Purposes of Editing

The Purpose of Editing

What is editing?

Editing is the art of putting film, music, pictures or words together to create something. Film editing is the only are that is unique to cinema. In film, the editor works with the unedited footage and selects shots or goes by an EDL (Editing decision list) in order to combine the clips into sequences and create a finished movie. Film editing is often referred to as the "invisible art" because when it is well-practiced, the viewer can become so engaged that he or she is not even aware of the editor's work.

What is the purpose of editing?

The purpose of editing in film is to create a piece that will tell a story, inform or/and educate the viewer. In cinema, films have been edited together to create an hour or so film. The Lumineer Brothers were the first to create a movie but had come to the conclusion that cinema had no future because in all of their movies, it was just one shot, at the same angle throughout, which would manage to get boring after a while.

Porter was the first person to actually edit two different shots of film together. It was in one of his short films called The Life of An American Fireman. The first shot was a view from outside the window of a burning house which then went into a shot from inside the house showing the fireman helping a the woman to rescue outside the window and down a ladder.

How does editing help develop a narrative in film?

Editing creates narrative by changing to different shots. The changes in shots show a continuous change in the film. One shot leads to another, then leads to another to the point where the audience begin to associate the different shots with a storyline.

How does editing engage the audience with characters and situations?

The music, angles and rhythm of the edit create tension and the emotion in the audience. If you want to create tension in a horror film, the editor would use short clips to build up to the scary part.

How does editing link to genre? Use two different genres, what sort of editing techniques would they use? What is the effect?

In horror films, there needs to be tension and good control of rhythm and pace in order to create the build-up before you actually see the scary part. In a romantic comedy, using slow pans and normally paced cuts creates the effect.

The different music used in films also creates the emotion in the film whilst the audience are watching. The music in a horror film for example, would be a beat that creates pace and builds up the tension. It would be something that sends chills down your back, makes you lean off your seat and will shock you when it happens. In the trailer ‘The Host’ the first shot zooms into a girl taking things out of a fridge, the music now is quite a low, unnoticeable tone. When someone comes up to her and grabs her, the music has a sharp quick noise that replicates the movements that have just happened, which create the emotion the audience would be feeling if they were in her position.

Editing Techniques In Talent Shows

Talent Shows are currently one of the most popular television genres. Following the success of the Reality genre, Talent Shows fascinate the audience because of the fact that they show real people put under pressure to perform at their best. The public see people become stars overnight.

Much of the success is from the editing techniques used in the talent show genre. The editing style and choices manipulate the way the audience perceive contestants and judges increasing the entertainment value of the programme.

 

A good example of this would be the Susan Boyle audition for Britain’s Got Talent. When the audience are first introduced to her, we are shown a unflattering shot of her eating a sandwich, this was used to create a negative image. In addition to this, there was non-diegetic comical music put over the footage to emphasise the negative connotations. Furthermore, as Susan went to appear on stage and was greeted by Ant and Dec, non-diegetic laughter was put in the background to make the audience think her audition would be terrible, like her appearance. As she was on stage, the editing drifted from shot to shot of peoples different facial expression towards her.

One  shot shown below is from someone in the audience laughing at the idea of what her audition is going to sound like and other shots were of the judges expressions of  smirking and talking to Susan. The editor chose to show a chot of simon rolling his eyes because he is basically the star of the show and the main opinion comes from him. This shot from the edit was then depicted by his reaction shot to when she began singing. As Susan starts singing, the whole audience clap, the edits go from showing peoples negative opinions to positively shocked, cheerful faces. Even Ant & Dec were clapping and saying ‘you didn’t expect that, did ya?’.

When Susan reaches that last few high notes , a shot of Amanda standing up is shown to applaud Susan's audition then a shot of the audience shows everyone else creating a standing innovation. The editors then decided to keep the footage of her walking off as soon as she had finished her song, just as part of the entertainment. All these editing techniques have been used to generate a negative image of Susan, so that the audience are expecting a dreadful audition but then get the shock when they hear her amazing voice. This is just merely one example from the Talent show genre. This is the type of editing used to entertain the Nation.

 

Editing Techniques In Reality TV

The first ever Big Brother was a massive discovery for reality TV. People were fascinated by the whole idea of putting people in a house and filming their every move. The thing that people didn’t realise when watching is that what was happening in the scene they was watching might not all be from the same event during that time of day. The editors had the power to manipulate what they had already filmed into their own storyline and only show that audience what they are allowed to see. This either withheld or revealed what happened to the audience. The diary room would have also been used to manipulate the storyline that was already in tact and would make everything seem more believable. The editors managed to build up drama from every day conversations and interactions. This use of editing made the audience generate an image and a perspective on each person in the house and turn them into characters in a drama. The audience will develop an opinion on each person whether they thought they was genuine or ‘‘playing the game’’.

