A Lesson from Video #3 of the Video Journalism Workshop, Shots 1-5 out of the ABCs of the Visual Language
Every visual story you see or tell uses the same visual alphabet, or what I call the ABCs of the visual language. Our written alphabet contains 26 letters. The visual alphabet contains fewer than half that and is covered in more detail in Video 3 of the Video Journalism Workshop.
These definitions may differ somewhat between filmmakers, just like slang words can mean one thing in one part of the country and something different in another. But these are the fundamental shots that are used for shooting a documentary. You should learn them and make them part of your professional vocabulary. Later on we will pull out just a few of these when we explore the Six-Shot System but for now this is what you need.
Extra Close-UP (XCU)
1. Extra (Extreme) Close-Up (XCU)
In the context of a face shot, the XCU would be just the eyes, or the glasses and the eyes. Or maybe just the hands typing on a keyboard.
Close-Up (CU)
2. Close-Up (CU)
The next shot is the Close-Up (CU), which is pretty much from the top of the head to just below the chin. You can take off some of the hair line, but you can never take off the chin, for two reasons. The first is that the audience wants to read the subject’s mouth and expression, which are critical in deciphering whether a person is telling the truth or not. The second reason is that editors and producers might want to put the person’s name under his/her face and you need the space at the bottom of the frame so as not to have lettering appear over the subject’s mouth. We refer to this lettering as title or lower third.
Medium Shot (MS)
3. The Medium Shot (MS)
The Medium Shot runs from the top of the head to the waist or just below your belt. We need to see the belt.
Wide Shot (WS)
4. Wide Shot (WS)
The Wide Shot (WS) includes everything from head to your toes.
Extra Wide Shot
5. Extra Wide Shot (XWS)?
An Extra Wide Shot (XWS) is even wider than a WS and might include visual information that’s in front of and behind the subject. The XWS also is referred to as a “Master” or “Establishing” shot because it shows where all the elements in a scene are located in relation to each other. You will understand this better when we get to the Six-Shot System, which we’ll go over in a future email.
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