History of Animation

1600 -1870 Animation Before Films

With the spread of the Industrial Revolution in Europe and North America in the 18th and 19th centuries came experimentation with machines that would make images appear to move.

1609: MAGIC LANTERNS – an image projector using pictures on sheets of glass (however some not consider it as animation since they were assisted to move by human hand live in front of the audience).

1824: THAUMATROPE – a rotating mechanism with a different picture on each side and when rotated, you saw a combined picture (persistence of vision).

1831: PHENAKITOSCOPE – it featured spinning disks reflected in mirrors that made it seen like the pictures were moving.

1834: ZOETROPE – showed a clip, a spinning cylinder with a ring of pictures on the inside which where drawn on interchangeable strips that spin and made images appear to move.

1868: FLIP-BOOK (KINEOGRAPH) – it reached a wide audience and is credited with inspiring early animators.

1877: MOVIEOLA/PRAXINOSCOPE – expanded the zoetrope, using multiple wheels to rotate images. It is also considered to have shown the first prototype of the animated cartoon.

1900 -1930 The Silent Era

The early 20th century marks the beginning of theatrical showings of cartoons, especially in the United States and France. Many animators form studios, with Bray Studios in New York proving the most successful of this era. Bray helped launch the careers of the cartoonists that created Mighty Mouse, Betty Boop, and Woody Woodpecker.

1906: “Humorous phases of funny faces” (Produced by James Stewart Blackton) – marks the first entirely animated film, using stop-motion photography to create action.

1914: “Gertie the dinosaur” (Produced by Winther McKay) – the dinosaur who is given different commands by its creator is considered first moved drawn animation in good quality and the first cartoon to feature an appealing character. Gertie had also a personality and a gender.

1919: “Felix the Cat” (Produced by Pat Sullivan and Otto Messmer) – Musical “Mews and Feline Follies” introduced Felix the Cat, a children’s comedy cartoon character, often considered the first animated movie star.

Animation starts developing its next term

1928: “Steamboat Willie” (featuring Mickey Mouse) —becomes the first cartoon with the sound printed on the film, and is the first notable success for Walt Disney Studios, founded in Los Angeles in 1923.

Walt Disney and his brother Roy co-founded Walt Disney Productions, which became one of the best-known motion-picture production companies in the world. During his lifetime Walt Disney won 22 Academy Awards. He innovated animation other than theme park design; he also was particularly noted as a filmmaker and a popular showman.

1930 – 1950s The Golden Age of American Animation

1929: “Wallstreet Crash” (Black Thursday) – this major American stock market crash led to the “10 years depression”: people had very few food and money. However, theatre played an important role during this period, and people were made aware of the entertainment of animation: theatrical cartoons became an integral part of popular culture. “The Skeleton Dance” is an example.

The “Great Depression” led to a vast production of cartoons and during this time Disney produces something that would change Animation forever.

1937: “Snow White” – this is the first ever featured film to use hand-drawn animation. this film is revolutionary for its time also because it made use of new techniques:

• Rotoscoping technique: an animation technique that animators use to trace over motion picture footage, frame by frame, to produce realistic action.
• Multi-plane Camera: this new machine made possible to obtain a real feeling of depth and dimension in the painted backgrounds: this camera was positioned on top of the different oil painter layers of glass sheets which had a particular order and were moved accordingly to the movement of action of the scene and then the camera would take the picture each time.
• Moviolas: this large screen machine was used for viewing his detailed nature and scenic cinematography, shot for Walt Disney Studios: it assured that the film had no mistakes.
• Disney created also its own sound effects and music.
• The Artists involved in the film showed their skills by coming up with distinctive characteristics for the characters created: the dwarfs, for instance, were named after their personalities.

1960 – 1980s The American Television Era

The animation industry began to adapt to the fact that television continued its rise as the
entertainment medium of choice for American families. Studios created many cartoons for TV, using a “limited animation” style. By the mid ‘80s, with help from cable channels such as The Disney Channel and Nickolodeon, cartoons were ubiquitous on TV.

1960: “The Flintstones” (Hanna-Barbera) – the first animated series on prime-time television.

Animation grew and grew with “Looney Toones” (1969), and clay Animation being Hollywoods way of creating real looking monsters by animators like Henry Hausen, who made the “skeleton scene of the underworld” animation in “Jason and the argonauts”.

