Engl 142 UNC Midterm 1

The Lumiere Brothers

An inventor and businessman, Lumibre

and his brother Augurste devised one of the first practical cinema cameras (5.59).

The Lumibre camera, the most flexible of its day, also doubled as a projector.

Whereas the bulky American camera invented by W.K.L. Dickson was about the

size of an office desk (5.60), the Lumibre camera weighed only l2 pounds and was

small and portable. As a result of its lightness, the Lumibre camera could be taken

outside and could be set up quickly. Louis Lumidre's earliest films presented simple

events-vvorkers leaving his father's factory, a game of cards, a family rneal.

But even at so early a stage of film history,, Lumidre was able to Llse framin-e to

transform everyday reality into cinematic events.

Melies

. Melies wels also a rnagician, and he discovered the possibilities

of simple special effects. In 1897, M6lies built his own studio. Unlike Edison's

Bluck Muriit. MeliCs's studio was -glarss-sidecl like ir greenhouse, so that the

stuclio did not have to lnove with the slllt (12.4).

Melies also be-ean to huild elaborate settings to creerte fantasy worlds within

which his nra-gical trurtsformutions coLrld occur. We have already seen how Mdlies

thereby becurne the first rnnster of rnise-en-scene technique (4.3-4.6). From the

sinrple filnting of a nta-gician perfornrin.-9 a trick or two in a traditional stage settin..g,

Melies progressed to longer narratives with a series of tableaux. Each consisted of

one shot, exce;lt when the transfornrations occurred. These were created by cuts

desi-enecl to be inrperceptible on the screen. He also adapted old stories,, such as

Cirtdet'ellu (1U99). or wrote his own. All these factors made Melids's films extremely

popular and widely inritated.

Magic Lantern

s an early type of image projector employing painted pictures or photographs on sheets of glass, a lens and a bright light source.

Kinetoscope

By 1893, Thomas A. Edison's assistant, W.K.L. Dickson, had developed a

camera that made short 35mm films. Interested in exploiting these films as a novelty,

Edison hoped to combine them with his phonograph to show sound movies.

He had Dickson develop a peep-show machine, the Kinetosc'ope (12.1), to display

these films to individual viewers

Cinema of Attractions

a cinema that displays its visibility, willing to rupture a self-enclosed fictional world for a chance to solicit the attention of the spectator

Lap dissolve

a fade-out of a scene in a movie that overlaps with a fade-in of a new scene, so that one appears to dissolve into the other.

Phi phenomenon

The phi phenomenon is the optical illusion of perceiving a series of still images, when viewed in rapid succession, as continuous motion. Max Wertheimer defined this phenomenon in 1912.

Stroboscopic effect

The stroboscopic effect is a visual phenomenon caused by aliasing that occurs when continuous motion is represented by a series of short or instantaneous samples.

Frame

refers to a single image, the smallest compositional unit of a film's structure, captured by the camera on a strip of motion picture film - similar to an individual slide in still photography; a series of frames juxtaposed and shown in rapid succession make up a motion (or moving) picture; also refers to the rectangular area within which the film image is composed by the film-maker - in other words, a frame is what we see (within the screen); see fps and framing below.

Framing

refers to the way a shot is composed, and the manner in which subjects and objects are surrounded ('framed') by the boundaries or perimeter of the film image, or by the use of a rectangle or enclosing shape (such as a shadow, mirror, door or hallway) within the film image; also, camera angles such as low-angle and high-angle shots contribute to the framing; reframing refers to short panning or tilting movements of the camera to adjust to the character's movements and keep them onscreen, centered, and in the frame.

Aspect ratio

The ratio of frame width to frame height is called the aspect ratio. The rough

dimensions of the ratio were set quite early in the history of cinema by Thomas

Edisorl, Dickson, Lumibre, and other inventors. The proportions of the rectangular

frame were approximately four to three, yielding an aspect ratio of I .33: I

Masking*

portions of the frame that cover the full image

Blocking

Blocking was originally a theater term that refers to the positioning and movement of the actors in the stage. In cinema, camera and lights are added to the equation.

