Tuesday, June 23, 2009

Designing Shots

An important tool for filmmakers, and one that ought to be thoughtfully considered prior to shooting a claymation movie, is shot design. In your breakdown list, each shot or cut of the film needs to be planned for its action and content, as well as the type of shot: Close up, Medium Shot, Establishing Shot, Long Shot, Extreme Close Up, or Two Shot. 

This knol excerpt from
Angelo T.  gives a fine description of the main types of shots. Look through your favorite movies to see if you can identify each type--before you start to shoot your film. 

2.0 The four main shots.

To bring variation in scenes, and to keep the audience's attention refreshed, the camera angle will change to a different shot every few seconds. In film and television productions, professionals use mainly these four types of shots. All four of them can be combined easily to form a coherent and linear productions.


  • Long shot (LS)
This one shows the bigger picture, lets the audience have a look at the subject in relation to its surroundings.
Here we see the protagonist either leaving or entering what looks like a club.  


  • Medium shot (MS)
Puts the evidence as center, while getting rid of surrounding distractions. Useful as transition between Long shot and Close-up.  Useful to show body languages, poor for facial expression.
Example of the medium shot.


  • Close-up (CU)
This one is to show details on the subject.  If only head and shoulders show,  we have a closeup shot. They should fill most of the picture.  Suitable to show possible facial emotions on the subject.
A typical closeup.


  • Extreme Close-up (ECU)
Used to show very small details on the person or in the scene. Makes focussing on the important part of the subject. Deemed less useful for establishing the subjects emotions.
The extreme closeup, though in lesser extent.


3.0 Other types of shots.

  • Two-shot

This type of shot frames two people in the same view, thus making them the subject. Both subjects do not need to stand besides eachother to form a Two-shot. The shot allows good visualization of the subject's interaction and emotional reactions and establishing relationships between the subjects.
The two-shot


  • Establishing shot

An establishing shot sets up a scene's setting and/or its participants. It will usually be at the start of a scene, and helps the audience get insight of the scene's location.  Landmarks can be used as well, to establish for example that the scene is in a certain location.  For example the Statue of Liberty could establish the scene is depicted in New York.

Themes can also be established with this shot.  For example, an opening depicting combat between armies might establish the theme of war. Some television series like "x-files" rely on very detailed establishing shots, including written location name, and sometimes even the depicted scene's local time.

If a scene begins with this shot, we can safely establish the scene happens somewhere in Paris, France.

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