Instruction

One shot, one minute. In 1895 Louis Lumière set a camera outside his family’s factory in Lyon and recorded workers walking out of the gates. La Sortie de l’usine Lumière à Lyon is a single shot of under a minute. There is no cut, no script and no actors in the modern sense. The whole production was one person, one camera, one position and a roll of film. Watch it first, and count what is missing: close-ups, sound, a plot, a second location.

Eight years later. The Great Train Robbery (Edwin S. Porter for the Edison company, 1903) runs about twelve minutes. The Library of Congress record notes that Edison registered its copyright on 1 December 1903 and gives a running time of 11:54 at 18 frames per second. It tells a story across many separate shots: bandits hold up a telegraph office, rob a train, escape on horseback, and are chased down by a posse. It was filmed in Edison’s New York studio and on location in New Jersey, with actors, horses, a real railroad and a staged gunfight. It ends with a shot of an outlaw firing straight at the camera, which the Edison catalog said exhibitors could place at the start or the end. That flexibility tells you something: the film was already being thought of as a product that other people would program and sell.

Why the jump matters to you. Once a film has more than one shot, it needs planning. Someone must decide what the shots are and in what order (writing and storyboarding), find the places and people (locations and casting), schedule a railroad and horses on the same day (scheduling), pay for them (budgeting), keep the gunfight safe (set safety), and put the pieces together afterward (editing). Everything this course teaches exists because films stopped being one shot long.

The five stages. The industry divides a film’s life into stages. Development: the idea, the script and the money to make it. Pre-production: breakdowns, budget, schedule, locations, crew, casting, storyboards, rehearsals. Production: the shoot itself, run by the director and the assistant director. Post-production: editing, sound design and mixing, effects, titles, color. Distribution: festivals, sales, release, publicity. Most of a film’s decisions are made before the camera rolls; a common saying on set is that problems are cheapest to fix on paper.

The people. A producer runs the business and the plan. A director leads the creative vision and the actors. The first assistant director runs the schedule on set. The director of photography (DP) designs the images with the gaffer (lighting) and key grip (rigging and camera support). The production sound mixer and boom operator record dialogue. The script supervisor tracks continuity. The editor, sound designer and colourist finish the film. You will do most of these jobs this year, which is how you find out which ones fit you.

Careers. Start a career log today. For each role you meet, note what the job does, which unit you practiced it in, and one question you would ask someone who does it. You will use the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Outlook Handbook later to look up training and pay for the roles you are most interested in.

Formative check

Work through these before moving on. They are not graded — they tell you, and your teacher, whether the standard below has landed yet.