Prepared by I. M. IRENEE [email protected] 0783271180/0728271180 1. Introduction Cinematographic techniques such as the choice of shot, and camera movement, can greatly influence the structure and meaning of a film. 2. Size of shot Examples of shot size (in one filmmaker's opinion) The use of different shot sizes can influence the meaning which an audience will interpret. The size of the subject in frame depends on two things: the distance the camera is away from the subject and the focal length of the camera lens. Common shot sizes: • Extreme close-up: Focuses on a single facial feature, such as lips and eyes. • Close-up: May be used to show tension. • Medium shot: Often used, but considered bad practice by many directors, as it often denies setting establishment and is generally less effective than the Close-up. • Long shot • Establishing shot: Mainly used at a new location to give the audience a sense of locality. Choice of shot size is also directly related to the size of the final display screen the audience will see. A Long shot has much more dramatic power on a large theater screen, whereas the same shot would be powerless on a small TV or computer screen. Wednesday, January 18, 2012 Prepared by I. M. IRENEE [email protected] 0783271180/0728271180 3. Mise en scène Mise en scène" refers to what is colloquially known as "the Set," but is applied more generally to refer to everything that is presented before the camera. With various techniques, film makers can use the mise en scène to produce intended effects. 4. Camera view, angle, movement, shot A. Dutch angle Dutch tilt, Dutch angle, oblique angle, German angle, canted angle, or Batman Angle are terms used for a cinematic tactic often used to portray the psychological uneasiness or tension in the subject being filmed. A Dutch angle is achieved by tilting the camera off to the side so that the shot is composed with the horizon at an angle to the bottom of the frame. Many Dutch angles are static shots at an obscure angle, but in a moving Dutch angle shot the camera can pivot, pan or track along the director/cinematographer's established diagonal axis for the shot. Examples of usage in movies Dziga Vertov's 1929 experimental documentary Man with a Movie Camera is known to contain one of the first usages of the Dutch angle, among other innovative techniques discovered by Vertov himself. The angle was widely used to depict madness, unrest, exoticness, and disorientation in German Expressionism, hence its name (Deutsch, meaning German, was often conflated with the Wednesday, January 18, 2012 Prepared by I. M. IRENEE [email protected] 0783271180/0728271180 etymologically identical word Dutch; compare Pennsylvania Dutch). Montages of Dutch angles are structured in a way that the tilts are almost always horizontally opposite in each shot, for example, a right tilted shot will nearly always be followed with a left tilted shot, and so on. The 1949 film The Third Man makes extensive use of Dutch angle shots, to emphasize the main character's alienation in a foreign environment. An anecdote of cinema lore alleges that once filming was completed, the crew presented director Carol Reed with a spirit level, to sardonically encourage him to use more traditional shooting angles. Dutch angles were used extensively in the original TV series and 1966 film of Batman, where each villain had his or her own angle. Scenes filmed in any villain's hideout, when only the chief villain and his or her henchmen were present, were invariably shot at an angle departing extremely from the horizontal. This was to show that the villains were crooked. Dutch angles are frequently used by film directors who have a background in the visual arts, such as Tim Burton (in Edward Scissorhands, and Ed Wood), and Terry Gilliam (in Brazil, The Fisher King, Twelve Monkeys, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and Tideland) to represent madness, disorientation, and/or drug psychosis. In the Evil Dead trilogy, Sam Raimi used Dutch angles to show that a character had become possessed. The Dutch angle is an overt cinematographical technique that can easily be overused. The science-fiction film Battlefield Earth (2000), in particular, drew sharp criticism for its pervasive use of the Dutch angle. In the words of film critic Roger Ebert, "the director, Roger Christian, has learned from better films that directors sometimes tilt their cameras, but he has not learned why." James Cameron 'Dutched' the camera during the final stages of the sinking in his film Titanic, but here the intent was not to produce a sense of unease, but rather to exaggerate the slant of the deck, which -- because of its length, and the need for sections of it to submerge -- could only be tilted by an angle of about 6 