1980 – 2014 The Modern American Era

The CGI (computer generated imagery) revolutionized animation. A principal difference of CGI animation compared to traditional animation is that drawing is replaced by 3D modeling, almost like a virtual version of stop-motion. A form of animation that combines the two and uses 2D computer drawing can be considered computer aided animation.

1984: “The Adventures of Andre and Wallie B) – This short film was the first fully CGI-animated film, created by The Graphics Group, the precursor to Pixar.

1986: “Pixar” – Steve Jobs has bought the Graphic division from Lucas Films (which gain its notoriety between the 1979 and 1983 withe the Star Wars Series) and, with Edwin Catmull and Alvy Ray Smith, they found the “Pixar Animation Studios Company” and create a new breed Animation which is the CGI which involves creating Animation using computers: this new process is easier and cheaper compared the previous methods and makes cartoons almost realistic. Pixar produces in 1995 the first fully Computer Animated Feature: “Toy Story”

As digital imaging techniques continue to improve in quality and affordability, it becomes increasingly difficult to draw a clear line between live action and animation. Films such as The Matrix (1999), Star Wars: Episode One (1999), and Gladiator (2000), incorporate backgrounds, action sequences, and even major characters conceived by illustrators and brought to life by technology. Despite these boundary-pushing advances, full-figure, traditionally animated films continue to be produced such as The Iron Giant (1999) where Brad Bird was the artist.

2009: “Avatar” (Produced by James Cameron) – Avatar breaks the barrier between live action and digital moviemaking (almost fully made in CGI) its production, almost four years, is an important milestone for the industry.

History of CGI & VFX

Before analysing the history of CGI and VFX I think it would be appropriate to state their differences since they are closely related but are not similar to each other. When VFX is used for a film, CGI becomes a part of the process. However, both CGI vs VFX can be created independently.

CGI includes all the tools and techniques aimed at the digital construction of audiovisual material, starting from almost zero. Any type of image or other graphic content made entirely on the computer by special software is an example of CGI. However, the acronym is generally associated with the construction of images (objects, characters, environments) in 3D graphics, which combines different elements, knowledge and artistic needs. Example of CGI: animated films, but also elements and entire sequences within live-action films.

VFX is a set of processes designed to digitally process audiovisual material and its results. The ultimate goal of visual effects is therefore an alteration of the original product that consists in the combination of live-action footage with new elements, which can be generated on the computer (CGI) and/or from other material of actual acquisition. Example of VFX: the green-screen, or chroma key, replacing the famous green background with another image.

The main differences is that Visual effects include any element that is not taken directly from the camera but added virtually in the post-production process. Computer graphics involves the modeling of 2D and 3D objects on a digital platform and the subsequent rendering of such images. CGI can be part of VFX. VFX are used to create visual situations otherwise impossible to achieve: images shot live on a physical set can be enriched in post-production with digitally created models or elements, or in CGI.

Regarding VFX, just like CGI it has been a huge part of film and tv as well as others aspects of media too. in the first era of VFX they did not have the technology and equipment we have today. Some valuable example of early experiments are: a combination print made by Oscar Gustave Rejlander, a Swedish Photographer. Therefore he created the world’s first special effects image in 1857; he achieved that by integrating sections of 32 negatives into one single image. Or Alred Clark, an American film director who made the first ever motion picture special effect in 1895: a stop-motion effect used in the re-enactment of the Mary Queen of Scots beheading. George Méliès, a French special effect pioneer, had an important role in the rise of VFX too: in “Le voyage dans la Lune” he discovered techniques like split screen and double exposure process.

Hollywood played an important role in the progression of VFX and CGI in the 1910s and 1920s and filmmaker like David Walk Griffith would be key in the development of video transitions like in and out iris effect (which is still used in Premiere Pro and After Effects).

in the 1940s Colour was introduced which had a big impact on VFX: colour grading is important to establish an overall mood for a scene for instance.

As I mentioned before, CGI includes the creation of still or animated visual content with computer software. CGI most commonly refers to the 3D computer graphics used to create characters, scenes and special effects in films, television and games. The technology is also used in everything from advertising, architecture, engineering, virtual reality and even art.

The first application of CGI to cinema can be considered 1950’s “Vertigo” by Alfred Hitchcock, but only in 1972 we have the first 3D Computer Generated short film: “A Computer Animated Hand” by  Edwin Catmull and Fred Parke, which introduced 3D computer graphics to the world: they digitised and animated datas starting from drawn triangles and polygons in ink on a hand.

