Designer, Sets, Scenery

161. The designer is the person who designs the sets (see units 110-111) and the costumes, if they need designing (художник)

In the cinema, sets is generally preferable to scenery, in the sense of декорации, because scenery may also mean natural scenery such as real fields, hills, rivers, etc., seen in a film (пейзажи). Since many films are shot out-of-doors, scenery often has this second meaning.

e.g. There is some beautiful scenery in the film.

On location is used to mean in a natural setting, either out of doors or in some building, as opposed to in the studio. It corresponds to на натуре.

e.g. The scenes in Paris were shot on location

The film was made/shot on location

Cameraman, Camerawork.

162. The cameraman is the person responsible for the photography or, as it is often called, the camerawork.

The cameraman is in charge of the camerawork as a whole but he has several assistants, and these are called collectively the camera crew.

Cameraman corresponds to оператор, and camerawork to операторская работа.

A film camera be distinguished from a cine-camera. Although these two expressions are basically synonyms, meaning an apparatus for taking moving pictures, in practice film camera is applied to the larger type used by professionals, whereas cine-camera denotes a smaller, simpler type used mainly by amateur photographers, for example, to fit their family and friends, places they visit, etc.

Shoot is often used in connection with camerawork, meaning photograph, film:

e.g. a. We must shoot that scene again.

b. They're shooting "The Blue Bird" at the moment.

c. Where was the film shot?

d. The film was shot on location (in Japan). (see unit 161 above.)

Shooting may be used as a noun (съемки).

e.g. Shooting has started/finished.

Shot (кадр) as a noun occurs in such sentences as:

a. The film opens with a beautiful shot of the river.

b. There were some very original shots in the film.

A close-up (крупный план) is a shot taken at close range and showing something in detail.

e.g. The film ends with a close-up of the hero's face.

A flashback is a shot or series of shots (sometimes a whole scene) showing something which happened earlier (ретроспекция, обратный кадр). For example, when a character is remembering his childhood, a scene from that period of his life is shown on the screen, thus interrupting the time sequence.

e.g. When Alan saw the house where he used to live there was a flashback to his childhood.

In slow motion is used when a movement or scene is shown much more slowly than it appears in real life, an artistic effect.

e.g. His fall was shown in slow motion.

There seems to be no set expression to denote the opposite device, that is, when something is shown more quickly than it appears in real life. However, speeded up can be used in non-formal style.

e.g. The movement of the traffic was shown speeded up.

163. Colour, black and white

A film may be shot in colour or in black and white. It is a colour film (NOT coloured) or a black-and-white film.

Technicolour and in technicolour were widely used to denote a particularly vivid type of colour, but since this type has become the norm, technicolour is now little used, at least in non-technical conversations. Simply colour is used.

Sound