Jump to content

Coverage vs. 1 shot


Recommended Posts

Read David Mamet's On Directing Film. He has a lot to say about choosing shots. You may disagree, but it's interesting food for thought.

 

And check out Hitchcock's Rope. All done in 9 shots! But I bet you knew that... :D

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I imagine it must be pretty tough for a director - sure you want to express yourself through your movie making, but when a producer is handing you x million dollars, you become responsible for that money.

 

How do you respond to that? Screw the money! I'm making art? Let's say you do that and the movie doesn't make any money and now that producer (and possibly others) will no longer give you money to direct...

 

I really respect oner's and have pushed for and shot more than a few, but I always encourage a safety net shot, because no matter how cool and awesome the shot seems on set, nor how carefully you've planned and worked out how it fits into the scene, there's a good chance that once you get into the editing room something about it just doesn't quite work...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 4 weeks later...

It's not about coverage vs. one-shot...it's about choosing the right coverage. Check out how Ang Lee shoots many of the dialogue scenes in EAT DRINK MAN WOMAN. He uses long takes that subtly rack from one character to the next, only cutting when he needs to. Or any Kubrick film-he often takes very selected, minimal coverage, but never loses any information or dramatic thrust. Selected, smart coverage I think is almost always superior to shooting every angle possible in a scene and then assembling it in the editing room. Not only does this feel uncertain from a directorial standpoint, but it takes forever for that many setups on set.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

When studying coverage of scenes, I've always been a big fan of Spielberg's style and camera sense using surprisingly long takes in big budget action movies. If you like that style at all and want to learn about blocking long shots in interesting ways, then I'd suggest grabbing "Directed by Spielberg" as it breaks down a lot of his most famous shots going into how and why many different compositions where in a single shot using actor and camera movement simultaniously.

 

An approach I've also always liked it Walter Murch's "cut when the (good) actor blinks", which is to say that you only cut when you've expressed an idea in the shot and you're moving onto another one. Specifically, he found that he was always making cuts when Gene Hackman blinked (although that's not what he was trying to do).

 

You want to have a purpose for each and every shot, but how you justify those shots varies from director to director. And not everything is a "super artistic" reason...

Why did Cameron use a shot of the Terminator stepping on roses in T2? Because it looked cool.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...