degrees. The Cable Guy (1996) uses the Dutch Angle to foreshadow the disturbed personality of Chip Douglas (Jim Carrey). Fay Grim (2006), was shot almost entirely in Dutch angles. B. Establishing shot An establishing shot in film and television sets up, or establishes the context for a scene by showing the relationship between its important figures and objects. It is generally a long- or extreme-lon g shot at the beginning of a scene indicating where, and sometimes when, the remainder of the scene takes place. Wednesday, January 18, 2012 Prepared by I. M. IRENEE [email protected] 0783271180/0728271180 Establishing shots may use famous landmarks to indicate the city where the action is taking place or has moved to, such as Big Ben to identify London, the Statue of Liberty to identify New York, the Sydney Opera House to identify Sydney, the Eiffel Tower to identify Paris or the Las Vegas Strip to identify Las Vegas Sometimes the viewer is guided in his understanding of the action. For example, an exterior shot of a building at night followed by an interior shot of people talking implies that the conversation is taking place at night inside that building - the conversation may in fact have been filmed on a studio set far from the apparent location, because of budget, permits or time limitations. Alternatively, an establishing shot might just be a long shot of a room that shows all the characters from a particular scene. For example, a scene about a murder in a college lecture hall might begin with a shot that shows the entire room, including the lecturing professor and the students taking notes. A close-up shot can also be used at the beginning of a scene to establish the setting (such as, for the lecture hall scene, a shot of a pencil writing notes). Establishing shots were more common during the classical era of filmmaking than they are now. Today's filmmakers tend to skip the establishing shot in order to move the scene along more quickly. In addition, scenes in mysteries and the like often wish to obscure the setting and its participants and thus avoid clarifying them with an establishing shot. An establishing shot may also establish a concept, rather than a location. For example, opening with a martial arts drill visually establishes the theme of martial arts. A shot of rain falling could be an establishing shot, followed by more and more detailed look at the rain, culminating with individual raindrops falling. A film maker is colluding with his audience to provide a short hand learned through a common cinematic cultural background. An establishing shot should be two or three seconds - long enough for viewers to appreciate the scene. C. Follow shot Follow shot or tracking shot is a specific camera shot in which the subject being filmed is seemingly pursued by the camera. The follow shot can be achieved through tracking devices, panning, the use of a crane, and zoomlenses resulting in different qualitative images but, nevertheless, recording a subject (performer) in motion. Wednesday, January 18, 2012 Prepared by I. M. IRENEE [email protected] 0783271180/0728271180 D. Forced perspective Unintentional forced perspective effect in this U.S. Navy photograph. The CH‐47 Chinook helicopter at left is more than eighteen feet tall and almost one hundred feet long. The Potemkin Stairs in Odessa extend for 142 meters, but give the illusion of greater depth since the stairs are wider at the bottom than at the top Forced perspective is a technique that employs optical illusion to make an object appear farther away, closer, larger or smaller than it actually is. It is used primarily in photography, filmmaking and architecture. It manipulates human visual perception through the use of scaled objects and the correlation between them and the vantage point of the spectator or camera. Forced perspective in filmmaking Examples of forced perspective: • A scene in an action/adventure movie in which dinosaurs are threatening the heroes. By placing a miniature model of a dinosaur close to the camera, the dinosaur may look monstrously tall to the viewer, even though it is just closer to the camera. • A scene in which two characters are supposed to be interacting in the foreground of a vast cathedral. Instead of actually filming in a cathedral, the director mounts a large painting of a cathedral's interior in a studio and films the actors talking in front of the painting. This gives the effect on film that the characters are in the foreground of a large room, when in reality they are standing next to a flat surface. Movies (especially B-movies) in the 1950s and 1960s produced on limited budgets sometimes feature forced perspective shots which are completed without the proper knowledge of the Wednesday, January 18, 2012 Prepared by I.