Task Eight: Transitions and Effects

Transitions and Effects
A transition is when a camera cuts from one scene to the next usually to show a chronological order of events and is sometimes added with an effect to show the transition. There are different types of transitions. The most common transition is the straight cut which is a camera cut that goes directly from one scene (or camera shot) to the next with no fades just one straight cut, the straight cut helps to 'retain' the reality of the film by immersing the audience with the film by having them continually watching rather than having some time waiting for the transition effect to end. Another type of transition effect that is really popular used in films is the dissolve where a scene/shot dissolves into another scene or shot.
Dissolve Example:

Another form of a transition is a wipe where the transition effect is that the scene or shot is wiped across the screen and the next scene is underneath which is unveiled when the other is wiped off.

Graphic Match
A graphic match is a form of transitions which is more advanced than the original transitions where a scene shot is focused on a particular object and is transitioned to another scene which is focused on a similar looking object. A great example of a graphic match is from a movie called psycho which involves a bath tub's circular plug hole and is transitioned to another shot of a dead woman's circular eye who was murdered in the bath tub, this transition is really intense for the audience which is shocked from the murder.
Psycho Example:

Following The Action

"Following the Action" is when there is movement in a scene while the camera is moving fluidly around the scene showing off the action, a famous example of this is from the movie Mr. and Mrs. Smith where the couple have a shootout whilst the camera spins around them while they are moving. This rotation of the camera shot of the action allows the audience to see more of the action rather than just having the camera showing just one angle at a time of the action

Multiple Points of View

Multiple points of view is part of following the action by showing each character's side of a particular point of view either in an action sequence or part of a storyline, this can happen by showing one characters part of the storyline then switching to a secondary character. This is used to engage the viewer in the storyline or action in the film.

Shot Variation
Shot variation is when a shot is uninterrupted by editing and shot distance changes. The shots can either be static or mobile and must be in a continuous motion for example the shot begins with a long or wide shot and ends up with a close up. A great example of a shot variation is from the movie 'The Matrix'


Manipulation of Diegetic Time and Space

Manipulation of Diegetic Time and Space is about moving from the chronological order from the movie and showing the age of a character, object or even an enviroment either by going into the future or past, this can also mean you can move into an alternative universe. Films that use the manipulation often show it by having a desaturated segment that shows that it was in a different point in time. Many films use this such as 'The Time Machine
' who travels through time and shows the changes in the enviroment around the time traveller as he travels through time. A more modern use of manipulation of diegetic time and space is in the third harry potter movie where the two characters use a watch that spins very quickly and characters move at super speed around them to indicate that they went back in time.

Task Seven - Creating Pace

Creating Pace
Pace is created by engaging the viewer in the film, ways of doing this are:

• Speed of Editing - The speed of editing is one of the best ways to create pace within a scene, this allows for either a fast paced or slow build up for a climax. Movies that used this technique to a great extent have been movies such as 'Bourne' series where the main character is being chased by people and there is fast cuts between the main character and the villains.
• Cross Cutting - This is also a great way to create pace by showing two sequences connected to each in a certain way that the audience would need to know, this is often used in movies as events happening at the same time in different locations or a character relieving a memory. This can be effectively used to develop drama such as making scenes more dramatic like in the movie 'Scream' where the character Casey in the opening scene of scream is made more dramatic with the cross cutting to her parents approaching and almost making it in time to her home before she is murdered.
• Cutaways - A cutaway would be used to reveal details to the audience without detracting from the narrative or the action such as when a child leaves behind a toy unintentionally.
• Creating Pace - by creating pace we allow to create feelings for the audience such as making the audience excited and interested in what will happen next in the film.

• Development of drama - This allows the audience to be more engaged into the film and we do this by using pace to keep the viewer on the edge of their seat not being able to wait for what is next to come.

Creating pace is vital within a video or movie in order to engage the viewer into the film rather than having them bored and take the video/movie off instead.

Task Six - Non-Continuity

Non-Continuity

Although most directors usually make movies following continuity editing, some directors create deliberate non-continuity edits by using jump cuts or breaking the 180 degree rule. One famous deliberate non-continuity edits have been from "A Bout de Soufflé"

In this short clip there is deliberate jump cuts along the scene having the character 'jump' from one action to another.
 

Another famous scene is from The Shining where a scene would include deliberate non-continuity shots where they would break the 180 degree shot rule multiple times in one scene.

 

 

Task Five - Continuity Editing

Task Five - Continuity Editing

Continuity editing is a style of editing which has been used in many famous movies as well as T.V shows, Continuity editing serves as a sort of guideline whilst filming.

Continuity Editing Techniques 

Match-On-Action is one of the techniques which is about matching an action whilst filming with a different camera angle shot, for example if one character starts an action in one camera shot; the character has to replicate the action for the other shot.

Eye-Line Match is another one of the techniques where we film a shot at something as if the character is looking directly at that something, for example if a character is looking at a car across the street the camera will go as if it's a first person view of the character looking at the car.

180 Degree Rule is one other of the techniques where we follow what is more like a guideline and is kind of complicated to understand, what it is about is that when filming the shot the camera can't pass this 180 degree line. Where is this line? well the line is located where the characters are in a shot, for example say a camera shot is looking at two characters talking to each other; the 180 degree line is going through the two characters so if the camera was to film the other side of the two characters then the 180 degree rule will have been broken.