Angle

The frame positions us at some angle looking onto the shot's mise-enscene.

The number of such angles is infinite, since the camera might be placed anywhere.

In practice, we typically distinguish three general categories: ( I ) the

straight-on angle, (2) the high angle, and (3) the low angle. The straight-on angle is

the most common (5.94). The high-angle positions is looking down at the material

within the frame (5.95). The low-angle framing positions is looking up at the framed materials

Height

The framing usually gives us a sense of being stationed at a certain

height in relation to the settings and figures. Camera angle is, of course. partially related

to height: To frame from a high angle entails being at a vantage point higher

than the material in the image.

But camera height is not simply a matter of camera angle

Level

The frame can be more or less level-that is, parallel to the horizon If the

framing is tipped to one side or the other, it's said to be canted. Canted framing is

relatively rare, although a few films make heavy use of it,

Distance

framing of the image stations us not only at a certain angle and height and on a level plane or at a cant but also at a certain distance. Framing supplies

a sense of being far away or close to the mise-en-scene of the shot

Close-Up

shows details of a person or object, usually indicates nuances of feelings/thoughts

Medium Close-Up

frames from the body chest up

Medium Shot

refers to a conventional camera shot filmed from a medium distance; although it is difficult to precisely define, it usually refers to a human figure from the waist (or knees) up; between a close shot and a long shot; abbreviated as m.s.

Medium Long Shot

shots in which the human figure is framed from about the knees up are called

Plan Americain

and refers to a medium-long ("knee") film shot of a group of characters, who are arranged so that all are visible to the camera. The usual arrangement is for the actors to stand in an irregular line from one side of the screen to the other, with the actors at the end coming forward a little and standing more in profile than the others. The purpose of the composition is to allow complex dialogue scenes to be played out without changes in camera position. In some literature, this is simply referred to as a 3/4 shot.[1]

Long Shot

a camera view of an object or character from a considerable distance so that it appears relatively small in the frame, e.g., a person standing in a crowd of people or a horse in a vast landscape; variations are the medium long-shot (or mid-shot) (MS) and the extreme long-shot (ELS or XLS); also called a wide shot; a long shot often serves as an establishing shot; contrast to close-up (CU); a full-shot is a type of long shot that includes a subject's entire body (head to feet).

Extreme Long Shot

very large distance between camera and object of focus, dwarfs the person/object

Off-screen Space

implied space outside of the frame

On-screen Space

space visible within the frame

Lighting Source

The source from where the light comes from

Natural Light

Nature's illumination: daylight, even on interiors. The term implies that the source is not artificial.

Artificial Light

An ambiguous term that refers to light produced by electricity as opposed to a Natural source and to illumination introduced to record images. Depending upon how it is used, it looks either artificial or natura

Three Point Lighting System (key light, filter, back Light)

What most directors use a variation of in order to film something. Set up in a triangle

Cinematographer (Director of Photography)

is the chief over the camera crews working on a film, television production or other live action piece and is responsible for making artistic and technical decisions related to the image.

Key Grip/Grip

the crew member responsible for setting up dolly tracks and camera cranes, erecting scaffolding, moving props or scenery, or the adjustment or maintenance of any other production equipment on the set - a physically demanding job; the key grip is the head grip who coordinates all of the other grips in the crew, and receives direction from the gaffer or head lighting technician; the key grip's right-hand assistant is known as the best boy grip

Direction of Light (Front, Back, Side, Top, Bottom)

Just where the light is coming from

Front Lighting

Good for elimination of shadows, just light from the front

Back Lighting

Light from behind. When alone creates silouhettes

Soft Lighting

Diffused, Bounced, indirect light; the opposite of Hard Light. The soft shadows and subtle highlights produced are so luscious one wonders why this light isn't used for everything. At times it seems to be. The difficulty of hiding and controlling a soft source, however, especially when shooting reverse angles, and its reluctance to "go the distance," limits its use. So does fickle fashion. Tip: The largest, cheapest soft source is an overcast sky.

key lighting

the main or primary light on a subject, often angled and off-center (or from above) that selectively illuminates various prominent features of the image to produce depth, shadows, etc.; high-key lighting (with everything evenly and brightly lit, with a minimum of shadows) is termed realistic (and often used in musicals and comedies), while low-key lighting (with less illumination, more shadows, and many grayish, dark areas) is termed expressionistic (and often used in film noir); three-point lighting uses: (1) a fill (or filler) light - an auxiliary light to soften shadows and areas not covered by the key light, (2) a back light behind to add depth to a subject, and (3) a bright key light

High-Key Lighting

refers to an overall lighting design that uses fill light and backlight to create low

contrast between brighter and darker areas. Usually, the light quality is soft, making

shadow areas fairly transparent.

