Purpose Shots

An establishing shot delivers the information that an audience needs to understand where a scene is taking place. It can also deliver information about who is in the scene and what the environment is like. Eg, if the scene were at school, it could be a close up of the room sign (Room G2), or it could be a wide shot of the inside of the classroom, or a shot of the school gates.

This is a shot that contains two (or more) characters. By placing two characters on a screen, the film-maker is saying that there is a relationship between them. This could be positive (friends, lovers, business partners etc), or negative (enemies, argument, disagreement etc). The difference between these is usually based on where the characters are in relation to each other (space between, higher or lower etc), and the way they act towards each other.

This is where the camera is positioned behind a character and looking over their shoulder to see the subject that the character is looking at. The shot size usually is described by the framing of the subject, not the characters shoulder. This is used to connect the character and the subject, similar to a 2 shot and POV shot, and is often used in conversations.

A POV shot is a shot used to show exactly what a character sees...through their eyes. What is shown is what the character sees. The purpose of this shot is to give the audience an understanding of the character and something they see as important.

A reaction shot is used to show a characters reaction to something, event, or other character. This is important because it shows the audience how to feel about the event the character is experiencing, or how the character feels and relates to events around them. In conversations, or when you want to connect two people/objects, you can often bounce the camera between them, this is called a Shot/Reverse Shot. This can be a series of reaction shots of the conversations participants, or reaction shots of people and the person/object/action that is creating that reaction.

A cutaway shot is when a shot is used to show something that is outside the main line of action. This could be to reveal information that may not be noticeable (eg, A policeman reaches for his gun subtly to not alert the robbers), or it could be a cut away to action happening at the same time but in a different location (eg, two characters are fighting on the roof while someone is in the basement defusing a bomb). If this cutting is repeated, it strongly connects two similtaneous scenes, and is called Crosscutting. The purpose of a cutaway show is to deliver information for the audience.