Film Production:

Who Does What?

Preparation (Pre-Production)

• Producer – oversees logistics

• Executive Producer – the money

• Line Producer – on-set liaison

• Screenwriter – writes the script

• Treatment – initial script proposal

• Shooting script – writer’s intended screenplay,

often changes during shooting

Shooting (Production)

• Director – oversees all aspects of shooting

• Production Designer – oversees the visual

creation

• Cinematographer (director of photography) –

oversees camera distance, angle, etc., as well

as lighting

• Actors – bring the script to life

The Director’s Team• Casting Director – recommends/selects actors

• Script Supervisor – oversees continuity

• Dialogue Coach – feeds lines to actors

• Second Unit Director – shoots at secondary locations

• Recordists – capture live sound

• Clapper Boy – marks scenes and takes before each run

of the camera

Production Designer’s Team

• Art Director – another term for production designer

• Set Decorator – selects objects/props for set

• Set Dresser – places objects/props on set

• Costume Designer – creates the vision for clothing

• Storyboardists – draw or otherwise draft intended shots

• Special Effects Teams (matte artists, model makers) – create visual effects that don’t exist in the natural world

Cinematographer’s Team

• Camera Operator – actually photographs

• Key Grip – lead stage hand

• Gaffer – lead electrician

• Best Boy – gaffer’s assistant

• Loader – puts film in the camera

ActorsStars

Supporting Players

Minor Players

Extras

Stunt Actors

Assembly (Post-Production)

• Editor – oversees cutting and compiling shots into a coherent whole

• Composer – creates musical score• Dailies – each day’s recorded shots• Rough Cut – the first compiled version of the

film, often much longer than the final cut• Final Cut – the trimmed version to be released• Outtakes – leftovers between Rough & Final• Spotting – identifying places for sound to be

edited in• ADR – automated dialogue replacement

Elements of Meaning

Film Form

And Content

Content/Meaning/Theme

Content = (Subject Matter + Form) + ContextContent is also known as Meaning or Theme

• Subject Matter is what the film is about.

• Form is how the subject matter is presented.

• Context is when, where and how the filmmaker’s creation meets its perceiver.

Levels of Meaning• Referential, a.k.a. Literal

observation of the recognizable

• Explicit, a.k.a. Textual/Connotative directly stated meanings (lines of dialogue)

• Implicit, a.k.a Universalthematic inference drawn from implication

• Symptomatic, a.k.a Culturalbroader social/symbolic meaning

Elements of Film Form

Narrative Elements

Plot

Character

Setting

Point of View

Metaphor

Stylistic Elements

Mise-en-Scene

Cinematography

Editing

Sound

Narrative Elements: Plot

• Exposition (stasis) – Act I

• Complication – Act I

• Rising Action (conflict) – Act II

• Climax – Act II

• Falling Action – Act III

• Denouement (resolution) – Act III

Standard Plot Structure

Plot vs. Story

• Plot is everything seen and heard by the perceiver of the film – everything that is presented, whether it’s a part of the story or not.

• Story is everything that happens in the lives of the characters – everything they experience, whether it is explicitly presented to the perceiver or not.

Diegesis

Plot and Time

• Temporal Duration – passage of time for the

characters

• Screen Duration – passage of time for the

perceiver

• Temporal Order – chronology (Flashbacks,

flashforwards)

• Temporal Frequency – repetition of events

• Beats – major events in the plot

Character• Protagonist – central, dynamic character with

whom the perceiver identifies/sympathizes

• Antagonist – obstacle to the protagonist

• Round – well-developed character whose motivations are clear

• Flat – opposite of round

• Dynamic – character who changes significantly

• Static – opposite of dynamic

• Characteristics (character traits)

• Catalyst (goal vs. investigation)

• Causal relationships – action/reaction

Setting

• Location – authentic, artificial, interior, exterior, etc.

• Screen space – everything we see

• Directed attention – director’s/ cinematographer’s control of what we see/hear

• Imagery – meaningful objects, colors, sounds

Point of View• Restricted Narration – a character’s

POV

• Unrestricted Narration – omniscient POV

• Perceptual Subjectivity – we perceive what the character perceives

• Mental Subjectivity – we perceive what the character is thinking

POV and the Perceiver• Cues – sights & sounds that cause expectations

in the perceiver

• Suspense – delay in fulfilling expectation

• Surprise – incorrect, or cheated, expectation

• Curiosity – cue causes perceiver to wonder

about past events

• Irony – disparity between characters’ &

perceiver’s POV

• Hierarchy of Knowledge – who knows what?

Metaphor

• Symbol – both literal and figurative

• Iconography – symbol whose meaning

transcends an individual film/story

• Motif – repeated symbol or image (often related

to temporal frequency)

• Allusion – reference to another work of art