Low Key Lighting

creates stronger contrasts and sharper, darker shadows.

Often the lighting is hard, and fill light is lessened or eliminated altogether.

High Contrast

High contrast involves not only an extreme Brightness Ratio but also few gray tones

Low Contrast

has an expanded range of intermediate tones with limited pure blacks and whites.

Chiaroscuro Lighting

or extremely dark and light regions within the image

Flat Lighting

The results of low-Contrast or close-to-the-lens light-ing or Over-kill Fill*. Tip: While Soft Light is, by its nature, flatter than Hard Light, even a soft source, above or to the subject's side, is not flat. Proof: Vermeer.

Halo Effect (Halo effect)

soft lighting on the actor's face or from behind gives the appearance of innocence or goodness,

Exposure

by regulating

how much light passes through the camera lens, though images shot with correct

exposure can also be overexposed or underexposed in developing and printing.

We commonly think that a photograph should be well exposed-neither underexposed

(too dark, not enough light admitted through the lens) nor overexposed (too

bright, too much light admitted through the lens). But even correct exposure usually

offers some latitude for choice; it is not an absolute.

Hand Painting

Here

portions of black-and-white images are painted in colors, frame by frame

Tinting

is accomplished

by dipping the already developed film into a bath of dye. The dark areas remain

black and gray, while the lighter areas pick up the color

Toning

worked

in an opposite fashion. The dye was added during the developing of the positive

print. As a result, darker areas are colored, while the lighter portions of the frame

remain white or only faintly colored

Saturation

is expressed as the purity of the color

Technicolor

became famous for its sharply distinct, heavily saturated hues

first three color process copyrighted in 1934

Gel

a transparent, tinted colored sheet of plastic used as a filter for a movie light to create a colored glow over a scene, usually to evoke a desired mood. Black-and-white silent films would often physically tint film stock to achieve the same effect (see tint)

Filter

slices of glass or gelatin put in

front of the lens of the camera or printer to reduce certain frequencies of light

reaching the film.

Elements of Mise-en-Scène: Framing, Setting, Staging (movement, acting), Costume, Make-Up

a French term for "staging," or "putting into the scene or shot"; in film theory, it refers to all the elements placed (by the director) before the camera and within the frame of the film -- including their visual arrangement and composition; elements include settings, decor, props, actors, costumes, makeup, lighting, performances, and character movements and positioning; lengthy, un-cut, unedited and uninterrupted sequences shot in real-time are often cited as examples of mise-en-scene; contrast to montage

Pan

moving camera side to side as if shaking head

Flash-Pan

in which the camera is purposely panned in either direction at a very fast pace, creating the impression of a fast-moving horizontal blurring of images across the screen

Tilt

movement in which the camera rotates on its horizontal axis: onscreen it gives the impression of unrolling a space either from top to bottom or bottom to top, as though the camera is looking up or down

Track/Dolly

Camera is mounted on something that then follows the characters actions

Reframing (Decadrage)

If a character

moves in relation to another cherracter, ofien the frame will slightly pan or tilt to adjust

to the movement

Arc

he subject is typically still and the camera provides the motion, tracking around the subject in at least a semi-circle of movement

Crane

the camera moves above ground level, rising or descending, often thanks to a mechanical arm which lifts and lowers it

Hand-Held Shots

a shot taken with a handheld camera or deliberately made to appear unstable, shaky or wobbly; often used to suggest either documentary footage, 'realism,' news reporting, cinema verite, or amateur cinematography; contrast with Steadicam

Steadicam

In recent decades. however, a simple and popular means has been a gimbal-balanced camera mount patented as the Steadicam. This mount attaches the camera to the operator's body by means of a brace. The operator can walk with the camera, guiding the framing by minimal hand movements while viewing the image on a video monitor. Another operator adjusts focus by remote control.

