film vocab 3

Question 1

Continuity Editing

Answer 1

An imaginary line traced along the axis of action in a shot

Question 2

Day for Night

Answer 2

Filming in daytime which the action appears in nightime

Question 3

Deep Focus

Answer 3

A cinematographic technique which enables several planes of action, from the foreground to the deep background, to be seen simultaneously–and in focus–on the screen.

Question 4

Focal Length

Answer 4

In 35 mm systems, lenses having focal lengths less than 12-14mm are generally called “fish-eye”

Question 5

Construction of meaning

Answer 5

Where the whole film text generates.

Question 6

Hand held camera

Answer 6

A filming technique in which the camera is not placed on a tripod, dolly, crane, or other carrying device or platform, but is, rather, held by the operator during a take.

Question 7

interior

Answer 7

Not only the obvious diametric opposite of “Exterior”, interior designates an indoor setting. It is much more commonplace to film interiors on sound stages than it is exteriors.

Question 8

Lighting

Answer 8

The placing of controlled illumination upon a scene or object to be filmed and thus the ultimate tool of the cinematographer

Question 9

High key lighting

Answer 9

is a style of lighting for film, television, or photography that aims to reduce the lighting ratio present in the scene. “singing in the rain and the object of beauty”

Question 10

Low key lighting

Answer 10

“citizen Kane” focuses on accentuating shadows by using hard source lighting in a scene.

Question 11

Montage Theory

Answer 11

Basically a theory which develops the proposition that it is through editing that film finds its greatest–and most unique–powers of expression.

Question 12

Picture track

Answer 12

The print which includes the optical sound track and picture during printing of true film.

Question 13

Shot

Answer 13

A single piece of film of any length or duration which is exposed by the camera being turned on, then off, a single time only.

Question 14

Close up

Answer 14

A shot wherein some feature of the physiognomy (or object) fills or virtually fills the entire frame.

Question 15

Close shot

Answer 15

The conventional definition of a close shot is one where an entire human face from chin or lower neck to top of head or equivalent part of the physiognomy or object fills the frame.

Question 16

Medium close shot

Answer 16

An arbitrary mid-point between a close shot and medium shot.

Question 17

Medium Shot

Answer 17

In a medium shot the human torso from top of head to waist appears in the frame.

Question 18

Medium Long shot

Answer 18

An arbitrary mid-point between a medium shot and a long shot. Sometimes known as an American shot.

Question 19

Long shot

Answer 19

An entire human figure, from head to toe, is seen wholly on the screen, or, a relatively far away object is seen in its entirety in a spatial context.

Question 20

Sound Track

Answer 20

The audio equivalent of the picture, or, more accurately, the picture track, the sound track contains all the audio information which accompanies the film: dialogue, sound effects, music, and so on.

Question 21

SUPERIMPOSITION

Answer 21

The appearance of more than one image on the screen at the same time where one is overlayed upon another without masking it; not to be confused with split-screen, where two distinct images co-exist on the screen along side one another.

Question 22

Circle of Confusion

Answer 22

A concept closely related to that of depth of field , the _____ is an imaginary area on the screen which is defined by the relationship between the distance of the camera from the subject, the lighting conditions, the focal length of the lens used, and the aperture setting.

Question 23

Wipe

Answer 23

A transitional device in which shot “B” seemingly moves, in either screen direction, across shot “A” thus effectively “wiping” off shot “A” and replacing it.

Question 24

Auteur Theory

Answer 24

Introduced by the editors of the celebrated French critical film journal, and subsequently enlarged upon by the American critic Andrew Sarris among others. The theory posits that the director of a film is the equivalent of the author of a novel.

Question 25

Audience Expectation

Answer 25

A concept which describes the a priori suppositions which an audience will have upon encountering a film text.