Week 3: Lecture Summary

Good afternoon, acoverdale here reporting on the exciting happenings of Thursday morning. The lecture got off to a bumpy technological start, but J (little J?) was patient.

Shot sizes:
VLS/WS Very Long Shot/Wide Shot
LS Long Shot
MLS Medium Long Shot
MS Midshot
MCU Medium Close Up
CU Close up
BCU Big Close Up
ECU Extreme Close Up

Shots as words:
Who? - The closeup answers this.
What? - The midshot shows the 'what' doing whatever it is that the 'what' is doing.
Where? - Long Shot shows this.
When? - Wide shot and Close up are both useful to show places and time passing.
Why? - The Big Close up reveals all
How? - A series of Close ups can explain this.

Head room, Talking room, and Rule of Thirds:
Allowing enough head room is important so that your character's head is not cut off or cut out of the shot.
Also, allowing enough talking room so that the character and their mouth can be seen is essential.
The rule of thirds ensures the character is taking up at least two thirds of the picture - this is measured by the intersections of the lines, it must cross through four points.

The 180 degree rule:
This rule ensures that the audience always knows who is speaking, see the diagram page 13 of the lecture notes for further annotations, but basically the way in which you position the camera affects the audiences perception of who is in the frame and who is talking.

*Inserts and cutaways are used to provide extra information about a scene.
*Making a statement is important.

til next week,
XOXO
acoverdale