Film Terms to Help you Through the Term!
General Terminology
Production – The process of creating the film.
Distribution – The process of supplying the finished film to the places where it will be shown.
Exhibition – The process of showing the finished film to audiences.
Auteur – The “author” of the film. Directors known for their particular styles are often referred to as “auteurs.”
Genres – Various types of films which audiences and filmmakers recognize by their familiar narrative concerns.
Common genres include Westerns, musicals, and gangster films.
Cinematography – A general term for all the manipulations of the film strip by the camera in the shooting phase
and in the lab during the developing phase. Also, the art and craft of photographing moving objects on continuous
film.
Narrative Elements
Narrative structure – A type of filmic organization in which the parts of the film relate to one another as a series
of causally related events taking place in a specific time and space.
Narration – The way in which the plot conveys the story information. The narration can be more or less restricted
to character knowledge.
Plot – In a narrative film, all the events that are directly presented to us, including their causal relationships,
chronological order, duration, frequency, and spatial locations. Opposed to “story,” which is the viewer’s
imaginary construction of all the events in the narrative.
Story – In a narrative film, all the events we see as well as all the events we infer or assume to have occurred,
arranged in their presumed causal relationship, chronological order, frequency and spatial relations. Opposed to
plot, which is the film’s actual presentation of certain events in the narrative.
Closure – The degree to which the ending of a narrative film reveals the effects of all the causal events and
resolves all lines of the action.
Scene – A segment in a narrative film that takes place in one time and in one space or that uses crosscutting to
show two or more simultaneous actions.
Diegesis – In a narrative film, the world of the film’s story, including the events that are presumed to have
occurred but are not necessarily on-screen.
• diegetic sound – Any voice, music or sound effect as originating within the world of the film’s story.
• non-diegetic sound – Sounds such as mood music or a narrator’s commentary coming from outside the
space of the narrative.
Ellipsis – In a narrative film, the shortening of plot duration achieved by omitting certain parts of the story.
Formal Elements
Shot – In shooting, one uninterrupted run of the camera (or “take”). In the finished film, one uninterrupted image
with either a static (non-moving) or moving frame.
Framing – The use of the edges of the film frame to select and compose what will be visible onscreen.
Camera angle – The position of the camera in relation to the subject, which determines how the subject is
framed. Examples include high-angle (looking down at the subject), low-angle (looking up), and canted angle (see
below).
Canted framing – A view in which the frame is not level; either the right side or left side is lower, causing
objects in the scene to look slanted.
Establishing shot – A shot, usually involving a distant framing, that shows the spatial relations between the
important figures, objects and setting in a scene.
Close-up – A framing in which the scale of the object shown is relatively large; most commonly a person’s head
from the neck up.
Medium close-up – A framing in which the scale of the object shown is fairly large, for instance a human figure
from the chest up would fill most of the screen.
Extreme close-up – A framing in which the scale of the object shown is very large, most commonly an object or a
part of a person’s body, like a hand.
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Long shot – A framing in which the scale of the object shown is relatively small; a standing human figure would
be about the height of the screen.
Medium shot – A framing in which the scale of the object shown is of moderate size; a human from waist up
would fill the screen.
Extreme long shot – A framing in which the scale of the object is very small, for instance, a landscape.
Following shot – A shot whose framing shifts to follow a moving figure onscreen.
Mobile frame – The effect on the screen of a moving camera, a zoom or certain special effects.
Pan – A camera movement with the camera body turning to the right or left, producing a horizontal motion.
Tilt – A camera movement with the camera body swiveling upward or downward on a stationary support,
producing a vertical motion.
Tracking shot – A mobile framing that travels through space forward, backward or laterally.
Hand-held camera – The use of a camera operator’s body as a camera support, either holding it by hand or using
a harness.
Long take – A shot that continues for an unusually long time before the transition to the next shot.
Point of view (POV) shot – A shot taken with the camera placed approximately where the character’s eyes would
be, showing what he or she would see. Usually cut in before or after a shot of the character looking.
Offscreen space – The areas of the filmic space which we cannot see within the frame but assume to be there.
Offscreen sound – Sound presumed to be coming from the space of the scene but whose source is not visible.
Editing – In filmmaking, the process of selecting and joining camera takes. In the finished film, the set of
techniques that governs the relationship between the shots.
Montage – A synonym for editing, but often used to refer to a certain editing style among Soviet filmmakers of
the 1920s which emphasized the relationships between shots, juxtaposing certain images to generate an idea not
present in either shot.
Cut – An instantaneous change from one shot to another.
Cut-in – An instantaneous shift from a distant framing to a closer view of a portion of the same space.
Dissolve – A transition between two shots during which the first image gradually disappears and is replaced by
another shot gradually fading in. The moment in which these two images blend is called superimposition.
Fade – A fade-in is when a dark screen gradually brightens as a shot appears. A fade-out is when a shot gradually
darkens to black.
Crosscutting – Editing that alternates shots of two or more lines of action, usually occurring simultaneously.
Continuity editing – A system of cutting to maintain continuous and clear narrative action. Continuity editing
relies upon matching screen direction, position and temporal relations from shot to shot. See axis of action,
crosscutting, cut-in, establishing shot, eyeline match, reestablishing shot, screen direction, shot/reverse shot.
Axis of action – In the continuity editing system, the imaginary line that passes from side to side through the main
actors, defining the spatial relations of all the elements in the scene as being to the right or the left. The camera is
not supposed to cross the axis at a cut and thus reverse those spatial relations. This is also known as the 180° line.
Eyeline match – A cut obeying the axis of action principle in which the first shot shows a person looking
offscreen in one direction and the next shot shows a nearby space containing what he or she sees.
Match on action – A continuity cut which splices two different views of the same action together at the same
moment in the movement, making it seem to continue uninterrupted.
Shot/reverse shot – Two or more shots edited together that alternate characters, usually in conversation with one
looking right, the other looking left. Over-the-shoulder framings are common in shot/reverse shot constructions.
Mise-en-scene – All of the elements placed in front of the camera to be photographed: the settings and props,
lighting, costumes, make-up, and figure behavior, meaning how they will move within the image.
Contrast – In cinematography, the difference between the brightest and darkest areas within the frame.
Frontal lighting – Illumination of the scene from near the position of the camera.
Backlighting – Illumination cast onto figures in the scene from the side opposite the camera (from behind the
characters) creating a thin outline of highlighting around the character.
Focus – The degree to which the image is sharp or blurry.
Deep focus – A use of the camera lens and lighting that keeps both the close and distant planes being
photographed in sharp focus.
Deep space – An arrangement of mise-en-scene elements so that there is a considerable distance between the
plane closest to the camera and the plane furthest away.
Depth-of-field – The measurements between the closest and farthest planes in front of the camera lens between
which everything will be in sharp focus.
(Note: All definitions modified from Film Art by David Bordwell and Kristin Thompson)
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