Directing: ‘Film Techniques and Aesthetics’ by Michael Rabiger. 

This book is a manual for those who like to learn by doing. It talk about directing, and creating your own scenes. As a director you must know how to choose a piece of writing for the screen and then know how to shape and develop it. You must now how to critique, deconstruct and reconstruct the chosen piece.

External Composition:

A form of compositional relationships is the momentary relationship between one shot and the next. It is known as external composition, and it is hidden because the audience is unaware of how much the transition between one shot and then next influences our judgements and expectations. A common use for this composition is when a character leaving the frame in one shot leads the audience to the very place in the next shot.

• An example of this:

“The character Eric enters, stands in front of William, goes to the phone, picks up a book from the table, looks out the window, and then sits on the couch. The whole action has been covered by three camera positions. Making a floor plan for a sequence allows you to: recreate what a whole room or location layout looks like, record how the characters move around, and decide how the camera is placed. This will help you decide where to place your own camera in the future, and it reveals how little of an environment needs to be shown for the audience to create the rest in their imaginations”.

The book goes on to talk about the camera and asks the reader questions about the coverage of the shots.

“Use of Camera

• How many different motivations can you find for the camera to make a movement?

• Does the camera follow the movement of a character?

• Does a car or other moving object permit the camera to pan the length of the street so that camera movement seems to arise from action in the frame?

• How does the camera lay out a landscape or a scene’s geography for the audience?

• When does the camera move in closer to intensify our relationship with someone or something?

• When does the camera move away from someone or something so we see more objectively?

• Does the camera reveal other significant information by moving?

• Is the move really a reframing to accommodate a rearrangement of characters?

• Is the move a reaction—panning to a new speaker, for instance?

• What else might be responsible for motivating this particular camera move?

• When is the camera used subjectively?

• When do we directly experience a character’s point of view?

• Are there special signs that the camera is seeing subjectively? (For example, an unsteady handheld camera used in a combat film to create a running soldier’s point of view.)

• What is the dramatic justification for this?

• Are there changes in camera height?

• Are they made to accommodate subject matter?
• Do they make you see in a certain way?
• Are they done for other reasons?”