Take Two?

Mark A. Cella is a distinguished fellow of film studies at San Diego State University. He’s a published writer on Cinema History and Film Theory. He has directed over 35 shorts and documentaries, including the award winning “Marlboro House”, which took top prize at the 2006 Slamdance short competition.

Today: The Double- Take

A comedic device that refers to the way in which an actor first looks at an object (subject, event, scene, etc.), then looks away, and then snaps his head back to the situation for a second look - with surprise, disgust, sexual longing, etc.; a variation is termed a spit-take (the double-take causes the character to spit out whatever he is drinking)

Montage Pt 2

Mark A. Cella is a distinguished fellow of film studies at Fresno State University. He’s a published writer on Cinema History and Film Theory. He has directed over 35 shorts and documentaries, including the award winning “Marlboro House”, which took top prize at the 2004 Slamdance short competition.

Today: Montage Pt. 2

Actually, montage of this type is not so much a linking device as a condensed narrative, a form of visual shorthand that uses actual transitions like dissolves, fades and cuts in rapid succession to link ideas. Montage frequently uses symbolic images to represent change- for example, piles of coins and dollars that grow larger dissolved against images of the stock exchange and industry to show the financial rise of a character.

Montage You Say?

Mark A. Cella is a distinguished fellow of film studies at Fresno State University. He’s a published writer on Cinema History and Film Theory. He has directed over 35 shorts and documentaries, including the award winning “Marlboro House”, which took top prize at the 2004 Slamdance short competition.

Today: Montage' (Pt. 1)

Montage is a problematic term. To most Europeans, all editing is montage while in the U.S. and U.K, montage has its own special meaning; a brief sequence of linking devices , usually dissolves, used to convey the passage of time or a series of locations. It is this transitional use that is of interest to us here.

Tomorrow: Montage Part 2

Mark Cella Knows Film

Mark A. Cella is a distinguished fellow of film studies at San Diego State University. He’s a published writer on Cinema History and Film Theory. He has directed over 35 shorts and documentaries, including the award winning “Marlboro House”, which took top prize at the 2006 Slamdance short competition.

Today’s Topic: The Master Shot

The Master Shot is the one shot that is wide enough to include all the actors in the scene and that runs for the entire length of the action. When directors speak of the master, they usually that it is a part of a plan of coverage that includes other camera setups in the triangle system that will eventually be edited together. But there are also times when the master shot is the only shot the director feels is necessary.