Zoom

When the camera zooms in

Track and Zoom Combination

tracks the characters motion and zooms in one them

Aerial Shot

taken from an airborne device, generally while moving

Synchronized Sound

or sound technologically coupled to image

Montage

a French word literally meaning "editing", "putting together" or "assembling shots"; refers to a filming technique, editing style, or form of movie collage consisting of a series of short shots or images that are rapidly put together into a coherent sequence to create a composite picture, or to suggest meaning or a larger idea; in simple terms, the structure of editing within a film; a montage is usually not accompanied with dialogue; dissolves, cuts, fades, super-impositions, and wipes are often used to link the images in a montage sequence; an accelerated montage is composed of shots of increasingly-shorter lengths; contrast to mise-en-scene

Master Cut

is a film recording of an entire dramatized scene from start to finish, from an angle that keeps all the players in view

Cover Shot

a wide-angle photographic shot including a whole scene

First Cut

the intial rough cut of the film in which the editor, director, and producer usually confer and agree

Final Cut

the cut that is released to theaters

Ellipsis

editing technique to remove part of the narrative that is either implied or left out on purpose to conceal something

Graphic Match

When a shot cuts and there is something from the previous shot in the new shot that carried over

Kuleshov Effect

a neutral facial expression that is followed by something but the facial expression is the same for everything but with each thing coming after it takes on a different meaning

Cut

is an abrupt, but usually trivial film transition from one sequence to another

Fade in

going from a blank image and faded into something else

Fade out

also fade to black, the shot fades to something else

Dissolve

is a gradual transition from one image to another

Wipe

is a type of film transition where one shot replaces another by travelling from one side of the frame to another or with a special shape

Iris

shot is a technique frequently used in silent film in which a black circle closes to end a scene.

Jump Cut

an abrupt, disorienting transitional device in the middle of a continuous shot in which the action is noticeably advanced in time and/or cut between two similar scenes, either done accidentally (a technical flaw or the result of bad editing) or purposefully (to create discontinuity for artistic effect); also contrast with an ellipsis and match cut

180 Degree Rule

camera angle does not cross straight line; stays on one side of that line; creates continuity

Shot/Reverse Shot (reverse angle)

when you are given both perspectives of the 180 degree rule, like two people are arguing and it cuts to over the two peoples shoulders.

30 Degree Rule

a change in camera angle that is less than 30 degrees; can create discontinuity and discomfort in viewers

Match Cut (Match on Action)

Assume that a person starts to stand up

in shot 1. We can wait until the character is standing up and has stopped moving

before cutting to shot 2.But we can instead show the person's movement beginning

in shot l, and then we can cut to shot 2, which shows the continuation of the movement.

We would then have a match on action, the editing device that carries a movement

across the break between two shots.

Eye-line Match

When the camera matches what would be a characters eyes

Cheat

that is, to

mismatch slightly the positions of characters or objects.

Sound Bridge

sound or music that starts before the related change in image (cut); sound carried over a cut or visual transition; aids in continuity of sound

Non-Diegetic Insert

is a film technique that combines a shot or a series of shots cut into a sequence, showing objects represented as being outside the space of the narrative.

Sequence Shot

long take in which an entire sequence unfolds, often through the use of intricate camera movement and skilled choreography of action

Democratic Shot

director gives the audience the option of what to focus on

Dialectical Montage

cutting together of conflicting or unrelated images to generate an idea or emotion in viewer, like the sheep and people coming from the subway

Modern Times

Charles Chaplin, 1936

Caché

Michael Haneke

Far from Heaven

Todd Haynes, 2002

Singin' in the Rain

Stanley Donen, 1952

A Man Escaped

Robert Bresson, 1956

Stagecoach

John Ford

The Red Balloon

Albert Lamorisse,

1956

Citizen Kane

Orson Welles, 1941