Columbia Film Language Glossary P-Z

• A pan shot is achieved with a camera mounted on a swivel head so that the camera body can turn from a fixed position.
• Parallel editing is a technique whereby cutting occurs between two or more related actions occurring at the same time in two separate locations or at different points in time.
• With Point of View, the audience is, in effect, looking through the character's eye.
• Rear projection involves the projection of either a still or a moving picture onto the back of a translucent screen.
• A shot consists of a single take. A scene is composed of several shots. A sequence is composed of scenes.
• Slow motion is typically achieved by shooting at a fast speed and then projecting at a normal speed.
• Sound is the audio portion of a film.
• Soundtrack refers to all the audio elements of a film. Dialogue, music, sound effects.
• Split screen is a combination of two or more scenes filmed separately which appear in the same frame.
• A steadicam shot employs a kind of special hydraulic harness that smoothes out the bumps and jerkiness associated with the typical handheld style.
• Superimposition is when two or more images are placed over each other in the frame.
• A swish pan looks like a blur as one scene changes to another. The camera appears to be moving rapidly from right to left or left to right.
• A take is one run of the camera, recording a single shot.
• A tracking, or trucking, shot is one in which a camera is mounted on some kind of conveyance (car, ship, airplane) and films while moving through space.
• Virtual camera movement refers to the creation of the perceptual sense of movement through space by the manipulation of focal length or by more irregular techniques.
• Voice-over is dialogue, usually narration, that comes from an unseen, offscreen voice, character, or narrator.
• A wide-angle lens has a short focal length, which exaggerates the relative size or objects within field of view.
• A shot with a greater horizontal plane of action and greater depth of field is known as a wide-angle shot.
• Wipes allow one scene to effectively erase the previous scene and replace it.
• A zoom shot is one that permits the cinematographer to change the distance between the camera and the object being filmed without actually moving the camera.