Textual Analysis and Representation

Camera Shots, Angle, Movement and Composition

- Shots: establishing shot, master shot, close-up, mid-shot, long shot, wide shot, two-shot, aerial shot, point of view shot, over the shoulder shot, and variations of these.
- Angle: high angle, low angle, canted angle.
- Movement: pan, tilt, track, dolly, crane, steadicam, hand-held, zoom, reverse zoom.
- Composition: framing, rule of thirds, depth of field – deep and shallow focus, focus pulls.

Editing

- Includes transition of image and sound – continuity and non-continuity systems.
- Cutting: shot/reverse shot, eyeline match, graphic match, action match, jump cut, crosscutting, parallel editing, cutaway; insert.
- Other transitions, dissolve, fade-in, fade-out, wipe, superimposition, long take, short take, slow motion, ellipsis and expansion of time, post-production, visual effects.

Sound

- Diegetic and non-diegetic sound; synchronous/asynchronous sound; sound effects; sound motif, sound bridge, dialogue, voiceover, mode of address/direct address, sound mixing, sound perspective.
- Soundtrack: score, incidental music, themes and stings, ambient sound.

Mise-en-Scène

- Production design: location, studio, set design, costume and make-up, properties.
- Lighting; colour design.

Hegemony: Leadership/an idea of dominance within people e.g. one social class over another.
Hegemonic: Having power

Verisimilitude

The appearance of being true or real.

Mode of address - how the text speaks to the audience, and involves them. It also involves how a text influences an audience to respond to a text in a certain way.

Definitions

Iconic Signifier - where the signifier resembles the signified, eg. a picture. Indexical signifier - where the signifier is caused by the signified, eg. smoke signifies fire. Symbolic signifier - where the relation between signifier and signified is purely conventional and culturally specific, eg. most words. Polysemic - The ambiguity of an individual word or phrase that can be used (in different contexts) to express two or more different meanings. Metonemy - The substitution of the name of an attribute or adjunct for that of the thing meant, eg. suit for business executive. Synecdoche - A figure of speech in which a part is used to represent the whole (eg. ABCs for alphabet) or the whole for a part.

Definitions

Semiotics is the study of sign processes, signs and symbols. Encode - the producer's message through a text. Decode - the way the audience interpret this message. Representation - refers to the construction of aspects of ‘reality’ such as people, places, objects, events, cultural identities etc.

Definitions

Binary Opposition - where texts are organised around sets of opposite values such as good and evil, light and dark. Juxtaposition - to place side by side, especially for comparison or contrast