Must Know Technical Cinema Terms

Classical Hollywood Cinema

A form of American cinema that typically involves a narrative, characters, and their goals on how to get over certain obstacles.

Continuity Editing

A style of editing that creates an illusion of reality, coherence, unity within a movie.

Eye-line Editing

A type of continuity editing where one shot has a character looking offscreen and the next shot is of the object the character looks at in the same angle and position the character is looking from

Graphic match

A technique used in continuity editing where one shot’s composition are matched in the next shot.

Match on action

A type of continuity editing where a character does a physical action in one shot and it continues into another shot

180-degree rule

A rule in film-making where when cutting from one shot to another, the camera should remain on one side of the “imaginary line” that goes through the actors

Point-of-view editing

A type of eye-line match editing where the character looks offscreen, then cuts to a shot of what they see, and then back to the character for a reaction shot.

Shot/Reverse Shot

Types of shots used typically during conversation between two characters, where one shot is on one angle of the 180 line and another shot is on the other angle of the 180 line.