A big step forward was made for CGI development in the making of “Westworld” (1973) for the “Gunslinger vision” scene where a robot’s view is represented. The movie had a great success and inspired a sequel as well.

Since then CGI and VFX had a great development:

• During the 80s we have witnessed several examples of innovating use of CGI in Cinema and the potential it had, such as “The Trench Run Briefing”, “Tron” (1982) or “Star Wars: A New Hope” (1977). (VFX played a big role in the work of James Cameron, this film required him to set up his own effect shop to achieve massive effect shot in it).
• In 1985 the ILM brought the first real Computer Generated character to the screen in “Young Sherlock Holmes” with the “stained glass knight” scene.
• 1989: “the Abyss” – this film won an Academy Award for Best Visual Effects for the 75 seconds screen time of the water tentacle. They used an early version of Photoshop, which was the first use of this software in a featured film.
• in 1991 James Cameron improved upon the previous water effects and used them for the liquid metal cyborg in “Terminator 2: Judgement Day” (which was also honoured by the Academy for its Visual Effects).
• A new revolution in CGI can be considered to be “Jurassic Park” (1993). This film revolutionised Computer Graphics: Spielberg was one of the few people to use CGI and VFX in films. Some of the innovation it brought to the screen were:

They used photo real dinosaurs, complete with skeleton textured skin and detailed muscles.

For the animation they used “the dinosaurs input device”, which was an armature that was hooked up to a workstation to convert the creatures poses in real life into keyframes in the computer.

In order to replicate the movement of the dinosaurs, the animators studied and created footage of the correct animals and of the crew moving around, jumping, running: they were able to devise various walk cycles and make the creatures believably interact withe the environment

In 1993 the Academy of Motion Picture, Arts and Science honoured the incredible effort made with an award.

• “Toy Story” (1995), that I already mentioned above, is one of the milestones of CGI being the first feature- length film made entirely by Computer Animation.

Over the years the amount of movies created using CGI and VFX has widely increased and both techniques and quality have improved also due to the technology innovation that has made available more and more powerful machines.

Some of the most valuables examples are:

• 1996: “DragonHeart” – where the face of the character “Draco”, the dragon, was modelled after Sean Connery who voiced the character itself.
• 1999: “Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace” – for this film ILM finished over 2,000 visual effects.
• 2002: “Star Wars:Episode II – Attack of the clones”– the well know character of Yoda is introduced and all-digital.
• 2003: “Matrix- Reloaded” – for this film the artists used a process called “Universal Capture” to produce a 3D recording of the real actor’s performance which allowed to play it back from different angles and under different lighting conditions enabling to extract movement. This process combines two powerful computer vision techniques: optical flow and photogrammetry.
• 2005: “King Kong” (Peter Jackson) – the actor Andy Serkis (who also performed as the creature “Gollum” in “Lord of the Rings: two towers”) provided both onset reference and motion capture performance for the main character: his facial expressions were captured by using 132 sensors attached to his face and showed on King Kong’s face. Moreover the film implied a large number of VFX shots in a single film, in fact the film won an Academy for Best Visual Effects.
• 2006: “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead man’s chest” (Gore Verbinski) – ILM put its skills to test for the character “Davy Jones” and it was a success: the octopus-like character physical appearance is completely computer-generated and was so true to life that it was mistaken for a live action performance with prosthetic makeup.
• 2008: “The Curious case of Benjamin Button” (David Fisher) – this is the story of a man who ages backwards, so the face of Brad Pitt, the actor who played the main character was scanned and after digitally aged assisted by the “Mova Contour Technology”. This software records surfaces (specifically of actors’ faces) digitally, by using fluorescent makeup and stereo triangulation, allowing for very detailed digitisation and manipulation (the system captures images which are then used to generate dense per frame surface reconstructions. It then generates a temporally coherent mesh by tracking an invisible random pattern fluorescent makeup that is applied to the capture surface).

Last but not least, one film which had to be mentioned is “Avatar” (2009) directed by James Cameron. During filming, the director made use of his “virtual camera system”, a new way of directing motion-capture filmmaking. The system shows the actors’ virtual correspondents in their digital surroundings in real time, allowing the director to adjust and direct scenes just as if shooting live action.

VFX and CGI are a lot more common in films and tv shows now, our current era shows how much we rely on it to create world wide phenomenon.

