BHS Film Class (Chapter 1 Review: Lighting, Colour, Angles, Shots and Genres)

Realism

Captures events as they are viewed in real life, emphasizing content over form. Extreme form is documentary, aiming to preserve real-life authenticity.

Classicism

Mainstream fiction film with a significant story and renowned actors. Balances between realism and formalism, avoiding extremes. Involves classical cutting, defined conflict, climax, and resolution.

Formalism

Opposite of realism, focusing on purely imagined events like fantasy. Emphasizes techniques and expressiveness rather than real-life authenticity.

Avant-garde

Favors abstract elements, emphasizing formal beauty for its own sake. Often daring, obscure, controversial, and presents personal ideas.

Documentary

Recreates real events or actual aspects of life, aiming to capture authenticity.

Expressionism

Focuses on the self-expression of the filmmaker, distorting reality to convey spiritual and psychological truths. Results in a highly manipulated and stylized reality.

Shots

Usually defined by how much of the human figure is in view.

Frame

Defining lines on the edge of the screen image, representing a single photo from an entire film.

Medium shot

Scale is medium, typically showing a person from the waist up.

Close up

Enlarges an object, usually focusing on a person's head.

Telephoto

Zooms into an object without moving it, creating a close-up effect.

Extreme long shot

Taken from a far distance, often used for establishing scenes and showing a wide view.

Long shot

Distance between the camera and the object is similar to the distance between the audience and the stage.

Full shot

Includes a person's full body in the frame, from head to feet.

Deep focus shot

Long shot with multiple focal distances, capturing depth in the image. Lighting is crucial for this shot.

Establishing shots

Introduce the viewer to the movie's location.

Bird's-eye view

Filmed directly overhead, making people appear insignificant. Often used to show a higher perspective.

High angle

Diminishes importance, suggesting powerlessness or being trapped.

Low angle

Makes people appear threatening or powerful.

Oblique angle

Suggests tension, transition, or impending movement, commonly used for specific atmospheres like drunkenness.

High key lighting

Emphasizes bright and even illumination with minimal shadows, often used in comedies and light entertainment.

High contrast lighting

Involves harsh light and dramatic dark areas, commonly seen in tragedies and melodramas.

Low key lighting

Creates diffused shadows and pools of light, suitable for mysteries, thrillers, and gangster movies.

Available lighting

Utilizes existing light sources like lamps or sunlight, often preferred by realists for its natural feel.

Three point lighting

Involves a key light as the primary source, fill lights to soften shadows, and backlights to separate figures from the background.

Cool color

Includes blue, green, and violet, suggesting tranquility and aloofness.

Warm color

Incorporates red, yellow, and orange, indicating aggressiveness and stimulation.

Film noir

A style of black cinema post-WWII, portraying a fatalistic, despairing universe with themes of loneliness and death, characterized by low-key, high-contrast lighting.

Dominants

Areas of the film that immediately attract the viewer's attention due to visual contrast. (left, middle, right, up, down

Soft focus

Creates halos and a blurred effect for a dreamy or romantic look.

Rack focusing or selective focusing

Guides viewers to different distances, directing attention to specific elements in the scene.

Fast stock

Sensitive to light, producing a grainy image.

Slow stock

Relatively insensitive to light, resulting in crisp images and sharp details.

Special effects

Enhance realism in films by improving reenactments, saving costs, and creating impactful scenes like war sequences.