Demonstrating 180 degree rule & Shot Reverse Shot

The Activity 

The activity we had to do was to demonstrate a particular scene, where two people were having a convocation at a dinner date, whilst filming we had to show the 180 degree rule and the shot reverse shot. 

My particular role in this activity was to ensure the scrip was finished, also i had the role of being one of the two actresses and help making decisions on the editing. 

180 degree rule 

The 180 degree rule is when a imaginary circle has a imaginary line which connects the characters, this is called the axis. for every scene character A would appear framed to the left of character B, by keeping one side of the the axis or every shot. Character B would always be framed to the right of character . 

Shot Reverse Shot

Shot Reverse Shot is when one character is looking at another character which is often off screen. the other character is then shown looking back at the first character. in shot reverse shot it is important that the eye line matches, the audience then assumes that they are looking at one other. 

Evaluation 

As a group our use of camera skills varied and made a few mistakes, our eye-level wasn't matching through-out which was stated on our peer assessment sheet. We needed to make our eye-level consistent by making sure our characters are at the same angle so that their eye-level matches. 

 

To have excellent attention to framing, you need to ensure you don't cut of the tops of the characters head. As a group we made this mistake within a couple of clips, however we did make sure the characters faces could be seen. The only problem with this was we was too close to one of the characters face, in some clips we had long shots, medium shots which then made the framing inconsistent.

 

To make sure we had close attention to mise-en-scene we cleared the background to make it look more appropriate and make It look more like a restaurant. we did this accurately as there was no posters around, however we did plan to leave a door open as we thought with would give a goo effect but this didn't really work the way we wanted it to.

 

How could we improve on the success of any/all the above aspects? what will you do differently next time?

To make sure the attention of framing is accurate, we will make sure the characters eye level is consistent as well as making sure the tops of peoples head isn't and we will film this from medium shot, this will make the video flow better. Also to include more mise-en-scene, if we had to right prop we could have added flowers or candles to make it seem more like a romantic dinner date. we would also take into consideration that there will be no posters or lockers in the background.

 

How did editing help make the meaning apparent to the viewer?

Editing has a huge impacted as we got to show the 180 degree rule and we was able to order our clips which made us use the shot reverse shot rule. We made both these rules clear as you can see the camera is being switched between two characters,when your watching the video you will notice we stay on one side of the characters, this is how you can tell we use the 180 rule correctly.