Camera Angles, Shots, Lenses and Perspective
Shot sizes (framed on the human body)
EWS/establishing, then WS, MWS, MS (waist up), MCU (chest up), CU (head), ECU (eye or detail). Match size to emotion: the closer the frame, the more the audience feels.
Angles
- Eye level - neutral, observational.
- Low angle - the subject looms; power, threat.
- High angle - the subject shrinks; vulnerability.
- Overhead / bird's eye - geography, pattern, fate.
- Dutch / canted - unease, imbalance.
Lenses
- Wide (18–35 mm) - deep space, edge distortion, good for interiors and comedy.
- Normal (50 mm) - close to human vision.
- Long / telephoto (85–200 mm) - compresses the background, shallow depth of field, flatters faces, isolates the subject.
Perspective note
Lens choice changes the drawing. A wide lens exaggerates the near-to-far size difference; a long lens flattens it. Place the vanishing points accordingly.
Worked example
A director wants a tense reveal of a man watching from a doorway. Choose an 85 mm lens, low angle, medium close-up, shallow focus. Reasoning: the long lens isolates him from the street and blurs the background, the low angle adds threat, and the MCU keeps the doorframe visible for context.
Traps that cost marks
- Calling a waist-up shot a close-up.
- Using a high angle for a heroic moment.
- Mixing wide-lens distortion and telephoto compression in one sequence without a story reason.
- Forgetting that angle and shot size are two separate labels.
- Using ECU for information the audience has not yet been given.