To Do This Week
Do: Search for a favorite movie scene or sequence (no animation please) on YouTube. Select a part of a scene if it is made of many shots. Take screen grabs of each distinct shot in the scene or sequence.
Blog: Post these screen grabs in sequential order to the blog. Then for each image provide a description for the kind of shot (long shot, medium shot, close up, shaky, pan, etc) it is. Use Class Notes- Framing for reference. Discuss how the scene is held together as a narrative whole through the camera framing and editing.
In Class
- Continuity and Storytelling / Classical Hollywood Style > conflict, action/movement in space
- Porter > Griffith
- Continuity Rules / plan vs spontaneity
- Watch Duel
Notes
Blogging Set Up
username: first initial + last name + 24
2qFaOMmy4^O8myn78p^GP!ZA
I will provide blogging prompts and/or exercises to help you think critically and creatively about the themes each week. Blog posts should be approximately 250-500 words, demonstrate a solid understanding of the readings/screenings and the ongoing themes in the course, be crafted as mini-essays with proper grammar and spelling and include, if requested in the prompts, youtube/vimeo posts, relevant links, quotes and media inserts, etc. This is a chance to learn how to blog well. You are welcome to have your own writing style, but please demonstrate your understanding of the topic by referencing the movies, shorts and readings.
Video assignments/projects should be embedded from your youtube or vimeo accounts as blog post, along with a text introduction. Just paste the full video url in the post and it turns into a player.
Adobe Premiere
- Phones and Camera shooting: set for HD 720p and always shoot horizontal or landscape mode.
- Premiere export in codec .H.264, format .mp4
Presets for Vimeo and Youtube - Premiere keyboard shortcuts
- Adobe Tutorials
start edit by dragging first clips into timeline
Building blocks of cinematic storytelling:
Framing: distance from subject, angle, diagonal lines, foreground, middle-ground, background, depth, light/shadow, focus/unfocus, focal length, depth of field, rule of thirds, moving frame, duration
Continuity Editing: extended cinematic space – screen movement + narrative momentum + viewer imagination – the motivated shot, screen direction, 180 degree rule, 30 degree rule, match on action, graphic match, eye-line match, POV
Montage: juxtaposition of discontinuous shots: rapid cuts, rhythm, emotional sequences, thoughts, ideas, summary of events, passage of time, voice-over sequence, associational thinking, commentary, evidence, split screen
Mise-en-scène/Production design: all that that is captured by the camera: set design, costume design, make-up, actor types and their movements, gestures and expressions
Cinema Space > Storytelling
Continuity Editing: connecting shot to shot so that there is momentum in the narrative telling and a seamless narration of causally connected events. All edits are discontinuous. Story and character drive the editing and the sense of continuity.
Continuity Tricks:
The Great Train Robbery (1903)
Her Trust – D.W. Griffith (1912)
“A shot of a whole battlefield would be incomprehensible because looking at real things, the human vision fastens itself upon a quick succession of small comprehensible incidents like a mosaic out of such detail- the director counterfeits the operation of the eye with his lens and varies the length of shots to avoid the hypnotic affect.” – Griffith
Continuity Editing (The Classical Hollywood Style)
objective camera, invisible editing, dramatic tension (desire and obstacle), cause and effect chains
“Rules” Continuity Editing (and Shooting):
- Establishing shot
- 180 degree rule
- 30 degree rule
- Cut in / Match on Action
- Motivated Pov shot
- Eyeline match/ Shot Reverse Shot
- Empty frame
- Graphic Match
- Parallel action/ Crosscutting
@madmatthies ✨Groovy baby✨ transitions tiktoktransitions madmatthiestransitions smoothtransitions fypage
In-class Exercise: “Late To Class”
Create a sequence of 5 differently-framed shots, that depicts a student arriving very late to class.
The point is to use framing to convey, describe or evoke. Use at least 5 different framing compositions (long shot, medium shot, close up, etc.).
Some of you will share your ideas with the class…
Watch Duel, by Steven Spielberg
Blog Post (for next week):
This is an exercise to illustrate how continuity editing and framing are used to make a space and build a narrative. Select one scene from Duel. What kind of continuity edits are used to build the scene? Try to use continuity terms:
- 180 degree rule
- 30 degree rule
- Cut in / Match on Action (from wide to close-up or reverse)
- Motivated POV shot
- Shot Reverse Shot
- Empty frame
- Graphic Match
- Parallel action/ Crosscut
Describe how the arrangement of shots make a believable space. How does the framing focus attention to narrative detail? Discuss the role of sound in supporting the spatial relationships made in the cuts. If possible, comment on how the continuity editing in the scene (the spatial and temporal relationships from shot to shot) builds the tension of the story. What narrative information is revealed and concealed in the scene through the cuts?
Assignment: Due Sept 6th (next week)
Framing (5%):
30 seconds
- Tell a “story” in at least 5 shots and between 20 and 30 seconds in duration.
- Use framing and camera position to narrate an event, story, incident or dramatic reveal.
- Use a monopod or tripod to hold each shot steady – no moving camera for this assignment.
- You may use natural sound and sound effects, but don’t add a music track or voice over.
How would you frame a sequence of shots showing a messy kitchen and then the guilty pet in the corner? How would you frame someone anxious about opening up a letter they just picked up at the mailbox?
This is an exercise in visual storytelling. Most popular movies begin with a sequence of shots: the setting/landscape followed by medium shots of the subjects and then close-ups to emphasize a detail like a face or object etc. Or a scene can begin with a close-up and slowly reveal the wider context. The point is to connect each shot spatially and much of this is controlled by frame to frame relationships. A wide shot of a person, followed by a close up their eyes will seem as a spatial whole. This is the basic grammar of visual storytelling, using the frame to define sets of relationships in space and time.
Assignment: Due Sept 13th
Continuity (5%) :
30-60 seconds
Shoot and edit a short video that follows the principles of continuity to create the illusion of continuous space and time. You can even use principles of continuity to create an imaginary space. Try to vary the angles and distances of your shots: establishing shot, medium-shot, close-up, extreme-close-up. Sound may be an element here, but please do not include talking, music or verbal explanations. We are working on visual explanations, depicting continuity of action. Below are some ideas.
- Making or Doing Something:
Document someone making something or doing some focused activity, like cooking. The process may take 3-30 minutes, but the final video should be no more than 60 seconds. Document a single continuous action (making art, playing sports, cooking a meal, walking a dog) and edit it into a sequence that is between 30-60 seconds. - Spatial Story
Narrate a fictional event using rules of spatial/temporal continuity: a chase, a search through a house, a commute, going for a walk
Post on the blog your Continuity Assignment with a Vimeo/Youtube embed (place the url on its own line)