2008 : outdated page -- perhaps, I should continue work on glossary
... now I understand why to demolish and build a new structure makes more sense in our world.
I really do not know how to fix it. A new start -- cine101.com
After 2009 --
...
cinw101.com
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This is the 3rd Glossary (one is the main directory of film.org and one is in film directing class. WHAT to shoot, HOW to soot it, HOW TO PRESENT the shot:
* The terms importants for Monaco, part 3 "Signs & Syntax"
Denonative Meaning is WHAT we see...
Paradigmic: how to shoot it.
syntagmatic: how to edit (present) it.
diegesis = the sum of its denotations (p.162)
Codes: semiotic, cultural.
"Reading the Image" vs. "Understanding the Image" (diagrams 1 and 2 -- pp.176-177).
Paradigmic (categories of choice) and Syntagmatic (categories of construction)
Denotation = > Diegesis
Connotation = > Expression
signifier (s) and signified (s')
Icon: s = s' (a sign in which the signifier represent the signified mainly by its similarity to it, its likeness. Sample: picture of fire).
Symbol: s=s' (an arbirary sign in which the signifier has neither a direct nor an indexical relationship to the signified, but rather represents it through convernion. Sample: word "fire").
Metonymy: s~s' ("substitute naming" = associated details invoke an absract idea. Sample: the king as "the crown"), i.e. metonymy as in association. [metaphor as in comparatives.] + synecdoche as in the distribution of the whole into the part.
Trope: s=/=s' (A trope is a rhetorical figure of speech [wikipedia]: "turn" ).
Index: denotative + connotative together (a sign which measures a quality not because it is identical to it but because it has an inherent relationship to it. Sample: smoke).
THR 334W (3 Credits) Spring 2003Movies and Films (3+0) h Explores rotating thematic topics in the art of classic cinema (films) and popular mass media (movies). Comparative analysis of classics and recent motion pictures is used to present elements of film language, analysis and criticism.
[ list of glossaries ]
Film Glossary:
art film -- A film intended to be a serious artistic work, often experimental and not designed for mass appeal.
ANGLE The position from which camera photographs action. Camera point of view. High, low.
AUTEUR :
French for "author". Used by critics writing for Cahiers du cinema and other journals to indicate the figure, usually the director, who stamped a film with his/her own "personality". Opposed to "metteurs en scene" who merely transcribed a work achieved in another medium into film. The concept allowed critics to evaluate highly works of American genre cinema that were otherwise dismissed in favor of the developing European art cinema.
BEAT A smaller dramatic unit within a scene; a scene within a scene; a change in direction of scene content.
cinema: 1. A film or movie. + A movie theater. 2. Films or movies considered as a group.
The film or movie industry. + 3. The art or technique of making films or movies; filmmaking.
CLIMAX The point at which the complication reaches its point of maximum tension and the forces in opposition confront each other at a peak of physical or emotional action. (see Dictionary @ Theatre w/Anatoly)
COMPLICATION The section of a story in which a conflict begins and grows in clarity, intensity, and importance.
COMPOSITION (visual) A harmonious arrangement of two or more elements, one of which dominates all others in interest.
COVERAGE The camera angles a director needs for dramatizing values in a scene and for effective editing. For example, a full shot, over-shoulder shots, closeups.
CUTAWAY A cut to a person or action that is not the central focus of attention, perhaps to a spectator. Sometimes used by editors to delete unwanted footage.
Denotation -- a direct specific meaning (semio) * from de- + notare = to note: DESIGNATE or/and to make known : ANNOUNCE
DENOUEMENT A brief period of calm following the climax, in which a state of relative equilibrium returns (RESOLUTION).
EXPOSITION Information that the audience needs to know to understand a story. Introduction of a conflict, character(s), theme(s)
Diegesis --
EDITING The SELECTING of significant event details and the SEQUENCING of such details into a comprehensive whole.
FRAME The perimeter of a TV/film picture; a single photographic unit of film. Also a verb: to enclose or encompass subject matter.
IDENTIFICATION The viewer's emotional involvement with (usually) the protagonist in drama; the viewer becomes the protagonist.
INTERNAL CONFLICT A psychological conflict within the central character. The primary struggle is between different aspects of a single personality.
LEITMOTIF A motif or theme associated with specific person, situation, or idea; usually reprised for dramatic effect. Leitmotif is some intentionally repeated element (sound, shot, dialogue, music, etc.) that helps unify a film by reminding the viewer of its earlier appearance.
MONTAGE A term that originally referred to the editorial assembling of film segments. Montage today describes a rapid succession of images that convey a single concept.
Mise en Scene: mise en scène [mizA~sEn] refers to everything that is to appear before the camera and its arrangement – sets, props, actors, costumes, camera movements and performances. The term was coined by early French film critics and means literally "put into the scene" or "setting in scene." In auteur theory, less creative directors are sometimes disparagingly called "metteurs en scène". [wikipedia]
Point of view (POV) shot A subjective camera angle that becomes the perspective of a character. We look at the world through his or her eyes.
Paradigmatic -- "EXAMPLE, PATTERN" ... and Denotation
POLYPHONY The combination of two or more melodic lines (horizontal vectors), which, when played together, forms a harmonic whole (Vertical vectors).
PROGRESSION The traditional climbing action of drama, a growth in dramatic tension. Increasingly close camera angels represent camera progression.
PRIMARY MOTION (Event) motion in front of the camera.
REACTION SHOT A shot that shows a character "reacting" rather than acting. The reaction shot is usually a close-up of the emotional reaction registered on the face of the person most affected by the dialogue or action.