In this diagram you can see how the line can be passed by the camera.

Shot, Reverse Shot is the final technique and is about how two shots follows two (or more) characters having a conversation by showing one of the characters whilst the character is speaking and then switching the shot to face the other character whilst they are speaking; the shot, reverse shot normally happens till the end of the conversation. This technique is used in nearly every movie or T.V show at least once, T.V shows which use this the most are usually soaps like EastEnders since they are mostly speaking to each other in deep conversations.

Our Practical

We filmed a short movie to show our understandings of the techniques in continuity editing.

In our short film we show how the techniques of continuity editing by trying to make them feel 'fluid' how they would be used in an actual movie.

Task Four: Montages

Montages

Montages is a type of edits which contain many different shots put together particularly quickly,
For our first montages, me and my media group have decided to put together some inspirations from movies we have seen in the past as well as some ideas of our own.

In French film practice "montage" has it's literal french meaning 'Assembly, installation) which simply identifies the techniques of editing that you need to do for a french montage.

In Soviet filmaking a montage is a method of juxtaposing shots to derive new meaning that did not exist in either shot alone. A popular example of soviet film montage is by Sergei Eisenstein in 1925 called "Strike", this included a worker strike mixed with a gruesome killing of an animal:


In Hollywood cinema a "montage sequence" is a short sequence in a film in which narrative information is present in a condensed fashion with quick jump cuts and music. A great example of hollywood cinema montages is the rocky training scene where it shows how the boxer would train over a period of time with quick edits and great music:

We filmed two sets of montages, the first was a "Hollywood Montage", the second montage was a "Russian Montage".

The Hollywood Montage

This is our Hollywood Montage where we portrayed a boxer getting ready for a big match and added a montage sequence of him training while being interview, yes our main inspiration for this montage was 'Rocky' but has also some other ideas and inspirations too.

The Russian Montage
This is our Russian Montage where we had one character thinking about something but just by looking at the first scene you can't really tell what he was thinking about until we showed another scene where we showed how the character had recently been robbed however we then showed back to the character thinking where we then showed that he was thinking about money.

Task Three: From Analogue to Digital Editing

From Analogue to Digital Editing

Analogue Editing
Analogue films are made up images printed on acetate negatives which are 'spliced' together to form a reel of  film. These images are fed through a projector at a constant speed of 24 frames per second (24 Images per second) making the pictures move.
Analogue editing was by a person hand cutting and sticking reels of film together this was called "Splicing", this had many cons such as the reel of film being destroyed on accident or can be very expensive. No backups of film were store as there was no way of copying the reels of film.

The First Moviola
The Initial editing was first done on the first moviola was a device produced to be able to make editing easier and quicker by making the device to be able to cut and paste pieces of film together. This was done by using a splicer then threading the film on a device with a viewer such as the moviola.

Video Editing
Video editing is the process of editing when segments of motion picture, special effects and sound recordings are edited together perfectly in the post-production process before the film release. Before digital technologies became available, magnetic tapes otherwise known as video tapes would have been used to store film. Most video editing had been superseded by the more superior digital editing which is usually a cheaper and faster process.

Digital Editing
Digital media is a form of electronic media where data is stored digitally (instead of Analogue Form) which took up less space in physical form and would be much more difficult to destroy.
Digital editing is the use of computers to order and manipulate the digital data allowing the editing of the movie to be quick and easy.
Non-Linear Editing
Non-linear editing is a method that allows you to access any frame within the digital video clip regardless of the sequence in the clip and be able to edit the frame any way you wish by adding effects or by moving/deleting it. The freedom to access any frame and use a cut-and-paste method allows you to easily include effects such as fades, transitions and effects that cant be achieved without linear editing. The pros of this is that it is very easy to do and can be done quickly however can be very difficult to learn and edit film.
Final Cut
Most digital editing is used on software such as Avid or Final Cut Pro which allows a bypass of the positive film press altogether, this meant that a physical copy wouldn't have to be cut and spliced to edit and is done digitally and easily

Task Two: In-Camera Editing

In-Camera Editing is a linear editing technique where you would film scenes chronologically in a film by starting and stopping the camera then by moving the camera to film another scene in the film and start/stop the camera again, this technique is used frequently in early cinema and is still in use from modern movies today
In-Camera Editing was the only way of editing in early cinema as the technology wasn't advanced enough to begin non-linear editing and was the only way to begin filming for cinema at the time.




In our in-camera editing short film we would use the camera by starting and stopping to edit different scenes together. We would begin by having one character enter the scene then we would stop the camera move the camera to a new position to carry on the scene from a new perspective, we would have one character speak their lines then stop recording and switch to a new character speaking and would repeat till the scene has finished.

The Pros of In-Camera Editing is that there is no 'real' editing would be so filming would be quick and easy to do and wouldn't cost any extra apart from the equipment.

The Cons of this however is that if you were to mess up on camera while its recording that would mean that you would have to redo the scenes again because you can't edit it out on the camera. Another con would be that the screen on the camera is really small to looking at what your recording would be different when its the full screen. The sound recording on a camera is also very bad and recording the voices will be difficult and will pick up background noise, you will not even be able to check the audio after recording.