Camera is used in this films to show important things to the audience, and to help create an overall feel for the film.
MOVEMENT: tracking, panning, tilting, handheld, and zooming. SHOT TYPES:
Consider how are these camera shot types are used to help the audience understand the narrative (storyline)? ANGLES: high, low, neutral, tilted, birds eye view. Consider what these might suggest about a character or situation? FILM FORMAT: the format used for filming: 35mm, 50mm, 70mm, IMAX, Black & White, Colour, Video, Animation and Photography. |
To begin our discussion on film analysis, ad specifically CAMERA, why not start with a student film?
In 2013, RSC Year 12 student Callum Sloan created the fictional narrative short film Defibrillation, which is set in the not too distant future. In his short, Callum made use of all of the above Production Elements in order to achieve a certain look and feel for his film. He also had an important message that he wanted to communicate with the audience. Can you guess what it is? WATCH: The opening scene from Orson Welles' 1958 film Touch of Evil. This is a classic piece of film making history which showcases the art of the one take shot.
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When discussing Sound, we refer to two different categories:
DIEGETIC These are sounds that occur within the film’s world – sounds that the characters can hear. We can think of them as real sounds. For example; the sound of footsteps, a glass being dropped, talking, car tyres screeching, birds chirping, or waves crashing. NON-DIEGETIC These are sounds that are added, and that the characters cannot actually hear. The sounds do not exist within the film's world, they are added for the benefit of the audience. For example; a film soundtrack or score, sound effects (that you cannot actually hear in real life) like the whoosh of a punch. WATCH: The Big Bang Theory. This clip features a scene from this sitcom without the studio laughter.
WATCH: Frozen (Buck & Lee, 2013). This is one of the final scenes of the highly awarded animated feature. Note how sound is used to build anticipation. suspense, and to draw upon the audience's emotion.
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A Foley Artist is a creator of sound, who specialises in recreating everyday sound effects that can be added into films. This may include sounds like footsteps, traffic, a school bell, an alarm clock, the wind, and even the movement of clothing. If they do their job really well, the audience may not even notice the sounds.
Without this sound, a film can seem unnatural, so the role of the Foley Artist is vital in creating a sense of realism within a film. Now watch the SoundWorks Collection video - The Sound of the Man of Steel. In this short documentary / behind the scenes of the latest Superman movie, we follow the work of Foley Artists who's job it is to record sound for film. |
The production elements of Editing refers to the editing of sound and vision. At the basic level, the purpose of editing is manipulate time in a narrative.
DECREASED TIME - (COLLAPSED / SPED UP) This includes scenes in films such as montages - we see a lot of quick shots of something that might have occurred in the story world over months and we the audience see it in a matter of minutes. We, the audience, don't need to see every minute of every character's life. We can piece together the parts that are not shown. INCREASED TIME - (EXPANDED / SLOWED DOWN) This is when time is slowed down. This give the audience a moment to stop and take in what has just happened. This is a common edit technique when something dramatic had just happened. Think of major fight scenes in films. As the punch is blown the film slows down so we the audience can take it all in. In some cases, the punch is then shown from multiple angles, to further engage the audience. This is the editing technique of overlapping editing. WATCH: Deja Vu (Scott, 2006) trailer, and note how it makes use of some very clever editing to tie in with the overall theme of the film.
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There are a number of different techniques that editors make use of to enhance a film.
WATCH: the Transformers: Age of Extinction (Bay, 2014) trailer and write down what you notice about the use of editing - specifically, making note of sound and vision.
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While we're talking about Editing and Michael Bay (oh, very nice segue) let's look at this wonderfully edited trailer for Up, if it was directed by Michael Bay!
WARNING: trailer may include excessive amounts of lens flares and explosions. |
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Lighting within a film the responsibility of the cinematographer also known as the Director of Photography (DOP). Lighting is used to create mood and atmosphere. There is no such thing as natural lighting. Do you think that Neighbours is only filmed when it is a sunny lovely day on Ramsey Street? NO, there is a whole crew that makes Neighbours look like it's always a lovely day.
Here are the common terms of lighting that you will need to refer to:
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WATCH: The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (Stiller, 2013) is a beautifully shot film, with exceptional cinematography (DOP: Stuart Dryburgh). While the film has been accused of being too much like an extended music video, it offers a great opportunity to discuss the use of lighting techniques.
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2008 TropFest winner - Marry Me
Watch the 2008 Winner of TropFest 2008, Marry Me, (Directed by Michelle Lehman). The TropFest Signature Item for that year was the number 8 … can you find it?
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Scott Pilgrim vs. the World is a 2010 comedy film co-written, produced and directed by Edgar Wright, based on the graphic novel series Scott Pilgrim by Bryan Lee O'Malley. It stars Michael Cera as musician Scott Pilgrim, who must battle his girlfriend Ramona's seven evil exes, who are coming to kill him. Scott Pilgrim vs. the World was planned as a film after the first volume of the comic was released. Wright became attached to the project and filming began in March 2009 in Toronto. The film received generally positive reviews from critics, but it failed to recoup its production budget during its release in theaters, grossing $31.5 million in North America and $16 million internationally. The film has fared better on home formats, becoming the top-selling Blu-ray on Amazon.com on its first day of sale, and has gained a cult following. Read more on Wikipedia and IMDb.
Edgar Wright’s seminal film Scott Pilgrim vs. The World (2010, Universal Pictures) effectively illustrates the audiovisual parallels and differences between the two media. It organically integrates the distinctive stylistic flourishes of video game play into the dominant cinematic texture, to the point that the film, particularly in its action sequences, evolves into a subjectively rendered (and relatable) gameplay experience. It thus represents a genuine video game film. Read more of this essay here.
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MARKETING: Michael Cera stated that he felt the film was "a tricky one to sell. I don't know how you convey that movie in a marketing campaign. I can see it being something that people are slow to discover
As part of additional marketing for the film, the animated short Scott Pilgrim vs. the Animation was produced by Titmouse Inc. and aired on Adult Swim in August 2010. The animation adapts the opening prologue of the second Scott Pilgrim book.
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In Semester 2, we will be studying Now You See Me (directed by Louis Leterrier, 2013), a Blockbuster starring an A-list Hollywood cast, featuring; Jesse Eisenberg, Mark Ruffalo, Woody Harrelson, Isla Fisher, Dave Franco, Morgan Freeman and Michael Caine.
While the movie has all the key ingredients for success, it has come under fire as being "overcomplicated" and "underwhelming" by some film critics. What do you think? Read some of the reviews below. A great mystery weaves through the darkness with a certain momentum. It dodges left, cuts right, moves in all directions and then suddenly circles around and flips on the lights to reveal an intricately designed puzzle that’s not missing a single piece. As the credits role, it makes you believe there’s no other way the film could have accounted for the exact sequence of events, and it makes you want to re-watch to see how well everything holds up with your newfound knowledge. |
Overcooked, overcomplicated and underinteresting, this heist caper turns into a mess ... The opening 10 minutes are reasonably entertaining – crucially, this is the section of the movie not about bank-robbing – but it just gets tangled, wildly implausible and dull, and the quartet's mastery of the ordinary non-magic skills necessary in large-scale theft is entirely unconvincing, and no amount of narrative misdirection can get around this. |
In Semester 1 2014, we studied The Dark Knight (directed by Christopher Nolan, 2008).
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