Noel Southward

Ms. Doar
British Lit.
11 March, 2016
Film Techniques Vocabulary and Descriptions
Instructions:
1. Research to find the various techniques used in film making.
2. You should NOT copy/paste, but include information in your own words to show comprehension.
3. Visit several websites and documents to collect comprehensive information.

Category

Technique and Description

Sound

1. Diegetic Sounds: (actual sound) refers to the sounds whose source is visible on
screen, or whose source is implied to be present by action
2. Voice Over: Off camera narration by a character or a commentator.
3. Non-Diegetic: (commentary sounds) where sounds soured is not visible or
implied.
4. Theme Music: a recognizable piece sometimes written specifically for the film and
is sometimes used throughout the whole movie,
5. Internal Diegetic: Only one character can hear (internal dialogue, supernatural
voices)
1. Deep Focus: where foreground and background are equally focused

Focus

2. Rack Focus; When the director or cameraman shifts focus from one object to
another

What is the purpose of the technique? Why is it useful?

How does it enhance the viewers perception of a scene
or character?

Often used to create a mood

Its used to create a mood for the film

This is used to draw attention to everything. Audience
chooses where to focus attention.
This is used to shift the audiences attention from one
Thing to another. It can point out to the audience the
relationship between two things or people.

3. Shallow focus: This is when o only one part of the image is in focus while the rest
is out of focus
4. Soft Focus: The scene is soft and somewhat blurred.
Framing
(Shots)

1. Long-Shot The object seems small or is seen from a distance. If a person is in the
shot, it is the entire body and a great deal of background visible.
2. Close-up: This is where only one of the characters face is shown. Takes 80% of
the screen
3. Extreme Close Up: A shot that focuses on one single body part or object
4. Mid/ Medium Shot: a shot that shows the character/characters from the waist up.

Offers viewers a sense of time and place; also offers the

viewer a choice of where to focus.
This lets the audience see the characters emotion.
Used to draw attention to object
How the characters interactions and gives the audience a
chance to also views their emotion.

Noel Southward
Ms. Doar
British Lit.
11 March, 2016
5. Full-Shot: This is a complete view of characters in scene.

Audience views the relationships between characters and

can also appreciate the styling choices.

6. Establishing Shot: Shows setting mostly and landscape

7. Extreme long shot: A very broad and panoramic shot

Camera
Angles

1. Birds eye: an angle that looks directly down on the scene.

This is commonly used to establish setting.

2. Eye-level Angle: this makes the audience on an equal footing as the characters

Its most common and allows the audience to feel

comfortable with the characters
It can be used to suggest imbalance, transition, or
instability.
Indicates tension, uncertainty or danger
This can be used to make the audience feel vulnerable and
make the character more powerful/dynamic.
Makes object look vulnerable

3. Oblique Angle: This is when the camera is tilted and not horizontal to floor level
4. Dutch Angle: Camera is slightly tilted
5. Low-angle: an angle that looks up at character
6. High Angle: Camera is above or at an angle above subject
1. Side Lighting lighting from the side that leaves the subject half in light and half
in the shadows.
2. High-key Lighting: Lighting that produces uniform brightness: scene flooded with
light
3. Low-Key Lighting: Lighting that produces dark shadows

Lighting

4. Bottom Lighting: light comes from bottom up and puts subject in half light and
half shadow
5. Front Lighting: Lighting from the front
6. Back Lighting: Lighting from the back

It can indicate a split personality or a secret/something

hidden by a character.
To create a natural looking scene and audience have no
misunderstandings.
Creates suspension, mystery or danger. Good for horror
films
Makes subject appear threatening or sinister
Makes subject more vulnerable and creates a softening
effect.
Can be used to create a sense of depth, to produce a halolike aura.

7.
Camera
Movement
and
Transitions

1. Pans: Where the camera moves horizontally.

2. Tilts: similar to a pan but scans a scene vertically.
3. Dolly Shot: A shot taken from a moving vehicle
4. Crane/ Boom shot: shot take from a crane, which vertically moves the camera and
cameraman in any direction.

Most often used to follow something moving.

Used to simulate a point a view or to reveal a person or
object
Commonly used to scan a room. It gives the viewer a look
at the details in a scene
Often used by directors to enhance the end of a scene.

Noel Southward
Ms. Doar
British Lit.
11 March, 2016
5. Zooming: this is a change in lenses focus.
6. Follow shot: where the camera follows the subject
7. Mobile camera: The whole camera moves

Editing

1. Fade a scene fades to black (or any other color) for a very short time as is slowly
replaced with another image; may start the next scene or change subjects
2. Point of View: A shot form the characters point of view
3. Cut: A joining of two separate shots so that the first is instantaneously replaced by
second
4. Dissolve Transition: a transition technique where on image is gradually replaced by
another
5. Wipe Transition: A new image wipes off the previous image
6. Flashback/Flash-forward: A segment of a film that dramatizes what has happened
in the past or what will take place in the future
7. Shot-reverse-shot: switches back and forth between 2 characters
8. Crosscuts/ Parallel Editing: Switching between two actions taking at the same time
9.

This is used to give an impression of movement.

To Follow a subject
To follow character or object
It indicates a passage of time or the end of a segment.
Makes audience fell like theyre apart of the scene

Shows gradation and blends scenes together

Can move any direction
Lets the audience figure out the plot and connect the
scenes. Lets the audience learn about characters
Often used to show reaction in a conversation