Editing involves joining images together to create meaning and tell a story. Key techniques editors use include controlling shot length to set tempo, using transitions between shots, and precisely timing shots. Editing draws attention through close-ups and establishes settings. Cutting between shots of two people in conversation (shot reverse shot) or matching a character's eye line builds narrative and draws viewers into the story.

1. Principles of Editing

2. Creating meaning
through collage,
tempo and timing

3. Joining Images
Editing forms a collage, an assortment of images joined
together to create meaning.
The link below is a clip from ‘Escape To Victory’ and
they have made a montage of loads of individual
clips to produce a final copy of one long sequence.
This form of editing is very common nowadays as it
creates a better story and captures the audiences
attention quicker and stronger.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4i5KjchN3I8

4. Tempo
Shot Length – the most obvious way editors create Tempo is by controlling the
length of shot.
• Long shots slow down the pace of a scene.
• Short takes quicken the pace and intensity
• Long shots for romantic scenes, quick shots for action.
The link below shows a scene from friends. This scene is a love
scene and the camera angles add a massively important
effect on the scene.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T-_85uxmHEg

5. Cont…..
Studies have suggested that shots are gaining pace compared to The Golden age
of Hollywood. The average shot used to be 5.15 seconds but nowadays it’s risen
to 4.75 seconds. The change of length can be seen when you compare Casablanca
to the Woman In Black. This is due to the fact that films are now electronically cut
and used to be physically cut using scissors.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YJoA6n120Sc

6. Problems
It takes the average person 3 seconds to adjust to a shot change. Brandt has argued
“…..if the audience takes 3 seconds to adjust to a new scene, what happens when the average
shot length is so short that the audience is never given a chance to catch up”.
The tendency to rely on such rapid editing in recent films may explain why younger
audience are not receptive to older films; they seem slow paced. We have grown up
around fast tempo films resulting in us often becoming inpatient when watching a
slow paced film and old film.

7. Shot transitions
The second way editors adjust the tempo is shot transitions. Common shot transitions
are ‘Cut from A to B’, ‘Fade in/fade out’ and ‘Dissolve overlapping’. This transitions add
several effects to the scene you see and can either have a good effect or bad.
Sometimes it can make the editing look amateur and poor whereas if used correctly,
then it will look professional and will capture the audience easier.
The link below is the trailer for the film ‘Hugo’. This trailer
Shows fades and transitions which are vary rarely shown in
Films.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CE1bzNrdz8s

8. Cont….
These shot transitions convey a passage of time, but they also affect the pacing of a
scene. Cuts quicken the pace of the action and connote instant change. Even a scene
with long takes, a cut often suggests sudden change in mood or character dynamic

9. Fades
Fades effect the pace of the film as they literally pause the action. They rarely occur in
films but when they do it is to introduce memory or fantasy . This is because it shows it
in stages and as if the actor is dizzy, confused and thinking.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mmh-YVA_4Zs

10. Timing of a shot
The third editing technique is timing of shots. By editing the clips poorly and
being 1 millisecond out, you can cause the film to look poorly edited resulting
in a poor film. Timing of shots and shot types are vital. Cut a way's are used
to emphasize a persons reaction or response. For example:
• A Cut away to a newspaper on the table when presented in narrative.
• Cutting from a two shot to a close up for reaction or a close up to a long
shot for landscape effect.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mCJBXfKtOiM

11. Hitchcock's ‘Notorious’ 1946
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DPd5uSRDrZk
Attribute to editing
• Collage
• Tempo
• Timing
Techniques used in Notorious
• Medium shot (romantic
intimacy) vs. Close up
(disappointment)
• The cut abruptly changes the
pace of the conversation; As
Alicia and Delvins words
become more heated, the
scene relies on shorter takes
• Cut to close up of Alicia
coincides with Delvins line “I
bet you’ve heard that line
enough’

12. Story- centered Editing
and the construction of
meaning

13. Editing and timing
Narrative sequencing. Telling the story as it happens in Linear editing. This is
the most common. ‘Medias res’ is the term used when narrative is jumbled
up. (Fight Club for example).
The link below shows a man running to attempt to get into a building but
struggles to find a door that will open and enable him entry into the building.
The shots they have used has made it look like one long sequence.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eR6yctA9vEM

14. Condensing / expanding time
Collages condense time. For example, Spiderman uses ‘condensed editing’
when thinking of a costume – speeds up hours, days or years in the characters
lives. Expanding – overlapping shots of a single action
example: Someone pressing a door bell shot from 3 angles and shown after
each other to portray time but also nerves in the person pressing it.#
Below is a scene from Spiderman, where he designs his costume.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uPa9rq0ZMT0

15. Arranging the order of events
• Media Res
• Events taking place in the present are interrupted by images that have taken place
in the past.
• Flashbacks
• Rare occasions there are flash-forward's
• By their nature ‘flash forwards’ can be confusing as they can only be understood
once the event has occurred on scene.
Easy Rider – Captain America is interrupted as he talks by a shot of burning debris on the
side of the road. Only later will viewers realise that the debris is from CA motorcycle crash at
the end of the film

16. Time and Space
Editing draws the viewers attention to the detail
• Close up (example of the very first ‘close up’ used in film)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q2X_BZpnWFc
• Establishing
Example: Friends http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SdClvwG9uH8
The close up shot on chandlers facial expression helps put the emssage
across that joey is an idiot.
This drawers the viewers attention to a number of things; the
emotional tenor of a conversation, the object of a characters gaze,
important detail in the mise en scene and the group dynamics of a
scene.

17. Shot reverse shot
Conversation between two people.
One speaks to the other listening.
Rule of thumb is: the actors will never speak .directly to the
viewer as this destroys the illusion of a naturally unfolding story.
Cameras are normally slightly angles to the side rather than
using point of view shots.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QLkUHZ1qips

18. Eye line match
The match cut uses the characters line of sight
• Powerful storytelling devise as it This draws the viewers into a characters
thought process and emotional state
Cutaways
• Unlike eye line match a cut away is not character centered, the on screen
appearance of an object does not depend on the character having to ‘see
it’ in the previous shot
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0VPMEKCITvs

19. Creating meaning outside the story
• Continuity is consistency of the characteristics of persons, plot, objects,
places, events, abilities and the fictional universe seen by the reader or
viewer over some period of time.
• 180 degree rule is a basic guideline regarding the on-screen spatial
relationship between a character and another character or object within a
scene. Examples of when this is used are Ant & Dec and Jedward.
• Soviet Montage (political meaning) was a theory from Eisenstein and he
created 5 methods of montage being Metric, Rhythminc, Tonal,
Overtonal and Intellectual.

20. TASK 3
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xlrqaAjBwS4
The Hangover is a film where camera angles and shots are vital to
help create the feeling of being confused and being hung over.
The selected scene I have chosen, shows loads and loads of
different angles. Depending on what's’ happening and where the
location is, the shots will change and will attempt to try and suck
you in to the situation. At the beginning of the clip the shot types
are one shots and panning shots. As the clip goes on and more
people come in creating more conversations, two shots begin to
come into use as well as dolly zooms and over shoulder shots.