Shooting for the edit vs. too much coverage.

[Pete Cofrancesco]

Every time he asks a question or wants to do something, it inevitably leads back to him trying cover up something done poorly.

This goes back to your obsession with compression and telephoto lenses. Concentrating on getting the basics right. If your actor is out of focus none of the other stuff you spent time over thinking matters. If you can't handle a shallow dof, unable to pull focus, don't use super telephotos lens, use a smaller sensor camera or smaller aperture. Like Brian said a large field monitor, it's like the first thing you learn. This is freshman film school stuff. Awful!

[Greg Smith]

Having a decent sized monitor on the set and using it religiously for playback after each shot can greatly cut down on the number of surprises in the editing room. Even better if you can recruit someone to watch for you while shooting and call out errors before the camera ever rolls. This doesn't require fancy equipment - I use a 22" Samsung consumer TV that I think I paid $139 for - but it's good enough to see focus errors, blown highlights, boom shadows, microphone intrusions, lens flares and the like. I wouldn't trust it for judging subtle color settings, but it can tell me if I've forgotten to white balance or something. And it doesn't take a highly trained professional to be a quality control assistant in real time, just somebody with a reasonable eye for details and assertive enough to bring up what they see with the director.

It may appear at first that this will take extra time on the set, but it saves a lot of uncertainty, frustration and retakes in the long run.

[Ryan Elder]

Oh okay thanks, I can get someone like to help look for errors or get a large monitor, or perhaps even both. Thanks.

And as for coverage, what I could do is just shoot the shots I see in the script only. However, there is one thing that may be important. I was told by one filmmaker that I cannot cut back and forth between a medium shot and a CU shot, because the shots have to match if you cut back and forth constantly. Is that true, or no?

[Brian Drysdale]

You can if there's a dramatic reason for doing so, however, it sounds like you were cutting back and forth inappropriately.

Although, not the same shot sizes, "The Caine Mutiny" uses a two frame size leap. In this case between a BCU and MCUs. In this case it's used for a dramatic effect. .

[Ryan Elder]

Oh okay. I was told it was a rule that if you cut constantly between two shots, that the shots have to match. And so many movies choose to do this that I wasn't able to find any examples that deviated from that.

What about a scene like this... Was there a mastershot where they let it run for the entire scene, for safety do you think, or is it shot for the edit exactly, with no extra coverage, other than what we see in edit here? It's the scene at 0:48 into the clip. Thanks.

big heat clip example - YouTube

[Brian Drysdale]

Where did that rule come from?

It's nonsense, there are plenty of films where they cut between different shot sizes, they change the sizes as the dramatic points are made.

The Caine Mutiny (1954) - Paranoid Breakdown Scene (8/9) | Movieclips - YouTube

[Ryan Elder]

Oh okay, thanks for showing me that.

The rule, or method, was discussed here on film riot at 4:37 into the video:

Perfect your Film with Cinematic Motion - YouTube

He talks about how you have to wide, medium, and close up shots, and then do reverses of them all, or the editor is going to have a hard time cutting back and forth, if they do not have those matching shots. If there is some relevance to what he is saying?

[Brian Drysdale]

That is just the starting point, it's the shot use being described in a basic way. Similar to saying that feature film script has 3 acts.

The basics are built on when things start becoming more complex as the dynamics and power play between characters is revealed through the editing of shots. It might''t be as symmetrical as 3 + 3, it might be 3 + 4 or 2 +3

It seems like you're still trying to find the basic rules, when you should at the stage (when trying to make a feature film) where they should be starting to become instinctive.

"Film Directing Shot by Shot" by Steven Karz might be worth reading. It goes into more depth than a short video.

[Ryan Elder]

Oh okay, I didn't realize he meant it as a starting off point. He said that it bit him in the butt time and time again, if he did not follow the formula. He didn't say that it was a good starting off point, and that he learned anything new or instinctive as a result.

He also used Blade Runner as a example of the 3+3 rule, and what's a movie like Blade Runner, doing, using starting off point formulas, when it is more advanced of course...

[Brian Drysdale]

You can use these rules, but how you use them will vary. I don't think Ridley Scott was consciously thinking about the 3 + 3 rule when shooting Blade Runner or any other of his other films. It's more a way of teaching, the way scenes generally get covered. Of, course, there will be directors who don't work in that way, since all rules are there to be broken. He mentions one exception being horror films.

[Ryan Elder]

Oh okay thanks. What I could do is throw rules out the window and just use whatever shot I think is emotionally appropriate at that particular moment in the scene, no matter what any rules, say, if that's best? I am just worried that it would be seen as possibly too avante guarde or drawing too much attention to itself, if give myself complete free rein though.

[Brian Drysdale]

Have a look at this, since it about getting material for the edit and how you're going to tell the story,

Why Does an Edit Feel Right? (According to Science) - YouTube

[Pete Cofrancesco]

Brian interesting video thx for sharing

[Paul Mailath]

I think Ryan needs to change his "also known as" to az állandó kérdező (Hungarian)

[Ryan Elder]

Thanks. I saw the video before, but it refreshed my memory to see it again now. Thank you very much. I felt that my editing so far is better than my shot decisions, perhaps.