The process of creating CGI is long, challenging and very technical. Teams are large and very diverse which means there are opportunities for all types of people ranging from hardcore coders through to illustrators and non-artists who like managing teams – Art Department, Pre-visualisation, Asset Department, Research and Development, Animation, Matchmove, FX Simulation, Lighting, Matte paint, Rotoscoping, Compositing, Production.

The History of Film

(from Paul Merton’s “weird and wonderful world of early cinema” documentary on BBC)

On December 28th 1895 the Lumière brothers demonstrated their invention of motion pictures for the very first time: they put a projector, the Cinematograph, on a stall which would project the “film” on a cloth screen. The most notable example is a train coming into a station which terrified and mesmerised people at the same time: some people left the room because they thought that the train was going to run them over.

However the Lumière brothers weren’t the only ones to be working on the principle of projecting moving photographs: both in Europe and America, inventors were separately and simultaneously coming up with creations which led to the invention of the Cinema:

• In 1877 Edward Muybridge in order to understand if at any point in a horse gallop are four legs off the ground. So he set up a system of 12 still camera, spaced from each other, which were triggered by the horse hooves passing on trip wire: the result was a succession of photographs which gives the impression of movement.
• In 1891 Thomas Edison had perfected the Kinetoscope in America.
• In 1892 Emile Raynaud projected the first animated film on the Praxinoscope.
• in 1895 Max Skladanowsky and his brother invented the Bioscope and projected moving images to an audience two month before the Lumière’s screening (however it was technically inferior the Cinematograph since it was a much more reliable system).
• In 1896 Robert W. Paul, after the end of his partnership with Birt Acres (with whom he invented the first 35mm camera in 1895), Robert Paul continued to work on the development of his camera. He demonstrated his projector “The Theatrograph” the very same day that French entertainer Félicien Trewey gave a preview of the Lumière Cinématographe at the Regent Street Polytechnic, just five miles away.

Before the invention of Cinema theatres films were usually shown in Musicals as variety acts, just like the “serpentine dace” where is shown a woman moving cloths in a choreograph.

A distinctive figure in the early Cinema was George Méliès, his interest in magic led him to experiment with filmmaking leading him to become on of the most famous filmmaker of his time. Among other things, he also embraced hand colouring other than turning the camera into a sort of “magic box” using tricks as double-exposure (achieved by rewinding the film in the camera several times to exactly the same position, for instance). By a camera technical mistake he discovers how to mimic magic tricks.

His English “counterpart” was George Albert Smith, a stage hypnotist and magic lantern exhibitor. He experimented with close-up shots and reverse motion shots. In “Grandma reading glass” he uses a magnifying lens to show the grandma eyes.

James Williamson was a filmmaker influenced by the work of Smith. He is famous for developing the film narrative: he was one of the first to develop multi shot films and he also used to cut from one shot to another from different camera angles to create dramatic effects.

One of the first world’s first female directors and producers was Alice Guy, a French pioneer filmmaker, and one of the first to make a narrative fiction film. She was the first woman to direct a film. From 1896 to 1906, she was probably the only female filmmaker in the world. She experimented with color-tinting, interracial casting, and special effects. Two examples of her works is “how monsieur takes his bath” and “race for the sausage”: this films show that she had a keen sense of humour as well.

With the development of cinematic techniques film stars start to emerge too. such as Andre Deed, the first comic star of cinema, he was a musical comedian and had plenty of personality who appeared in some Méliès films. Another important star figure was Max Linder, one of the most popular comedian in the world. the reasons for his success was his dedication to his work, his expressive eyes and the truthfulness in the way he acted. However, Max Linder is an example of how the war changed the cinema industry: after he fought in the war (he was also thought to be dead at some point), he was not himself anymore since he endured physical and mental trauma. At the end of the Great War Hollywood took over as the leader of world cinema and by that time the cinema language was already formed.

Film Language: “How to Speak Movies”

Just as it happened for a good book and a mesmerising painting, films have their unspoken language too, they communicate with a visual language which is used by directors to plan their movies, since from how a camera is placed it can tell a particular story. there is a “Shot Dialogue” since the most basic unit of a film is a shot. Each shot can mean something on their own. However, how do we speak movies?

One of the dimensions of the camera is length in which the camera moves horizontally: the “shot length”, which can be described as wide (far) and tight (near). With a wide shot someone can see the entirety of a subject or of a scene. Let’s see in more detail all the different shots times:

• EXTREME WIDE SHOT – which is wider than a wide shot and though which the audience can watch the whole scene from a distance.

