Invisible Editing……what is it?

[Chaz Shukat]

If you cut on an action, the viewer is paying attention to the action. The action draws attention away from the edit, so you don’t notice it. You see it but you don’t notice it because your attention is drawn to the action or movement in the frame. It’s like a magicians slight of hand, where he does an action to distract you while he does his slight of hand. It’s right there to see but you don’t notice it because the action distracts you from it. Same principle. Does that help?

Chaz S.

[Milton Hockman]

i think so.

so is this a good example…..

let’s say a person’s head moves into a shot from frame left and leaves frame right. at about almost the time the head leaves the shot you cut to another clip that has a pan move that goes from left to right. (so the motion is in theory continuing between the two shots.)

is that an invisible cut technique?

[Mark Suszko]

I think I have a better example. “Rope”. Where the idea is the whole movie is one continuous shot, only it couldn’t be, because the film reels weren’t long enough, so Hitchcock had an actor walk in front of the camera creating a natural wipe. Cutting on the pass, you are tricked into thinking it is still a continuous shot.

Speilberg and his editor used this technique a lot in a particular scene in “Jaws”. The scene is Brody, uncomfortably sitting on the beach; the mayor has coerced him into allowing swimming on a beach that almost certainly has a shark nearby. He watches the bathers in the water intently, his gaze flitting from one false alarm to another. Other bathers are walking thru the shot continuously. Each pass is a wipe/cut and as they reveal the new scene, it’s a closer and closer shot of Brody. It really ratchets up the anxiety and tension for the arrival of the actual shark.

[Chris Bové]

Let’s say you’re cutting 2-camera dialog.

Go to a dinner party and watch other people having conversations. You know that moment when someone (Charlie) is having a conversation with someone else (Lucy) at a dinner party, and Charlie is explaining something that’s rather complex, and mid-way through one of their sentences Lucy understands what Charlie is talking about? Lucy displays a visual reaction when this happens – and it is usually slightly exaggerated to show Charlie that the idea has been conveyed.

A few frames before this moment is the perfect time to cut to a reaction shot. It’s when the audience gets the idea that’s been conveyed and (I guarantee you) mimics the reaction Lucy makes.

This is one of 10,000 examples of invisible editing. It’s the inexact science of cutting on the emotion, and is one of the few instincts a great editor can claim – similar to perfect pitch for musicians.

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\`(=)`/…Pixel Monkey
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A picture says 1000 words. Editors give them meaning.

[Erik Pontius]

This actually brings up a good point. Ever try watching a movie with the sound off? You’ll notice a lot more cuts than you would with the sound on. Why? Just as was mentioned, the loud hit (or stab) in the soundtrack or sharp noise of a door slam or other such noise distracts the viewers eyes from percieving the changes in the scene…effectively masking the edit.
That’s only one example. There are many, many techniques of hiding edits. Some of the books mentioned in the other thread talk alot on how to mask edits.
In interviews or scenes of dialog, they have the talent position and the framing of the camera done is such a way that the eyes of the subject on the the same level. The eyes are the windows to the soul and the focal point of most viewers. Just about everyone watches the subject’s eyes as they move across the screen whether they are conscious of it or not. When shooting interviews it’s important to get both eyes in the frame and to have the lighting positioned to give a little glint to the eye (an eyelight). This gives the viewer a reference point as to where the subject’s eyes are in the frame.

Erik

[Milton Hockman]

well i’d like to know more about invisible cutting in reference to putting two b-roll shots together.

for example. my coworker told me that this was a jump cut, but i thought i was making an invisible cut……

a plane is landing in the shot going from left to right and then i cut to another clip that has a plane taxiing on the runway (going slow)

i ligned up the shots so that the noses of each shot almost matched up. the second shot nose of the plane was a little farther in the fram in the right than the previous shot.

I personally thought that this cut was ok and made an invisible cut, but he said it was considered a jump cut cause i cut from one plane to another doing the same thing.

who is right??

[Mark Suszko]

I think your friend is right on this one.

[Chaz Shukat]

I’m not sure what you are referring to when you say invisiable edit anymore.
Everyone here is talking about what you could almost call an effect, something that is used on occasion, but not on every single edit. I think that good editing is editing that viewers don’t notice because they are focused on the story because the edits are not jarring and don’t call attention to themselves. To me, that’s invisible editing as much as the “hidden” edits discussed in previous postings. And in answer to you plane example, I would say that it is not an invisible edit or good editing and the first example would be an opportunity to do a hidden edit if you were cutting to another shot with a person walking in the same direction, not a pan in the same direction, unless there was something in the forground like a tree or a pole or a wall edge that was moving across the screen in the same direction.

Chaz S.

[Erik Pontius]

For your plane example, I think your co-worker is probably right. The two shots put in close proximity indicate that these actions are occuring in a very short time. We as viewers know that a plane landing going fast suddenly seen a split second later going slow is would be impossible. We need a visual cue between both shots to indicate a passage of time for the edit not to be as jarring. Editors often throw in the all to common cross dissolve inbetween these shots…the dissolve gives us a visual cue that time has passed. There can be other solutions as well. What would happen if you stuck a third shot in between, say a shot of the passengers seated in their seats or the pilots in the cockpit. There is enough visual difference between the plane landing shot and the cockpit/passenger shot and then from that to the taxi shot to avoid a jump cut and imply a passage of time. Another solution perhaps if you didn’t have a 3rd shot, would be (if you have the head material) would be to start the taxi shot far earlier in the clip, perhaps showing the runway where the plane is off camera for a dozen frames or so and then rolls into the frame. That extra couple of frames gives the viewer time to notice that this is a different scene and that time has passed…avoiding a jump cut.
Try it and see what works. After editing for a while you start to get a “gut feeling” as you watch your edits. Usually if something feels wrong but you can’t quite put your finger on it, make a duplicate of your sequence (so you can get back to where you were if things go wrong) and then start rearranging the order of clips, trimming or extending a few frames from shots, until it feels right. Alot of watching programs/films/etc… is on a subconscious level (or unconscious for some) we as humans are very trained by our ancestral caveman hunter/gather hunter/hunted instincts as to what we think should be correct as we watch.

Erik

[Charley King]

[Chaz Shukat] “I think that good editing is editing that viewers don’t notice”
That is the real concept. Invisible editing? I personally have never liked that term. No edit is totally invisible, if you are looking for it, or are aware it happened. I prefer the term tranparent editing. Edits should not bring attention to the edit, but should bring the audience into the scene by capturing their attention totally on the scene.
I totally agree the plane description is not a good, invisible, or even transparent edit. The speed alone would be jarring, not to mention background, foreground, etc.

Charlie