Film Image Essentials
| Code | Completion | Credits | Range | Language Instruction | Semester |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 304CEI | Z | 1 | English |
Subject guarantor
Name of lecturer(s)
Learning outcomes of the course unit
In a series of seminars the students will get familiar with the building blocks of film language focusing on the cinematographer’s role in the process of creating audiovisual content.
The students will become conscious of what tools they have available, how to use them and how they can offer them to director in close cooperation on a film and/or use them for authoring thier own content.
Mode of study
Individual elements of film language such as framing, composition, action, movement within the frame and camera movement , continuity will be discussed in detail and categorized. Film excerpts will be analyzed and discussed. These discussions will include interpretation of a script excerpt followed by an analysis of that same scene in the finished film with regard to the staging techniques and cinematographer’s choices of composition and spatial relationships.
The students will be assigned a series of practical exercises in which they will prove their understanding of the film language vocabulary and grammar.
Prerequisites and co-requisites
The students will watch the films in their entirety selected for this seminar prior to the analysis sessions in order to formulate their opinion on the narrative and camera style.
Course contents
In the introductory sessions the structure of basic cinematic forms will be discussed covering the whole process from conception, script writing, staging, picture and sound acquisition all the way through the editing. The students will learn how the whole process is interwoven and how the creative decision taken during the writing and preproduction impact on the camera work just as the camera work impacts the editing.
The importance of visual and narrative unity of any given film form will be explained and the fundaments of cinematic continuity will be demonstrated.
As the students become familiar with the basic composition and framing techniques the course will explore how to work with time and movement.
In a series of excerpts from films we will look at how using of different film elements and their combination affect the viewer through editing and how they impact on their psychological perception – creating the feel of expectation, suspense, romance, relaxation.
The students will bring their own examples.
Finally we touch on cinematographer’s tools of expression and the strictly visual aspects of film language – lighting and the mood, color and texture. The use of film optics will be discussed and how different lens types render reality in different ways. The reason for leaving this important aspects of the cinematic language at the end is the fact that lighting and understanding of film optics will be subject to specialized lectures and seminars throughout the year.
Seminars’ Framework:
- If cinema is a language, then we must ask: what is the structure of that language? What is the vocabulary, what are the rules of grammar, the structure of this cinematic language?
2.Literary design. Film script structure. Dramatic arch.
3.Analysing a film with classic three act structure ( Three Days of the Condor) vs films with more complex structure (Parasite)
4.Visual design – understanding the script, DOP’s analysis of the script.
5.Basic construction pieces of a scene
6.Set design (scenography) creating visual world for the characters
7.Building the character – costume, make up, pacing in the set context, framing
8.Types of shots by function vs types of shots by size
9.Composition
10.Camera movement
11.Color !
12.Color in postproduction.
13.Black and White
14.Mis en scene, staging, blocking
15.Lighting
16.Continuity
17.Editing
18.Showing vs Obscuring and revealing
19.Broader perspective – DOP and knowing the film language, learning how to communicate
20.Films with strong visual style
21.Lenses and optical devices
22.Special effects and recent technological advances.
Two exercises will form an indispensable part of this seminar:
1.Creating a storyboard, moodboard and choosing locations.
The students will deal with the task of how to conveying a simple narrative situation, spatial relationships of the actors and objects as well as using his/her imagination to estimate the timing of each scene and shot. This process will also help the student to understand the storyboarded scenes and prepare their own storyboards for their future projects.
In this assignment we will deliberately exclude the technical and creative tools such as tonality, use of different lenses and rather let the students concentrate on spatial and dramatic aspects and the mis en scene.
2.The next assignment will concentrate on transforming this storyboard/stills sequence into a motion picture sequence.
Recommended or required reading
Blain Brown : Cinematograohy Theory and Practice (chapters: Visual Language, Language of the Lens, Visual Storytelling)
Syd Field : Screenplay
Steven D.Katz : Shot by Shot
Assessment methods and criteria
85% participation in seminars
Finished assignments in due time:
Exercise 1 deadline October 31
Exercise 2 deadline December 10
Wxcercise 3 dedline April 30
Schedule for winter semester 2021/2022:
|
06:00–08:0008:00–10:0010:00–12:0012:00–14:0014:00–16:0016:00–18:0018:00–20:0020:00–22:0022:00–24:00
|
|
|---|---|
| Mon |
|
| Tue |
|
| Wed |
|
| Thu |
|
| Fri |
|
| Date | Day | Time | Tutor | Location | Notes | No. of paralel |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tue | 17:20–18:55 | Michal BAUMBRUCK | Room No. 230 Lažanský palác |
lecture parallel1 |
Schedule for summer semester 2021/2022:
The schedule has not yet been prepared
The subject is a part of the following study plans
- Cinematography_3_2021 (required subject)