Media language

If the question is about media language, you need to focus on ‘the language of film’ as you have all produced short films (don’t forget other students will have completed different briefs so will be required to talk about media language in a different way, for example, the language of newspapers).

The language of film will necessarily involve discussion of genre and narrative, so don’t be scared to write a bit about this even if these concepts aren’t directly mentioned in the question.

The majority of your response should be about film language in the sense that film as a medium is a CONSTRUCT and your films are artificial representations.

DIEGESIS: You’re familiar with the words diegetic and non-diegetic when talking about sound; the term diegesis is somewhat broader in that in refers to the internal world created by the story the characters experience and the narrative ‘space’ in which the story is told. Diegesis is the fictional world in which events unfold. This means that anything you see on screen, or are told about (such as events leading up to the present action, people who are being talked about but not present, events that have happened elsewhere) are all diegetic. Anything that is neither taking place in the world of the film, nor is seen, imagined, or thought by a character is non-diegetic. This includes not just soundtrack but titles, subtitles and some voice-overs.

CINEMATOGRAPHY can be defined as the making of lighting and camera choices when recording photographic images for the cinema. This can be quite technical and as most of you will have used the ‘automatic’ function on the cameras, your cinematographic choices are likely to be limited.

All your films were shot in the aspect ratio 16:9 widescreen. You recorded video at 25fps (frames per second) in most cases.

The focal length of the camera lens determines the angle of view and, therefore, the field of view. Cinematographers can choose between a range of wide angle lenses, "normal" lenses and telephoto lenses, as well as macro lenses and other special effect lens systems. Wide-angle lenses have short focal lengths and make spatial distances more obvious. A person in the distance is shown as much smaller while someone in the front will loom large. A zoom lens allows a camera operator to change their focal length within a shot or quickly between setups for shots. All your films were shot with a camera with a zoom lens so you can refer to this.

Film grammar: Just as written storytelling uses a basic grammar of words, phrases and sentences, filmmaking uses shots, scenes, and sequences. This is part of film grammar — the basics of filmmaking language.

Shots By Position In The SceneEstablishing ShotPoint-Of-View ShotReaction Shot

Shots By Number Of SubjectsSingle (One-Shot)Two ShotGroup Shot

In the exam, you need to write about how your film operates within the language of film discussed above. Discuss mise-en-scene, shot types, continuity, editing decisions, sound, lighting etc in relation to your production.

Shots By The Type Of LensWide-Angle ShotTelephoto ShotZoom Shot

Shots By Camera AngleHigh AngleLow AngleBird's-Eye View

Continuity Imaginary 180 degree line Framing Extreme Close-upClose-upMedium ShotMedium Full ShotFull ShotWide ShotMatch Cut (Match on Action)By camera positionBy subject movementBy dialogue

Shots By Camera MovementDolly ShotPanning ShotTilting Shot

Shots By Camera PositionOver-The-Shoulder ShotHead-On Shot

Film Punctuation Fade OutFade InWhite OutCutting To BlackColour FadeDissolveComposition Light, ColourCamera AngleCamera Movement Object/Character Placement