RHYTHM In visual composition, the pleasing repetition of images. In drama: repetition of phrases, actions, or musical themes for increased dramatic effect.
SCREEN DIRECTION The consistent pattern of movement from angle to angle: left to right or right to left.
STYLE A director's personal pattern of treating material, including staging of camera and performers, script elements, and music.
SECONDARY MOTION Camera motion, including pan, tilt, pedestrian, crane or boom, dolly, truck, arc and zoom.
SCENE A clearly identifiable, organic part of an event. It is a small structural (action) or thematic (story) unit, usually consisting of several shots.
SEQUENCE The sum of several scenes (or shots) that compose an organic whole.
SETTING The time and place in which the film's story takes place, including all of the complex factors that come packaged with a given time and place: climate, terrain, population density, social structures and economic factors, customs, moral attitudes, and codes of behavior. Also, see Exposition
SHOT The smallest convenient operational unit in film. It is the interval between two distinct video transitions, such as cuts, dissolves, wipes.
STOCK CHARACTERS Minor characters whose actions are completely predictable or typical of their job or profession.
SUBJECTIVE TIME The duration we feel; also called psychological time. A qualitative measure.
TIMING The control of objective and subjective time.
VISUALIZATION The mental visual image of an event in a single shot. (see Conceptualization)
Action match cut Cut made between two different angels of the same action using the subject's movement as the transition.
Ambient sound Sound naturally occurring in any location.
Aspect ratio The size of a screen format expressed as the ratio of the width in relation to the height. Films made for television are photographed at a ratio of 1.33:1.
Attack (sound) The beginning portion of any sound.
Camera motivation A shot or a camera movement must be motivated within the terms of the scene or story if it is not look alien and imposed. (see POV).
Complementary shot A shot compositionally designed to intercut with another.
Continuity Consistency of physical detail between shots intended to match.
Contrast ratio Ratio of lightest to darkest areas in an image.
Controlling point of view The psychological perspective (a character's or the storyteller's) from which a particular scene is shown.
CS Close shot
CU Closeup.
DP Director of photography.
Dissolve The gradual merging of the end of one shot with the beginning of the next, produced by superimposing a fade-out onto a fade-in of equal length or by imposing one scene over another.
Dynamic composition Pictorial composition as it changes within a moving shot.
Establishing shot A shot that establishes a scene's geographical and human contents.
Eye-line shot A shot that shows us what a character is seeing.
Ext. Exterior.
External composition The composition between two images at the point of cutting between them.
FG Foreground.
FI Fade in. Fade-out/fade-in A transitional device in which the last image of one scene fades to black as the first image of the next scene is gradually illuminated.
Final cut A film in its finished form. A guarantee of final cut assures the filmmaker of producer that the film will not be tampered with after they approve it.
Flash forward Moving temporarily forward in time, the cinematic equivalent of the future tense. This quickly becomes a new form of present.
Flashback Moving temporarily backwards in time; a cinematic past tense that soon becomes an ongoing present.
FO Fade out.
Genre A kind or type of film (horror, sitcom, drama, etc.)
Headroom Compositional space left above heads.
High angle Camera mounted high, looking down.
High contrast Image with large range of brightness.
Insert A close shot of detail to be inserted in a shot containing more comprehensive action.
Int. Interior.
Final cut A film in its finished form. A guarantee of final cut assures the filmmaker of producer that the film will not be tampered with after they approve it.
Flash forward Moving temporarily forward in time, the cinematic equivalent of the future tense. This quickly becomes a new form of present.
Flashback Moving temporarily backwards in time; a cinematic past tense that soon becomes an ongoing present.
FO Fade out.
Genre A kind or type of film (horror, sitcom, drama, etc.)
Rising action The plot developments, including complication and conflict, that lead to a plot's climax.
Rushes Unedited raw footage as it appears after shooting.
Scene axis The invisible line in a scene representing the scene's dramatic polarization. Coverage is shot from one side of this line to preserve consistent screen directions for all participants. Complex scenes involving multiple characters and physical regrouping may have more than one axis (Crossing the line).
Scene breakdown A crossplot that displays the locations, characters, and script pages necessary to each scene.
SFX Sound effects.
Shooting ratio The ratio of material shot for a scene in relation to its eventual edited length. 8:1 is a not unusual ratio for dramatic film.
Shooting script Screenplay with scenes numbered and amended to show intended camera coverage and editing.
Single shot A shot containing only one character.
Slow Motion The effect of slowed action created by exposing frames in the camera at greater-than-normal speed and then projecting that footage at normal speed (twenty-four frames per second).
Split page format A script format that places action on the left hand side of the page and its accompanying sound on the right.
Storyboard Series of key images sketched to suggest what a series of shots will look like.
Take One filmed attempt from one setup. Each setup may have several takes.
Theme A dominant idea made concrete through its representation by the characters, action, and imagery of the film.
Three-shot/3S Shot containing three people.
Treatment Usually a synopsis in present tense, short story form of a screenplay summarizing dialogue and describing only what an audience would see and hear. Can also be a puff piece designed to sell the script rather than give comprehensive information about content.
Two-shot/2S Shot of two people.
VO Voice over.
WA Wide angle.
Whip pan Very fast panning movement.
White balance Video camera setup procedure in which circuitry is adjusted to the color temperature of the lighting source so that a white object is rendered as white on screen.
WS Wide shot. See -- LS (long shot)
XLS Extra long shot.
Zoom ratio The ratio of the longest to the widest focal lengths. (A 10 to 100 mm zoom would be a 10:1 zoom).