In Big Brother, They manage to put 24 hours of film and condense it so it shows all the highlights of the day into just 1hour. This is how it is so easy for the editors to just manipulate the time and space in the house. The hour slot is enough to show the audience what they are allowed to see as well as some things that might not even turn out how they started or ended. By using conventions like close up shots, voice over and narrator the editors are able to generate opinions about other people in the house against one another.  The close up shots construct an image so that the audience are manipulated into thinking that the individual is doing something that they shouldn’t be or overreacting to another’s comment. The fact that it is real people being filmed doing day to day things people find it authentic and buy into the idea that they are just watching people complete tasks and talk about each other to Big Brother.

None of this would have been prior to digital editing systems which allow people to work with a vast amount of footage very quickly. However, now everything is done digitally on computer systems and are easily put together by the click of a button.

Montage

A montage is several shots juxtapositioned with one another. The way they are edited together makes the audience innovate their own narrative instead of telling them the story, like done in continuity editing. Montage is when several shots are edited together rapidly, sometimes showing continuous action.

The first time montage was used, Kuleshov done an experiment using the same ‘beginning and ending shots’ then putting something totally unrelated in the middle. In one of Alfred Hitchcock's narratives to the experiment, he mentioned that when the first shot of the man was combined with the woman and her child, he looked like a nice man. Then when the shot was put together with a woman in a bikini, the audience would instantly think that he was a dirty old man.

Montage was then used again in a very famous film by Eisenstien called The Battle Ship Potemkin. This film is remembered for its astonishing use of montage. The main scene is set on a large set of stairs with people running down the stairs then eventually fighting with each other. The effect of Eisenstien’s montage is to emphasise destruction and cause panic. Continuity editing is used rarely in this piece. A mother is at the top of the stairs with her pram and then all of a sudden she loses grip, the shot changes and you see the pram tumbling down the stairs.

Rules Of Continuity

Rules of Continuity

Continuity editing is an illusion that creates the appearance of continuous action in a film. It is used to carry on the story from where it left off and take you into another space to develop the narrative. It is done by using these rules:

•180° Rule- The basics of this rule is used in a dialogue between two or more people. Like in the picture shown before, there is an invisible line in between the two people. The red side of the floor is the no go area and the green side shows the area that the camera can go in. It can be placed anywhere in that region, even on the line. As the diagram shows, the camera needs to stay in the same line of action so that the actors look like they’re talking to each other. 

•In this scene from V for Vendetta (Dir. James McTeigue, 2005) the 180° rule has been used in this dialog between two characters. Throughout the scene, they both move around however the camera always makes sure the rule is followed by not crossing the line of action. This ensures that Natalie Portman’s character is always on the right hand side looking at the left and the other character is on the left hand side looking right, so it looks like they are talking to each other even though they aren’t shown in the same shot.

From the screenshot this creates an eye-line match.

 

 

 

 

 

Match on Action- This is used all the time but is disguised by the editor because of the illusion. Match on action is used in most cuts. In the example of the Katherine Hepburn film (dir.) K begins to light the match from the table, then in the cut is put in between so we see her with the match lit, at a mid shot. 

Eye-line match- signifies what the character is looking at. For example in the film Inception, you see Leonardo looking down to draw, then you see what he’s drawing. This shows the eye-line match because it is showing the audience what he is looking at. Eye-line match can also be when two people are having a conversation and they are both looking at each other at the same eye level.

Shot reverse shot- This is used mainly when there is a conversation between two or more people. The camera keeps on cutting between the two people several times so that the audience don’t get bored, and so that they can observe each characters body language/facial expression to the conversation.

 

Cross Cutting/ Parallel Action- This editing technique is used to show two different stories at once. For example, if there were two main characters in a film both trying to get to the same destination, the screen would be showing the audience a clip from one persons journey, then cutting to the other persons journey. The reason why this type of editing is called parallel action is because it is showing two different things that are happening at the same time. This technique is used alot in the action film genre.

The picture above is a good example from the film Inception (Dir. Christopher Nolan, 2010). The top of the picture is showing what is happening in reality, the second shows what is happening in the first dream and the last picture shows the second dream. These are all things  that are happening at the same time. Throughout the film when these three different places are shown, the editor constantly cuts form one scene into another to show that all three scenes are happening at the same time.

 

D.W. Griffith

D.W. Griffith

Following on from Porter, D.W. Griffith developed continuity into a higher level in film. His first film, Birth of a Nation was created in 1915. In this film, he developed more story telling techniques. These include:

• The 180° rule- This orientates the audience so they know what they are looking at.

•Close ups- this allowed the audience to see peoples facial expressions. This also enabled the audience to understand the characters feelings in their given situation

•Flashback- Were already in books, he just figured out how to represent it.

 

Edwin Porter- Birth Of Continuity

Edwin Porter

Edwin Porter created a film called the Life of an American Fireman in 1903. The film shows a fireman rescuing a woman from her burning house from the outside, then replays the same thing but with a view from inside the house. Porter then realised there was no point seeing the woman being rescued twice, so he decided to put the cut in before the fireman had rescued her and changed the shot into the bedroom scene. This meant that we saw the fireman climb up the ladder to get inside, but when he was inside, the audience had the view from inside the room. This was the first time continuous action was represented by using two shots. This film had created the first use of continuity editing. 

Since Porter, continuity editing has dominated the film and TV industry and is constantly used. Continuity editing is used in most film and is meant to make the cut invisible.