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pacing. . . what is it?
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just to add to the good stuff thus far, part of it to me is, does the screen time “feel” like enough time has passed for the ‘realtime’ to be realistic? You know, one of those times when the hero is on a ten-second countdown, yet takes time for a 30-second speech before cutting the red wire… or was it the blue W-
BOOOOM!!!Sometimes you want to up-cut the expected time of a key even in order to shock or grab attention, or reinforce suddeness.
Think of it another way: in pleasant situations, time seems to have rushed by, and in scary or unpleasant ones, it slows to a crawl. Except for a few experimental films shot in real-time, we truncate time in our programs with edits. How we enhance or detract from the perception of time’s flow equals “pace”.
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I agree that pacing is what allows the viewer to keep up with the content without being bored or overwhelmed. I make educational videos for medical audiences, often with some pretty wordy paragraphs about technical subjects. Sometimes you need to space out the sentences just to give some breathing room between complex thoughts…it’s not a used car commercial.
Along the same line, it could also refer to how you cut action. In most cases you make your cuts motivated by action, such as someone entering or leaving a frame.
But watch Elephant, and you will see a whole new definition of pacing. The movie builds to a dramatic conclusion, but with very long cuts. I wish more action movies could understand that fast frenetic cutting does not necessarily make things more exciting.
Mike
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“Art is not a thing. It is a way” – Elbert Hubbard
According to both Hank and Jerry, it’s the same blonde that walks into the same bar, sits next to the same drunk and orders the same glass of prune juice. Why is the joke funnier when Jerry tells it? Hank had all his facts straight. He even made the same face that Jerry made when he said “prune juice”.
Damn that Jerry – he sure can tell a great joke. Must be his pacing.
…I’m starting to wonder if pacing is an accident of emotion, and is therefore something that can’t be taught… only emulated. The whole art-imitating-life thing.
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\`(=)`/…Pixel Monkey
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Pacing is an art that needs to be developed no question.. However, in just discussing it well, I think we can over-dramitize this as well…
STAR TREK IV – (Act 2, SCENE ?)
(Lead in …McCoy infers to Spooks Death
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[Chip Johns] “So I feel that many times the greatest accomplishments in society are usually by individuals who do not have as much natural ability, they know it and they work 100 times harder than the natural…”
I don’t think this is totally true in this case. First, I really don’t call it a natural ability, it is developed over time, but there is no real way to teach it, you just learn how to feel it as you go. Also as to working harder if you don’t have natural ability again is not totally true, many just let it happen, where if you got it you work harder to make it that perfect feel you know it can have. Just because you have that feel doesn’t mean every scene is going to fall into place you ahve to try scenes to feel which works best.
I remember a movie in the mid 60’s, not sure of the title but similar to Naked City. The opening credits were pl;ayed over a scene of a car driving through New York shot from the back seat. As credits end the car stops, people start getting out as does the camera and everyone walks up 2 flights of stairs camera following. This ended up as about a 2 and a half minute shot. one shot and it felt so dang good. I was always amazed at how it felt to not have a cut in such a long shot.
Charlie
ProductionKing Video Services
Unmarked Door Productions
Flamingo Las Vegas Hotel
Las Vegas, Nevada -
Good day,
Pacing is a feeling, is a scene too long or too short? What type of emotion are you trying to convey? Slow and methodical or heart pounding excitement? Are you trying to hold the viewer’s attention, so he gets the message?
It comes with experience and Charile did a great job in his explination.
John
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Oh God……thank you someone else who feels the same about that scene…..it killed me to watch….soooo long….so boring….so DUMB…….it went on and on……and they didnt even get bruised after TUMBLING with 4 ton animals that are rolling on top of them and bumping them into the walls…..just retarded if you ask me……after that scene the rest of the movie really sucked….what a overhyped piece that was……
Paul
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Agree. It’s all about VARYING the pace, and staying one step ahead of the audience’s expectations. Bad pacing is deadly; with great pacing, you don’t even think about the pacing, just how exciting and great the story is.
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Re: pacing. . . what is it?
I always thought it was what went on in the background, behind the editor (amongst the producers and the director).A simple example that comes to mind is a brief sequence of 3 shots. 1st is a wide shot of a porcupine occuping about 1/3 of the frame. After about 10 seconds of watching him feed with his fur waveing in the breeze people often question what it is as it looks so docile, peaceful and even cuddely. Cut to a shot of it a little closer with it’s menacing quills up and hold for 4 seconds or so , long enough to recognize it’s head which confirms it is the same critter but with much different feeling being evoked. Cut to a close up of a dazzed looking dog’s head with 127 porcupine quills sticking out of his mouth and muzzle. This short sequence transforms your feelings from warmth to shocked to where you can taste the adrenalin in your mouth. The 2nd clip is key as it breaks the mood of the 1st shot and sets you up for the final shot. It is only there long enough for the viewer to recognize the critter and break the peaceful mood.
A more complex example of pacing is the accident scene in Julie Taymor’s “Frida” where you go from a lengthy mood setting shot of them running for the bus. You never settle into the dialog after that as you are shown the bird in the boy’s hand, back to the speaker to connect the dialog and now to the gold in the craftman’s tool kit. both of these elements come back into play during the actual accident which, after a couple of vehicle passing and horn honking shots, breaks into slow motion and cumulates to the tragic overhead view of Frida lying on the floor (with a tremendous amount of creative cinemaphotography & effects in between). This entire crash sequence was shot from the interior of the vehicle! and it is probably the single most important event in the life of Frida Kahlo. What a piece of film work this movie was.
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Arguably one of the most thrilling scenes in Pulp Fiction was when Travolta dumps passed-out Uma Thurman with poor Eric Stolz and Rossanna Arquette. From the moment Arquette hangs up the phone to the moment they’re about to “stab Uma in the heart” there is not one single edit. Not one. (well two – the IN and the OUT ;o) The idea that we don’t HAVE to cut is something I’ve learned. The emotion of that scene determines the pacing without need for a single join.
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