Film Study: Willow | Shot Types

On Wednesday this week, we had a film study day. If you do not know what a film study is, then allow me to explain. A film study is where you watch through a film, and take notes of what is happening, along with analysing everything involved. You focus on the different shot types, the different angles, and understand exactly what is happening in the film. The film that our teacher Miss Kirkpatrick selected was an old movie titled Willow. A movie from 1988 that sets up a whole story about saving a princess that is bound to become the new queen. Throughout the study, we ended up with 5 different tasks to complete based on the movie itself, and movies in general. In this activity, our task was to find out what different shot types can be involved with movies. Our challenge was to find an image that showed what the shot type may look like in a film, along with an example from our Willow movie. This was a fun and simple challenge, that taught us all a little something.

Willow

Opening Sequence -

Shot types

L. I. - To know some film terminology (shot types etc.)

This is a close viewing of the opening sequence

Look at this list of shot types:

http://www.mediacollege.com/video/shots/

At the bottom are the camera movements.  

Look at the following:

Zoom, Pan, Tilt, Tracking

Look for examples in the movie -

SHOT / MOVEMENT	EXAMPLE	Example from Willow
Long shot
Close Up
Medium shot
High angle
Low angle
Eye level
Reverse angle
ZOOM	A zoom is technically not a camera move as it does not require the camera itself to move at all. Zooming means altering the focal length of the lens to give the illusion of moving closer to or further away from the action. The effect is not quite the same though. Zooming is effectively magnifying a part of the image, while moving the camera creates a difference in perspective — background objects appear to change in relation to foreground objects. This is sometimes used for creative effect in the dolly zoom.
PANNING	A pan is a horizontal camera movement in which the camera moves left and right about a central axis. This is a swiveling movement, i.e. mounted in a fixed location on a tripod or shoulder, rather than a dolly-like movement in which the entire mounting system moves.	In this shot, the dogs are seen running while the camera is following.
TILTING	A tilt is a vertical camera movement in which the camera points up or down from a stationary location. For example, if you mount a camera on your shoulder and nod it up and down, you are tilting the camera. Tilting is less common than panning because that's the way humans work — we look left and right more often than we look up and down. The tilt should not be confused with the Dutch Tilt which means a deliberately slanted camera angle. A variation of the tilt is the pedestal shot, in which the whole camera moves up or down.	No images available.
TRACKING	The term tracking shot is widely considered to be synonymous with dolly shot; that is, a shot in which the camera is mounted on a cart which travels along tracks. However there are a few variations of both definitions. Tracking is often more narrowly defined as movement parallel to the action, or at least at a constant distance (e.g. the camera which travels alongside the race track in track & field events). Dollying is often defined as moving closer to or further away from the action. Some definitions specify that tracking shots use physical tracks, others consider tracking to include hand-held walking shots, Steadicam shots, etc.	No image available.