ADR (Automatic Dialogue Replacement)
The process of replacing dialogue in post-production by an actor who repeats lines in sync with the original recording, thus ensuring a clearer dialogue track (also known as looping).
Assembly
The editor’s first pass at cutting a film, consisting of selected takes joined together in script order (also known as the Rough Cut).
Avid
The trademark of a type of digital non-linear editing system.
Closeup
An image of a subject filmed at close range.
Cold cut
Cutting to a scene where there is nothing happening. To be avoided, as it stops the forward movement of the film.
Continuity editing
The predominant mode of editing in narrative cinema, predicated on maintaining coherence from shot to shot.
Coverage
The breaking up of a master shot into a variety of closer shots and angles, allowing for smooth cutting among different perspectives in a scene.
Cross-cutting
An editing technique in which the camera cuts between two or more parallel lines of action, usually to establish events occurring at the same time but in different places (also known as intercutting).
Dailies
The raw, unedited picture and sound material shot during film production (also known as rushes).
Dissolve
An editing technique that overlaps two consecutive shots, gradually transitioning from the end of one shot to the beginning of the next.
Eyeline match
A continuity editing technique in which a shot of a character looking at something offscreen is followed by a cut to the object he or she is looking at.
Fade-in
An editing technique in which a shot begins in darkness and gradually lightens to full brightness, often used at the beginning of a scene.
Fade-out
An editing technique in which a fully lit shot gradually dims to total darkness, often used at the end of a scene.
Feet
A unit of measurement for film footage; each foot of film is made up of 16 frames.
Final Cut
A non-linear editing software developed by Macromedia Inc. and later purchased by Apple Inc.
Flatbed editor
A type of film-editing device that enables picture and sound rolls to be loaded onto separate wheels and synchronized. The two most common brands of flatbed editor, the Steenbeck and the KEM (Keller-Elektro-Mechanik), were invented in Germany and became popular in the US in the 1970s.
Frame
One of many single images in a motion picture. Film is projected at 24 frames per second.
Jump cut
A cut between two shots of the same subject taken from only slightly varying angles, creating a feeling of discontinuity.
Jumping the line
When two actors are speaking to each other in a scene, they are positioned on an imaginary 180° line, which the camera must not cross. If this rule is broken, it is called jumping, or crossing the line, and proves disorienting to the viewer.
Linear editing
A method of video editing that requires the material to be assembled in an ordered sequence.
Long shot
A shot that shows an entire object or human figure from enough of a distance to place it in relation to its surroundings (also known as a wide shot).
Long take
A shot that is held uninterrupted for longer than the conventional duration of a shot, often lasting several minutes.
Master shot
A shot that records an entire scene of dramatic action from start to finish, usually executed as a long shot that keeps all the actors in view.
Match cut
A cut that helps sustain visual and thematic continuity by having characters, objects and/or other compositional elements in one shot match those of the subsequent shot.
Medium shot
A shot executed at a medium distance from the action.
Montage
An editing technique in which short shots are assembled into a rhythmic, time-compressed sequence intended to convey an idea or theme and/or the passage of time.
Moviola
The trademark of an upright machine used to view and edit film.
Negative
The original footage that comes out of the camera and must be processed at a laboratory before a print can be struck from it.
Non-linear editing
A common method of editing that allows random, non-sequential access to the material without destroying it.
180-degree rule
A basic principle of editing that states that two figures in a scene should always have the same left/right relationship to one another.
Optical effects
A laboratory procedure in which shots are modified, using an optical printer, to achieve fades, dissolves and other effects.
Post-production
A part of the filmmaking process that follows principal photography and includes sound and picture editing and addition of visual effects.
Synchronize
To match the picture with the correct sound.
Trim bin
A device in which trimmed footage is hung or clipped while a sequence is being cut.
Up to camera
Editors’ jargon for keeping pace with principal photography by cutting a scene together as quickly as the material for the scene is shot.
Workprint
A rough, working version of a film used during the editing process.