Editing Rhythm

Editing rhythm

Editing rhythm is what editors use to keep pace of the film up to match the action that is going on in the film. Slow cuts edits has a calming, bordering feel to the edit, were as a fast cut edits has lively, aggressive feel  to the edit. 

Below is an example of a scene from the movie Hero which shows somebody else's unique creation of Editing Rhythm and i think it is effective, good way to show it. 

Below is an example of how some editors may use a technique in editing rhythm in a film sequence and the way that they may go about it. It shows a clever structure that they use to help them make their cuts more interesting so that unlike a repetition of  5- word sentences,  they sound melodic rather than monotonous. 

This sentence has five words.

Here are five more words.

Five-word sentences are fine.

But several together become monotonous.

Listen to what is happening.

The writing is getting boring.

The sound of it drones.

It’s like a stuck record.

The ear demands some variety. 

Now listen.

I vary the sentence length, and I create music.

Music.

The writing sings.

It has a pleasant rhythm, a lilt, a harmony.

I use short sentences.

And I use sentences of medium length.

And sometimes when I am certain the reader is rested, I will engage him with a sentence of considerable length, a sentence that burns with energy and builds with all the impetus of a crescendo, the roll of the drums, the crash of the cymbals–sounds that say listen to this, it is important. 

By Gary Provost

This extract in which i have given myself to analyse the directors rationale is The shining which shows how the director was intending to make the audience wait on the next action scene whilst the little boy remained sat on his bike, the deceased twins stood at the bottom of the corridor played the antagonist , however remaining still to make an attempt to catch the audience off guard whilst the camera does shot reverse shot from the boy and back to the girls - this is what the director successfully achieved by editing in this particular way.

Providing and Withholding information

Providing and withholding information 

Providing and withholding information is a big part of cinema because as a viewer we don't want to be told the plot from the beginning and this is why dramatic questions are very important in film making. 

Providing information for the viewer is essential in the sense that putting a few shots together that will reveal the minimum will engage your viewer as they will always be itching to find out what is going to happen or what is around the corner, but I think that the best way to keep a viewer guessing and more hooked on your plot by withholding information because then the viewer will be asking questions to try and justify the actions they've just witnessed, what makes sense of it and whats to come. 

It is very popular for this technique to be used in Horror and Thriller films as the anticipation of the audience is high and the tension is automatically built in a more mild sense as the conflict is not yet revealed - it is teased into the screenplay whilst the audience wait impatiently to find out what happens next. 

here is an example of Providing and withholding information 




Here is a shot example of providing and withholding information

Here is more of a withholding information shot as we can see here, it does provide us with information because it is from the persons POV, and we know that everything we see and all the information that we are given in the long distance camera shot, is everything the character can see. Through this we get a sense that something bad is due to/ about to happen and that the person who plays the main character is about to be confronted with the antagonist. However, the audience has been left wondering what is going to show up in the corridor, which angle is it going to come from? Will we see the antagonist as they may approach and attack from behind? could it come from a side door or will it be seen and approach the character/ vitim from straight ahead in the distance?

Following the action

Following the action

When there is a big action scene such as a car chase a camera on a tripod doesn't work so a camera needs to be able to move. There is different equipment used to film scenes like these. A dolly shot or tracking shot  is when a cart is on a track and is then moved along it to record a shot. The camera is mounted on the cart to film all the footage. Most dollies also have have the ability to move vertically to capture footage that maybe high up or in some cases they can be fitted with cranes so footage at a higher level can be captured easily and successfully.





A Dolly Zoom is a technique that zooms in and out but adjusting the the zoom angle and ensuring the the subject in shot in the same size in the frame.A  dolly zoom is an unnatural effect and creates something that your eyes wouldn't see. This effect was made famous by Alfred Hitchcock in the film Vertigo and was later used by Steven Spielberg in Jaws.

seamless

Seamless

When an editing style is referred to as classic Hollywood continuity editing it is because one of its principle aims is to make the mechanics of the editing process invisible to the viewer. These first elements synthesise and have a bearing on one another.

Good continuity editing shouldn’t draw attention to itself in any way. The viewers focus and attention should not be taken away from the action of the story. The aims of invisibility leads us to the term of reference ‘seamless’.

To be seamless, cuts should take on a n invisible quality about them, the viewer should not notice them.

To be seamless, continuity in terms of all elements of mise-en-scene and all elements of action in the frame should be preserved perfectly from one clip or taken to the next across the cut., this must be made sure of because if there are noticeable elements in one scene which are not included or featured in another, they will certainly go noticed by the audience as an obvious form of editing.

The script continuity supervisor –

Any mise-en-scene element such as the position of figure or object changing erroneously across a cut breaks continuity and leads to editing which is not seamless.

Any unit of action that doesn’t match properly across a cut also breaks continuity and this again leads to editing which is not seamless.

Breaking the 180 degree axis rule – or any of the associated rules – will also result in continuity issues and undermine the goal of invisible editing.

Continuity editing is the dominant style of film editing in the western world and most cinematic cultures around the rest of the globe.

Its purpose is to ‘smooth over the essential discontinuity of the process of editing and to establish a logical coherence between sequences and the constitutive shots from which they are composed.

The act of cutting represents a move-away from the real time action (detraction) from the continuous progress of a piece of action.

Removing or adding frames condenses or expands the time of the original action.

