Chapter 7 - Angles

Choice of Angles | The Flat Angle | The Power of Angles | Angles and Psychology | Don’ t be Angle Crazy! | Summary

Choice Of Angles

The general rule approves of a change of angles with each new scene. Such a change assures smooth continuity and variety. But just how good, how effective that change will be, is up to the photographer.

Angles arc a main ingredient of the cameraman's style. His choice of angles is as fundamental and important in his work as an author's choice of words. Angles can create drama, ex­citement, suspense. A story can be told more concisely in one good angle shot than in several scenes whose angles arc unin­spired.

Some of Hollywood's most brilliant cinematographers have made their reputations through a resourceful use of angles. They have rejuvenated subjects that were shot a thousand times before, removing all triteness with one dramatic, unex­pected angle.

The usual angle of vision is the straight, normal, eye-level angle. As the eye moves along in its daily operations, this angle is constantly, infinitely varied by high angles looking down on some subject, low angles looking up, and side angles. There is an endless shifting and combination of these angles as we walk down the street, buy a paper, board a bus, gaze up at our office building as we enter, glance down at our desk to see what mail has come. And as with the human eye, there are endless variations for the resourceful camera.

The Flat Angle

There is one type of angle, however, which is more a hind­rance than a help.  It is the so-called flat angle. Despite its name, it is really no angle at all. It is a direct head-on view, with the plane of the camera exactly parallel to the plane of the subject. So observed, the subject cannot be seen "in the round." lacks depth, becomes flat and two-dimensional.

Look through your viewfinder at the side or front of a car from a flat angle. Then try an oblique angle off to one side, so that your viewfinder takes in the front of the car as well as the side; immediately the subject gains depth and variety.

Left,  top   and   bottom:   Flat   Angles           Right   top:   Oblique   Angle

The flat angle is particularly to be guarded against in sta­tionary subjects like a house or a motionless person. However. it becomes a useful tool when shooting subjects moving to­ward the camera head-on—such sequences as a child running right at you, which carries constant interest because of the motion. Although the shot is flat, the angle of vision is con­stantly changing, and change makes for variety.

The Power Of Angles

Camera angles can control an audience's attention and re­actions to a remarkable degree. They can emphasize what \ on want your audience to see and Iioic you want them to see it.

Shrewd "angling" of the camera will enable you to control background and foreground and eliminate any feature that distracts from the subject.

High angles (in which the camera looks down) ordinarily give the illusion of reducing the height of a subject and slow­ing down its motion; low angles (in which the camera looks up) exaggerate height, and speed up subject motion when comparatively near the camera.

Try shooting Junior from an upper story window of the house as he rides his tricycle on the sidewalk. Then hop down­stairs and drop to one knee with your camera as he passes by. You will soon see how angles have affected your subject's size and speed of movement. For one thing, your high angle creates a certain feeling of "superiority" in the audience. It looks down on Junior. His size is foreshortened he appears earthbound, his action seems insignificant. But when the next shot shows Junior from a low angle looking up, audience psy­chology is reversed. Junior gains stature; he commands atten­tion; there is drama and excitement in 11is actions.

High Angle                                          Low Angle

Side angles are valuable for giving depth and perspective to people or objects. They help the audience see the subject in the round. Cleverly used, side angles can make a subject appear thinner or chubbier, as the cameraman desires.

While head-on angles give the illusion of reducing speed, side angles—especially the right angle—appear to increase speed. Suppose yon shot a sequence "1 the last lap of a horse race from a position at the finish line. If you make a long shot as the leading horses start down the home stretch, your head-on angle will make their movements seem slow compared to the Hashing speed of a right-angle shot as they dart past your camera at the finish line.

But don't bet any money on a horse shot from a low side angle. That exaggerated speed is just a powerful illusion.

Angles And Psychology

More is involved in the use of angles than merely the audi­ence's concepts of movement and distance. We have noted how a high or low angle changes audience psychology. A def­inite emotional and mental attitude can be invoked by taking advantage of the audience's instinctive urge to identify itself with the camera viewpoint.

Suppose you are shooting sequences of Mother with her child in a carriage. If your shots in the first sequence are from a normal eye-level angle, the audience is inclined to feel that it is a bystander, a spectator.

But if, in your next sequence, you shoot Baby using a high angle from the spot where Mother is standing—from Mothers viewpoint, as it were—the audience will unconsciously ident­ify itself with her. And if you take a third sequence shooting Mother from Baby's position in the carriage, with a low angle, your audience will associate itself with Baby, and look at things from her point of view.

Don't Be "Angle Crazy"!

So stimulating and rewarding are angle shots that the cameraman may be tempted to let his enthusiasm gallop away with his judgment. Being "angle crazy" is as bad as being "pan happy." Angles, like any other aspect of motion-picture technique, are only a means to an end—the objective of good continuity. It they are indulged in for their own sake. they become trick shots, nothing more.

Trick angles might be justified if you were shooting a circus movie, where the freak, tile grotesque, and the exaggerated are the order of the day. But the everyday world is not a circus world, and ordinary happenings are not usually observed from bizarre angles.

An angle so unusual that the audience's concentration is in­terrupted by the thought: "My, what an amazing shot!" is a poor one because you have interfered with your audience's attention to the main action.

On the other hand, if an unusual angle points up the ac­tion and strengthens the audience's concentration, it is a good angle, or then the audience" is not conscious of the angle as such and its attention is not distracted from the action.

Suppose two men are sitting at a table playing cards. A low-angle shot of the host, taken from the level of his calf looking up at him. would be an unusual angle all right, but nothing would be gained by it except the impression that the camera­man had tried something in the way of a trick. The main action still is the card-playing.

If the host's dog comes along, however, and rubs against his leg, disturbing him, a low-angle shot from the dogs level would be ideal to tell the story of how the host is distracted and looks down at the animal. The main action is now pro­vided by the dog and the low angle now becomes the most effective one. It contributes to, it improves the action; it is an integral part of the picture.

Smoothness, may we say again, is one of the outstanding qualities of good continuity. A smooth movie style must avoid angles that irritate and call attention to themselves, just as a smooth writing style must avoid similes or metaphors that are pretentious or  too odd.

A good angle, in short, is one that calls attention to the ac­tion—not to itself.

Summary

A cameraman's choice of angles is a main ingredient of his style.

A change of angles between shots not only enables application of the general rule; it also brings drama and excite­ment to the action.

The human eye-level angle is constantly varied by high, low and side angles.

The so-called "flat angle" lacks interest and should be avoided except when the subject is moving head-on toward the camera, in which case the motion itselt creates the interest.

Angles can mold an audience's concept of the size and speed of movement of the subject on-screen. They can also influence the audiences psychological attitude toward the subject.

Don't be "angle crazy. Avoid excessive use of unusual angles, which contribute to a picture only if they serve to clarify it and further the action.

A good angle is one that calls attention to the action, not to itself.

Are You Ready To Move Onto The Next Lesson? Click Here...