• MEDIUM SHOT – a partial bodyshop of the subject, so it could be from the knees down or from the waist up.

• TWO SHOTS – which involves two subjects are in a frame.

• CLOSE-UP – a type of shot that tightly frames a person or object to show details.

• EXTREME CLOSE-UP – which frames a subject very closely, often so much so that the outer portions of the subject are cut off by the edges of the frame.

If the camera is moved vertically we are talking about the angle. the most neutral angle in which a camera is positioned could be at eye level where the audience is at the level of the actor. But there are other more elaborate shot angles:

• HIGH ANGLE SHOT – where the camera looks down at the subject which can add a silly mood to the scene.

• LOW ANGLE SHOT – in which the camera looks up at the subject; it can make perceive a subject to be to be menacing.

• DUTCH ANGLE – where the camera looks at the subject from a tilted angle.

The third dimension of the camera is depth with involves focus and lenses (an important tool for controlling focus). The distance between the nearest and farthest parts in an image that appears in focus is referred as depth of field.

• DEEP FOCUS – a shot that has a long depth of field and where everything is in focus.

• SHALLOW FOCUS – where the shot is partially in focus, which is a technique used to show an important part of the frame).

• RACK FOCUS – which can draw the eye to important details since is done with a short depth of field and the focus is changed at mid-shot.

• TILT SHIFT – where a fake shallow focus is involved: a special lens or the work in post-production can selectively blur part of the image creating an artificial depth of field.

Some type of lenses are:

• Telephoto lens, long lenses that compress space.
• Wide angle lens, which gives a space more depth.
• Fish eye, which distorts images.

The movement that a film director can decide for the camera to make also influence the overall scene:

• HANDHELD SHOT – this way of holding a camera gives more freedom to the cameramen on one hand but it’s more unpredictable.
• STEADY-CAM – which is technically a handheld shot but with a rig which helps to stabilise it, giving the scene a flowing, dreamy effect.
• PAN – the camera is left on a tripod and can be moved horizontally left or right, for example.
• TILT – a camera movement that allows to swivel the camera vertically up or down.
• ZOOM – which modifies the shot length by adjusting the lens from wide to tight or vice versa.
• DOLLY/TRACKING SHOT – the camera moves with the subject or without since both the camera and the rig are moved and the camera is put on a moving dolly or tracks.
• JIB/CRANE SHOT – the camera is moved upwards since is put on a platform, raised above the subject or brought down to it.
• DOLLY ZOOM – it enhances the motion of a scene: is essentially an optical illusion caused by zooming in or out on the camera lens while tracking the camera.

Colour, Lighting, Space, all of these things create the “Mise en Scène”, the overall look of a film. Before actually starting rolling the camera there are certain aspects to take in considerations in a scene:

• SET DRESSING – objects in a setting which are not used by actors in a scene but can add texture in a scene or show a character.
• PROPS – objets that are “active” in the scene and that actors made use of.
• COSTUMES – to create a coherence with the plot and show characters personality.

A particularly relevant element of the “Mise en Scène” is Lighting: each frame captures light bounced off the subjects. However filmmakers cannot only rely on natural lighting so setups are used to achieve the desired lighting.

• THREE POINT LIGHTING – the basic triad of lighting setup, ideal for close-ups, is composed by key light (main source of light in the scene), fill light (which fills in the shadows created by the key light) and the back light (lights the back of a subject separating them from the background).

From this standard artificial lighting style there are some variations:

• HIGH KEY LIGHTING – characterised by bright colours, strong key lights and strong fill light.
• LOW KEY LIGHTING – where key lights and fill lights are weaker but backlights are strong which emphasises the outline of a subject.
• CHIARO SCURO – from Italian meaning light and dark typical of film noir where there is a high contrast between the bright parts and the darker ones. This style generally take advantage of the techniques such as the hard-lighting (bright key lights that cast dark shadows) or soft lighting (lights are diffused through a filter, scalping the subject without harming it.

However lights can also only set the mood :

• AMBIENT LIGHTING – which make use of the light in the scene.
• UNMOTIVATED LIGHTING – shaping the scene without being an element of it.
• MOTIVATED LIGHTING – on the contrary the light is an element of the scene.

In a similar way that filmmakers can control light, they control Colour. In the early stage of film a colour effects that they were using was tinting, where the scene was given a certain colour.

