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Lesson · Grade 6 · Applied Design, Skills and Technologies

Camera Shots: How Close-Ups and Wide Shots Tell a Story

  • Grade 6
  • Applied Design, Skills and Technologies
  • 1 min 7 s
  • British Columbia
  • BC6-AD-26

A camera frame moves over a drawn park where a child's balloon floats away, cropping it into a wide shot that shows the setting, a medium shot that shows the action and a close-up that shows feelings, while each crop drops into a numbered storyboard. The panels are then read as a sequence, and putting the close-up first shows how changing the order of shots changes the story.

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In one sentence

The question this lesson answers

How can a few camera shots tell a whole story?

Here is our scene: a child's balloon floats away in a park.

Transcript

What the lesson says

How can a few camera shots tell a whole story?

Here is our scene: a child's balloon floats away in a park.

A camera records only what is inside its frame.

A wide shot shows the whole setting, so we know where the story happens.

A medium shot crops in to show the child from the waist up, so we see the action.

A close-up fills the frame with the child's face, so we see how they feel.

Each shot is a different crop of the same scene.

Put the shots in order, one after another, to make a sequence.

First we see where, then what happens, then how the child feels.

Many films start wide like this, then move closer.

Start with the close-up instead, and we wonder why the child is sad.

Then the wider shots show us why.

Wide shots show where, close-ups show feelings, and the order tells the story.

Curriculum

Where this fits

British Columbia, Grade 6

Applied Design, Skills and Technologies, Media arts: techniques for using images, sounds, and text to communicate information, settings, ideas, and story structureBC6-AD-26

British Columbia, Grade 7

Applied Design, Skills and Technologies, Media arts: techniques for using images, sounds, and text to communicate information, settings, ideas, and story structureBC7-AD-24

This lesson is also listed in Grade 7.

The outcomes and strands follow the British Columbia curriculum.

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