If we cut away from one angle to another there is a noticeable break from the continuous action of the first take to a new shot.

The task of the continuity editor is to reduce that noticeability, so that the viewer’s immersion in the story is undisturbed.

Continuity editing is a process which attempt to make deviations from the continuous real time action of a single stretch of footage as inconspicuous as possible.

Editors achieve logical coherence by cutting to continuity where the emphasis is on smooth transition of time and space.

Why is motivated used by editors? Because the story calls the shots – we then let the story remain the focus for the audience, rather than unimportant details.

In mainstream cinematic narratives, emphasis is out on the story being told in a logical and clear order.

Seamless editing helps and audience suspend its disbelief.

Motivational editing complements continuity editing allowing the story to dictate what the audience sees.

continuity edit

Montage

Montage

History of the term

The film term montage comes from the French:

Monter (verb) – to assemble;

Montage (noun) – assembly;

When montage refers to techniques in film editing techniques it has three senses:

In French film practice, “montage” has its own literal French meaning (assembly, installation) and simply identifies editing.

In Soviet filmmaking of the 1920’s, “montage” was a methods of juxtaposing shots to derive new meaning that did not exist in either shot alone.

In classical Hollywood cinema, a “montage sequence” is a short segment in a film in which narrative information is presented in a condensed fashion.

Hollywood montage is a montage style that suddenly became a convention during the classical Hollywood era and remained very popular technique amongst directors and editors throughout the twentieth century and into our current one.

The montage sequence consists of a series of short shots that are then edited into a sequence to condense narrative which is displayed. It is usually used to advance the story as a whole (often to suggest the passage of time), rather than to create symbolic meaning.

In many cases, a song plays in the background to enhance the mood or reinforce the message being conveyed.

Examples #1

My first example is from ‘Hot Fuzz Opening Sequence’ which clearly conveys montage, although with a difference as it’s V/O (Voice over) montage which has somebody talking over the scene as they are almost narrating the story and the beginning of the scene alongside music as it gradually fades in. we see the first character walking through a building, training with the police force as part of his job, handling a street riot situation, sitting an exam as part of his police training, being awarded, being photographed with his colleagues, running up a set of stairs, helping members of the public, presenting in front of his colleagues, cycling, playing and fencing  and this is all happening at different times and that gives us the sense of montage as we are condensing time. 

Soviet montage edit - Lev Kuelshov

in soviet montage theory, the editing of shots creates symbolic meaning. 

For Kuleshov, editing a film is like constructing a building. Brick-by-Brick (shot-by-shot).

Kuleshov conducted an experiment to show that montage can lead the viewer to reach certain conclusions about the action in a film. 

The Kuleshove experiment

Kuelshov edited together a short film i which a shot of the expressionless face of Tsarist Matinee idol Ivan Mosjoukine was alternated with various other shots (a plate of soup, a gin in a coffin, a woman on a divan). 

Experiment explained

The audience believed that Mosjoukine's face displayed three different expressions according to what he was "looking at":

soup - hunger

girl in coffin - grief

woman on the divan - desire

Actual truth; 

*The footage of Mosjoukine was actually the same piece of shot each time. *

Montage works because viewers infer meaning based on context - we interpret based on the context and construct our own meaning.

Splicing and Cutting

Film Splicing

Technically this isn't video editing, it's film editing. But it is worth a mention as it was the first way to edit moving pictures and conceptually it forms the basis of all video editing.

Traditionally, film is edited by cutting into small sections of the film and rearranging or discarding them once finished. The process is incredibly straightforward and mechanical and theory a film could be edited with a pair of scissors and some splicing tape, although in reality a splicing machine is the only practical solution to get the job done properly. A splicing machine allows film footage to be lined up and held in place while it is cut or spliced together.

A film splicer (also called a film joiner, usually in Europe) is a device which can be used to physically join together lengths of photographic film. It is mostly used in film motion pictures. The units are made in various types depending on the usage: Single-8, Super 8 film, 16mm, 9,5 mm,35mm and 70mm. Used in film editing to make a cut (transition).

Cutting

In the post-production process of film editing and video editing, a cut is an abrupt, but usually trivial film transition from one sequence to another. It is synonymous with the term edit, though "edit" can imply any number of transitions or effects.

Jump cuts

Jump cuts    

Normally when we record in order to prepare for a cutting point which is between two consecutive shots – for example – cutting from a wide shot in a scene onto a closer coverage – you vary from both the size and the angle of the shot.

Some filmmakers will consciously choose not to vary the size and angle of the shot which will result in the cut having a jarring effect, this shows it literally jumping in what often feels like an awkward way from one shot to the next.

In the industry and universal terms, this is what we call a Jump-cut.

Filmmakers use jump cuts for several reasons:

Rebellion:

French New Wave filmmakers used jump-cuts in the 50’s to break from the traditional dominance of continuity editing.

Pace:

Jump-cuts can be used to ass a sense of speed to the sequence of events.

Psychological:

Jump-cuts can be used to suggest the non-linear way that te human mind works.

An example of a jump-cut in a film is  A bout de soufflé (breathless) – car scene. This clip conveys the types and ways jump cuts were used back in the day. 

cross-cutting and parallel editing

Cross-cutting and Parallel Editing

An example of cross-cutting:
 An example of parallel editing: