Open, Closed, Deep and Flat Framing. Using screen grabs from your own shooting, images from other films and with reference to Katz page 259 – 263, please provide a full discussion of how open and closed framing works. There are a few ways of framing a shot, things such as choosing what shot and angle to use is basic, but choosing what to put into the frame is where the film maker must decide on the two obvious choices open framing or closed framing. This is factored largely on the camera movement and features highly in regards to mise en scene, mise en scene regards everything we see in the shot. One thing to take into account is its not a choice of open or closed, the shot can start out open and become closed or vice versa or an edit between is often common. It is often a tug of war between which is better in a film for a sense of truth; Steven Katz said “Open forms are more realistic, while closed forms seem staged. This distinction is not without contradictions. The truth, of course, is that all compositions are arranged by the photographer.” (Katz, 1991, page 259) Katz is saying that you will never get a true sense of realism in open or closed framing, as they will never be truly authentic. The filmmaker chooses which framing to use based on how much information he wants to give to the viewer; an open frame limits what the audience will see. The effect of the open frame causes the audience to ask questions and creates a sense of mystery about the scene; this is why open frames are favoured in tense sequences. It is also thought that open framings keep the audience hooked more to a sequence and adds to suspense. This is an example of an open frame, the character is looking of screen with a sense of anticipation, this leads the audience to believe something will happen meaning it will be defined as an open frame.

The use of closed framing in a shot is an obvious choice for an establishing shot, it is a deliberately obvious shot featuring everything the audience will need to see to get a feel for the scene or the overall story. More often than not scenes will be established in closed framing then manoeuvre into open framing, through camera movement of

induction of character. Closed framing often has a sense of symmetry, this adds to the idea everything is in the scene and the lines of symmetry create the effect of a frame within a frame. The symmetry is shown in this closed frame from our shooting below.

This idea creates a sense of intimacy for the audience with the nature of a closed frame, everything being on screen for them. Katz wrote about open and closed framing creating intimacy, “For the narrative film maker, the most interesting aspect of open and closed framing is the way in which they are used to offer the viewer varying degrees of involvement and intimacy with the subjects on screen” (Katz, 1991, page 259) In my opinion I believe open framing offers the most involvement and it draws the audience in with questions and anticipation, whereas I believe that closed framing is the most intimate and comforting as you are not expecting shocks and the filmmaker will give you all the information. With references to Hurbis-Cherrier pg 40-42, your own video footage and examples from other films, explain deep and flat framing in film composition. Within open and closed framing you can also have a deep or flat frame, this refers to the use of the axis’ within the shot, Hubris-Cherrier wrote “We refer to a frame that accentuates the compositional element of depth (Z-axis) as a deep frame and one that exaggerates the two-dimensionality of the image as a flat frame” (Hurbis-Cherrier, page 40, 2007) Without going into a discussion on perspective, the mention of an accentuated Z axis is the idea of giving the frame depth this can be done in many ways by a film maker slow zooms and pans can give a deep frame, a famous example is the reverse zoom executed by Spielberg in the films ‘Jaws’. A flat frame is quite the opposite it relies on the focus being on the X and Y-axis this can also be done in many ways, a common way is the aspect ratio of the film itself it is harder to get a flat screen in widescreen than it would be in the academy ratio. Although a sense of perspective will lead viewers to see it as a deep frame, meaning flat framing is hard to achieve, as is deep framing.

During my filming of deep and flat framing, I filmed the flat frame showing a character walking beside a flat brick wall it is hard to judge distance and depth is obscured meaning it will be classified as a flat frame. The deep frame I shot shows the same character shot from a different angle, this time from behind you can now judge the distance he is walking and also the distance he is from things this shot will be classified as a deep frame. Katz, Steven D, 1991 – Film Directing Shot by Shot: Visualising From Concept to screen, Michael Wiese Productions. Hurbis-Cherrier, Mick, 2007 - Voice and Vision: A Creative Approach to Narrative Film and DV Production. Focal Press.