Here is an example of '180°' edit. In the following image, the shot is only taken from one side of the room of the conversation between the three of them. If it was taken as a 360° shot, the people would switch places which confuses the audience, therefore, 180° is used to make the audience focus and to illustrate the importance of the conversation. In this shot, the subject placement has been used to convey the importance of each character. Although we cannot see the man's face or whole body, we know he has higher authority because he is closest to the audience and is the most noticable person in the room. Furthermore, his big, black studded chair has been filmed which shows his authority. However, we also focus on the woman entering the room, because she is more centred, and we have a whole body shot of her.
Compounding this idea, the shot is taken from a different angle but still within the 180° area. Because of the era this film was made, lighting cannot be shown to enhance or portray an idea but the director has used a technique to highlight the characters by using 'The Rule of Thirds'. Both actors are sat at the sides with a dramatic gap between them, which makes them stand out more.
In this shot, there is a woman lying on the bed, looking to her right. This is an example of 'Eye line Match' where the camera cuts from a person looking in the direction of what they can see, and the camera changes to looking at that object/person. The effect of this builds tension as we don't know what they are looking at until it is shown and also gives us the impression that because we can see from their point of view, they have higher status because that is what the camera focuses on. Moreover, the director has intelligently made the woman look more important by using costume. The white, plain pillows make her stand out from the bed and the dress worn, with the black V shape neck line, directs us to her making her focal point. Again, subject placement is used to make her even more noticeable.
This is the image of what the woman on the bed is looking at. The shot is long shot where we only see part of his body. This is to make him look lower in authority and what also adds to this is the dark setting. The furniture to the right distracts us a bit from him, making him look less essential.
This shot is called 'Shot reverse shot' where we see a woman talking to two men which allows the audience to see what she sees. It seems here, that the man in the red top and the woman are the most significant people in the shot as they are the two that are talking. But costume is used again to highlight the most important characters, for example, the man is wearing a red top and the woman is wearing a pink jacket to make themselves stand out. Whereas, the other man is wearing a cream top which pretty much matches the background illustrating his unimportant part.
This shot is the same but from a different point of view, where we are looking from the men to the woman talking. Within the frame, we can still see all three people only part of the men's heads, if they weren't in the shot, it would look as if she is having a conversation with herself. So, it is used to show that all actors are still present in the scene. Rule of Thirds is used again to give all characters a similar level of importance. The shot is a close up which displays her facial expressions, while the shot of the men are mid shot which give her an even more important role.
The shot is usually used to show a conversation between people. Although, from the camera's point of view, the man in the cream top looks bigger and the woman looks small, she is still the focal point, because we can see the front of her and she has a much more appealing and dramatic facial expression, as opposed to the side shot of the dull, expressionless man.
These shots are from a scene where the 'Montage Editing' is used.
The shots move quickly to show different scenes, settings or places...
different characters and various actions.
This type of editing can be used to show flashbacks etc.
