LESSON 2
FILMING TECHNIQUES
TASK
Shooting uncontrolled action.
CONDITIONS
Given information and diagrams relating to uncontrolled and semicontrolled action.
STANDARDS
Demonstrate competency of the task skill and knowledge by correctly responding to 85
percent of the multiplechoice questions covering filming techniques.
REFERENCES
FM 1182
Learning Event 1:
USE BASIC SEQUENCE
1. The foundation of good camera technique is referred to as the "basic sequence."
This applies to both film and TV cameras. Do not be disturbed at the mention of "camera
technique" or "basic sequence," and anticipate many complicated rules to be followed.
They are a set of simple points used by professionals to achieve good footage. If you
want to tell a story, you must put together a wide variety of shots so as to obtain a
smooth, meaningful, visual flow of action. The basic sequence is the most important of
all the camera techniques that you will learn in your motion picture or television
course. In short, you must understand your medium as well as your camera; you must know
pictorial continuity. Pictorial continuity is the framework of every wellconstructed
motion picture, whether it is a Hollywood epic, newsreel, documentary, or service
training film.
a. In 1907 most films were still produced as though they were plays. Each scene
began with the entrance of the actors and lasted, unbroken, until their exit. The
players were always shown full size and at a fixed distance from the camera. The motion
picture still looked to most people like a shadowy carbon of the living theatre. No one
knew how to break away from the older medium.
b. The man who did break away, and brought to life a new art, was David W.
Griffith. He made his first radical innovation in 1909 when he departed from the old
"one sceneone shot" method by demanding a change of camera position in the middle of
the scene. In moving the camera closer to the actors, he had invented the "full shot" in
which only the upper half of the
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