lens: the technical means of shooting large depth of field is used to make the scenery (from the foreground to the background) at different positions in the longitudinal depth can be clearly seen. Such a lens is called a scene depth long lens. Take a picture of a train whistling. With a large depth of field lens, you can see the train clearly when it appears in the distance (equivalent to the distant view) and gradually approaching (equivalent to panorama, medium range, close-up and close-up). A scene depth long lens is actually equivalent to a group of long-range, panoramic, medium range, close-up shot combination of content.
- Long motion lens: a long motion lens is formed by using the camera’s push, pull, shake, move, follow and other motion shooting methods to form a long lens with multiple scenes and multiple shooting angles (azimuth and height). A long motion lens can perform the task of montage lens composed of different scenes and different angles.
II. The Cut
In the post-production process of film editing and video editing, a cut is an abrupt, but usually trivial film transition from one sequence to another. It is synonymous with the term edit, though “edit” can imply any number of transitions or effects. The cut, dissolve and wipe serve as the three primary transitions. The term refers to the physical action of cutting film or videotape, but also refers to a similar edit performed in software; it has also become associated with the resulting visual “break”.
- Action sequence
Switch from one shot to another. It is common to clip when the actor is moving, but the editing point does not have to be between fights. - Disjunction
First cut the screen to the insertion lens, then cut back. You can insert shots in the same space as the actors. - Cross editing
Cut shots of different scenes and switch back and forth frequently to establish interaction. For example, most phone shots are usually cross cut. - Skip cut
In the same frame, editing a picture is called skip cut, which is usually used to deliberately show the passage of time. This technique is often used in montage. - Match clip
Matching clips are often mistaken for skip cuts, but they are different. A matching clip is a shot cut on the same action point or a shot with similar composition. Matching clips are also often used as transitions, because the images have a jumping motion, jumping from one place to another, which may be the reason for confusing matching clips with skip cuts.
III. Transitions
Each paragraph (the smallest unit of a TV film is a shot, and a shot sequence formed by a shot connected together) has a single and relatively complete meaning, such as showing an action process, showing a correlation, showing a meaning, etc. The transition or transition between paragraphs, scenes and scenes is called transition.
- Fade in and fade out
In the film, the common transition effect is fade in and fade out, dissolve into or from the black picture. - Overlap
Superimpose one shot on another. - Jump splicing
Jump splicing is a shot that suddenly breaks the mood of the front field. The most obvious example is waking up from a nightmare. From a fierce scene to quiet, or from quiet to fierce conversion. - Invisible transition
Use shadow to hide clips to create an illusion of the same shot.
Each paragraph (the smallest unit of a TV film is a shot, and a shot sequence formed by a shot connected together) has a single and relatively complete meaning, such as showing an action process, showing a correlation, showing a meaning, etc. The transition or transition between paragraphs, scenes and scenes is called transition.
IV. Continuity Editing
Screen Direction — It is necessary to keep the visual fluency of a set of lenses. Simply put, screen orientation refers to the orientation of the subject in the scene – left or right. In splicing, screen orientation can be used to maintain visual continuity, or in an unconventional way to enhance the impact of the scene
180 Degree Rule — An imaginary line formed by the direction of a character’s movement, line of sight or related position, sometimes called a 180 degree line. Changing the angle of photography according to the law of axis can ensure that the direction of movement or related position of the characters is always clear, otherwise it will cause confusion
Match On Action — A kind of continuous play splicing method, in which the lens of the same action but different lens angle are spliced together at the action point without interruption.
Crossing the axis — Axis is an imaginary straight line or curve formed by the line of sight direction, motion direction and the relationship between different objects. Their corresponding appellations are direction axis, motion axis and relation axis. When setting and shooting the camera position, we should abide by the axis rule, that is, setting the camera position in one side of the axis, no matter how many shots are taken, how the camera position and angle change, and how complex the camera motion is. From the picture, the motion direction and position of the subject are always consistent, otherwise, it is called “over axis” or “axis jumping”.
Shot/ Reverse Shot — A shot in which the film runs in the opposite direction. It is shown on the screen as the opposite of the actual motion process. It is usually used to shoot thrilling scenes. If we use the method of reverse photography to capture the car driving safely from the overhanging edge, the shot projected on the screen is the scene of the car rushing straight into the cliff and falling into the cliff.
IV. Discontinuity Editing
- Freeze Frame
- Slow Motion
- Fast Motion
- Reverse Motion
- Jump Cut
- Match Cut
- Overlay
Montage
When different shots are spliced together, they often produce specific meanings that each lens does not have when they exist alone. Writing in this way is also known as montage.
Montage generally includes picture editing and picture composition. Picture composition: a unified picture composed of many pictures or patterns juxtaposed or superimposed. Screen editing: the way or process of making this kind of artistic combination is to arrange and combine a series of shots shot in different places, from different distances and angles, and in different ways to narrate the plot and depict the characters.
Effect
- Through the cut and join of lens, scene and paragraph, we can choose and choose the material, so as to make the main and secondary contents clear and reach a high degree of generalization and concentration.
- Guide the audience’s attention and stimulate the audience’s Association. Although each shot only shows a certain content, the combination of a certain sequence of shots can regulate and guide the mood and psychology of the audience and inspire the audience to think.
- Create unique film and television time and space. Each shot is a record of the real time and space. After editing, it realizes the reconstruction of time and space, forming a unique film and television space-time.
Category
- Parallel montage
This kind of montage is often represented by two or more plot lines in different time and space (or at the same time and in different places), narrated separately and unified in a complete structure. - Cross Montage
Cross montage, also known as alternating montage, is a fast and frequent alternative splicing of two or more plot lines in different regions at the same time. The development of one clue often affects the other, and each clue is interdependent and finally converges together. - Reverse Montage
This is a montage way to disrupt the structure, which first shows the current state of the story or event, and then introduces the whole story, which is shown as the re combination of “past” and “present” in the concept of events. - Continuous Montage
This montage does not develop as many clues as parallel montage or cross montage, but follows a single plot clue, according to the logical sequence of events, to narrate continuously and rhythmically.