1. Basic Film Terms

2. Time components of film
Running time—the full duration of a film. (Feature films are generally minutes.)
Story time—the amount of time the plot covers. (Could be hours or centuries.)

3. Principle Parts of Film
Frame – the rectangle itself in which the film appears & each still photograph that makes up a strip of film
Shot – what is recorded in a single operation of the camera from the time when the director gives the command “action” to the time the director says “cut”
Scene – a group of shots that are coherently related to each other with continuous action usually in a single location but not always
Sequence – a group of scenes forming a self-contained unit

4. Types of Shots
A shot is the time occurring between the camera being turned on and shut off.
Shots vary in time from subliminal (a few frames) to quick (less than a second) to “average” (more than a second but less than a minute) to lengthy (more than a minute)

5. Long Shot (LS)
(A relative term) A shot taken from a sufficient distance to show a landscape, a building, or a large crowd
(FS) a full body shot

6. Pulp Fiction (1994)

7. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part II (2011)

8. The Dark Knight (2008)

9. Establishing Shot (or Extreme Long Shot)
Shot taken from a great distance, almost always an exterior shot, shows much of locale
ELS

10. The Godfather (1974)

11. The Good, The Bad , and The Ugly (1966)

12. The Shawshank Redemption (1994)

13. Medium Shot (MS)
(Also relative) a shot between a long shot and a close-up that might show two people in full figure or several people from the waist up
Most common
type of shot
The Talented Mr. Ripley

14. The Godfather, Part II (1974)

15. Fight Club (1999)

16. 300 (2006)

17. Close-Up (CU) A shot of a small object or face that fills the screen
Apocalypse Now

18. Extreme Close-Up (ECU)
A shot of a small object or part of a face that completely fills the screen
Rocky Horror Picture Show
The Saint In London

19. X-Men: First Class (2011)

20. Rocky Horror Picture Show

21. Donnie Darko (2001)

22. Types of Angles
The angle is determined by where the camera is placed not the subject matter
Angles can serve as commentary on the subject matter

23. High Angle (h/a) Camera looks down at what is being photographed
Without Limits

24. Big Fish

25. The Big Lebowski

26. Blade Runner

27. Low Angle (l/a)
Camera is located below subject matter
The Patriot

28. Jurassic Park

29. The Patriot

30. Across the Universe

31. “Eye-Level”
Roughly 5 to 6 feet off the ground, the way an actual observer might view a scene/a camera films a subject from the same plane
Most common

32. The Dark Knight

33. Inception

34. The Shining

35. Camera Movement

36. Pan The camera moves horizontally on a fixed base.
Usually a stationary camera in a smaller space

37. Panning

38. Tilting
The camera points up or down from a fixed base

39. Tilt

40. Tracking (dolly) shot
The camera moves through space on a wheeled truck (or dolly) but stays in the same plane

41. The Dolly Shot

42. Zoom Not an actual camera movement
but a shift in the focal length of the camera lens to give the impression that the camera is getting closer to or farther from an object

43. The Zoom

44. Boom
The camera moves up or down through space

45. Crane
A camera that is high up on a crane

46. Lighting
High key lighting – the set, the stage, or scene is flooded with light

47. Low Key lighting
The set, the stage, or the scene is partially/dimly lit

48. Lighting continued…
Front lighting- to characterize and/or bring attention to a certain item/detail
Back lighting- make something look supernatural
Bottom lighting – make something look evil

49. Focalization – point of view
Subjective – a shot filmed from the pt. of view or perspective of a character
Authorial - a shot filmed from the pt. of view of the director
Neutral – a stationary camera films whatever is near it

50. Sound Diegetic – sound that characters (key word) in the film can hear
Non-diegetic – sounds that in the film that characters cannot hear

51. Editing techniques

52. Cut
Transition between scenes when one scene ends and another one begins
Most common

53. Dissolve
A gradual transition in which the end of one scene is superimposed over the beginning of a new one.
You see 2 shots at the same time.

54. Fade-out/Fade in
A scene gradually goes dark or a new one gradually emerges from darkness

55. Wipe
An optical effect in which one shot appears to push the preceding one from the screen.

56. Two Shot or Reverse-Shot- Reverse
focusing on one shot and reversing the shot (camera) to film the other subject or shot

57. Cross-cutting
When you cut from one scene to another, then change the scene or setting; however, both scenes are happening at the same time

58. Eyeline Match
When you film a person’s eyes in one shot, and in the next shot, you show what the person is looking at.

59. Flashback
Cutting from one scene to another that goes back in time

60. Final Things to Note: Framing (left, right, bottom, top, center)
Dialogue/music lyrics
Costuming/colors
The Filter
2 basic philosophies of film-making