Another important colour technique is colour grading where film colours are selectively adjusted for a distinctive look. Regarding the colour palette it enhances either the entire spectrum or selectively draws attention to a single colour.

The use of Space within a frame can tell so much about it and can make it unique. here are some features that characterise space:

• BALANCE – it gives a weight to the scene.
• DEEP SPACE – in order to draw the attention to the distance between two elements of the scene positioned far from each other.
• SHALLOW SPACE – which implies no depth at all.
• OFF SCREEN SPACE – the elements in the scene draw the audience attention to something out of the frame.
• BLOCKING – the overall movements an actor makes in the scene.

When it comes to filmmaking a substantial role is covered by the Editing: it is the key to blending images and sounds to make us feel emotionally connected and sometimes truly there in the film we’re watching. The following is a glossary which lists the terms involved in the editing process.

• SEQUENCE SHOT – a long-running shot usually over a minute that takes in a lot of action in a scene, sometimes it covers simple dialogue or covers a complicate sequence events.
• THE CUT – is the basic transition between the end of one shot and the beginning of another.

Some other common transitions may include:

• DISSOLVE – where one shot slowly fades into another sharing the same space for a few seconds
• WIPE – which frames one shot and a second rolling over the first
• FADE IN AND FADE OUT – a common way to going to and from a black screen.

In order to create a believable and coherent film there are some “rules” and directions that one’s need to understand in order to apply them to their film.

• CONTINUITY EDITING – paradoxically this technique should be invisible to the audience eyes, is the developing a syntax of shots to make believe that the plot is happening simultaneously.
• CONTINUITY ERRORS – on the other hand, when during the filmmaking established conventions can be broken. For instance, when the logic of a scene does not match with what is happening leading the audience mind to perceive something odd without, sometimes, even being aware of them.
• SCREEN DIRECTION – having a consistent direction of movement between shots in order to give the audience a sense of relative location and establish a continuous space.
• MATCH ON ACTION – which allows to get the action continue from one shot to the next.
• EYELINE – to help the audience understand what the character is looking at, filmmakers make use of this technique to make them parts of the action.
• 180 DEGREE RULE – a basic guideline regarding the on-screen spatial relationship between a character and another character or object within a scene: an invisible axis that the camera should not go beyond. Breaking this guideline could make perceive actions to not be entirely unintelligible, leading to the “crossing the axis“.
• ESTABLISHING SHOT – an informing shot that shows where the scene takes place.
• MASTER SHOT – which shows a scene in its entirety to everyone’s location. Usually, the master shot is the first shot checked off during the shooting of a scene.
• REVERSE ANGLE – a shot the usually shows who or what the first character was looking at.
• INSERT SHOT – useful to show important details breaking away from the main action.
• SHOT/REVERSE SHOT – used often in dialogues sequences to follow the eyeline of characters exchanging looks.
• CROSS CUTTING – In a cross-cut, the camera will cut away from one action to another action, which can suggest the simultaneity of these two actions but this is not always the case: it establishes actions occurring at the same time.
• DISCONTINUITY EDITING – where the filmmaker will deliberately use an arrangement of shots that seem out of place or confusing relative to a traditional narrative.

Time is essential for filmmaking and often directors and filmmakers take advantage of the nature of time during the creative process involved in the editing phase:

• FREEZE FRAME – where a single frame of film is stopped.
• SLOW MOTION – the “normal speed of action” is slowed down.
• FAST MOTION – adds a comical aspects to the scene speeding the action up.
• REVERSE MOTION – allows to portray unrealistic phenomenon making the action play backwards.

Intentional breaks and continuity can lead to impossible things to happen:

• JUMP CUT – an editing technique that cuts between two sequential shots. Jump cuts give the effect of moving forward through time; moreover they can remove the dead weight of a scene.
• MATCH CUT – a technique that take advantage of the similar graphics in a scene to transition from one to another.

The editor can show the continuity between two or more shots by framing them in the same scene:

• SPLIT SCREEN – two shots or more are spliced into the same frame showing simultaneous action.
• OVERLAY – editing technique that allows to place part of one shot over another shot and compositing the two.
• MONTAGE – in French the term means to assembly or set up. Is a simple but yet difficult type of editing technique to link shots together through a theme or thrown time to create a third meaning. It is a powerful mean also for showing the unreal: Symbolism and Expressionism can make use of it.