Guide to Camera Shots and Camera Angles

Published: November 16, 2019 | Last Updated: October 10, 2024

No decision is more critical to what is being communicated on screen in film than the shot!

A “shot” is the placement and angle of the camera relative to what is being shown in the frame. It is the most fundamental part of visual storytelling. A shot captures a specific subject or scene and is defined by the distance from a subject, the angle from a subject, or the camera’s movement. Camera shots are key in communicating emotions, narrative, and the overall visual style of a movie.

This guide gives you an overview of camera shot types, framing, angles, and movements and explains their functions:

• Camera Shots By Size
• Camera Shots By Framing
• Camera Shots By Angle
• Camera Shots By Movements

First, here is an overview of the most common shot sizes by how much of the subject is seen in a frame.

Notice that you can achieve the same shot size with various focal lengths. For example, you can create a close-up with a 20mm or a 200mm lens—it depends on how far the camera is from the subject. However, due to barrel distortion, the subject’s face would look slimmer at 20mm and flat or broader at 200mm.

Shot list abbreviations overview

If you’ve seen a shot list before, you might have seen some of these terms written in shorthand. Here’s a brief overview:

• Extreme Wide Shot (EWS) or Extreme Long Shot (ELS)
• Wide shot (WS) or Long Shot (LS)
• Full Shot (FS)
• Medium Full Shot (MFS)
• Cowboy Shot (CS)
• Medium Shot (MS) or (MED)
• Medium close-up (MCU)
• Close-Up (CU)
• Extreme Close-Up (ECU)

Knowing the terms, it should be fairly straightforward to understand what shots these terms refer to. Let’s look at each shot type and see some examples.

Extreme Wide Shot

The Extreme Wide Shot (EWS) or Extreme Long Shot (ELS) is often used as an establishing shot to show the environment or location.

Extreme Wide Shots are often used to give a sense of scale or isolation and to set the stage at the beginning of a scene or movie to establish context. The subject is either very small (or not visible at all).

Wide Shot

A Wide Shot (WS) or Long Shot (LS) frames the subject from head to toe while still showing a significant portion of the environment. It strikes a balance between the focus on the character and their surroundings.

Wide shots show the characters’ physical actions and movements in the setting, making it useful in action and fight scenes or when characters interact with their environment.

Full Shot

A Full Shot (FS) is a more focused version of the wide shot. In this version, the character fills the frame from head to toe, with less emphasis on the background.

The audience’s attention is centered on the character’s entire body, making it ideal for showing gestures, posture, and movement while maintaining some connection to the setting.

Medium Full Shot

A Medium Full Shot (MFS) frames the character from roughly the knees up. This shot balances the character and their environment while offering more detail on body language.

Medium Full Shots are often used in dialogue scenes where the physical stance or interaction between characters is important, but finer emotional details aren’t the primary focus.

Cowboy Shot

The Cowboy Shot (CS) (aka American Shot), typically framed from mid-thigh to just above the head, is a cinematic nod to Western films, where this framing allows for quick gun draws.

The CS focuses on the character’s upper body, giving a sense of readiness or action, and can highlight subtle body movements while still showing facial expressions.

It’s a variation of a larger category of over-the-hip shots.

Medium Shot

A Medium Shot (MS) frames the subject from the waist up. It’s one of the most commonly used shots because it perfectly balances the subject and the background.

Medium Shots focus more on the character’s expressions and upper body, making them excellent for conversations and actions that require attention to gestures and facial expressions.

Medium Close-Up

A Medium Close-Up (MCU) frames the subject from the chest or shoulders, narrowing the focus to the character’s facial expressions.

Medium Close-Ups are ideal for emotional scenes where subtle expressions are important, but the audience still needs a slight sense of the surrounding environment.

Close-Up

A Close-Up (CU) is framed tightly around the character’s face or another important detail. It’s a highly intimate shot often used to communicate intense emotions or draw attention to a particular object or action.

Close-up shots are among the most powerful ways to create an emotional connection between the characters on screen and the audience.

Extreme Close-Up

An Extreme Close-Up (ECU) focuses on a small part of the subject, such as an eye, mouth, or hand. It shows extreme detail, emphasizing a specific emotion or important narrative element.

Extreme Close-ups communicate tension, curiosity, or intense emotion and are often used to enhance dramatic moments.

Did you know many spaghetti westerns (including Once Upon a Time in the West) were shot in Andalusia, Southern Spain?

Similar to shot distance types, there are also shorthand terms for shots depending on how many subjects are captured by the camera’s angle. These types of shots are defined by how many characters are framed in a scene or how the camera positions itself relative to the characters.

Single Shot

A Single Shot frames only one character in the scene. It allows for a focused, intimate portrayal of the character’s emotions or actions, often isolating them within the frame to create a sense of personal importance or solitude.

Single shots are useful in scenes where you want to highlight the individual character’s experience or psychological state without distraction from others.

Two Shot

A Two Shot includes two characters in the frame, usually side by side or positioned to show their relationship to each other. Two shots are common in dialogue-heavy scenes or interactions between two characters.

The positioning and framing of both characters within the scene can communicate the dynamics of their relationship, whether they are close, distant, in conflict, or harmonious.

For example, by using depth-of-field and having one character in focus, you can emphasize which character the audience should focus on in a scene.

Three Shot

A Three Shot frames three characters together in one scene. It’s often used in ensemble scenes where interactions between multiple characters are important.

The arrangement of the three characters within the frame can tell a lot about their relationships and power dynamics.

This shot is most often used when a group of characters is meant to overwhelm or overpower a single character or when two groups of rival characters are facing off, and showing the breadth of their emotions or diversity of expression is important in telling the story.

Over-the-Shoulder Shot

An Over-the-Shoulder Shot (OTS) frames the scene from behind one character, typically showing part of their head or shoulder while focusing on another character or object. This shot draws us into a conversation, as it feels like we are experiencing the scene from the character’s perspective in the foreground.

It’s often used in dialogue to establish a connection between the speaking characters while giving the viewer a sense of positioning within the scene.

See also Reverse-Angle Shot.

Point-of-View Shot

A Point-of-View Shot (POV) shows the scene as if through the eyes of a particular character. It immerses us directly into the character’s perspective, allowing us to experience firsthand what the character sees.

This shot is often used to create an emotional connection with the character, to build suspense, or to make the audience feel like they are actively participating in the story.

Read more about point-of-view in film.

One of the director’s most important jobs is understanding how each angle will affect the audience’s perception of the story at any moment. Camera angles help shape how the audience interacts with and experiences the story. If viewed from another angle or various angles, the same scene could play very differently for an audience.

Eye Level Shot

An Eye-Level Shot places the camera at the character’s eye level, creating a neutral and natural perspective. This is the most common shot for dialogue and interaction, as it mimics how people see each other in real life. It establishes an equal connection between the viewer and the character without distorting the scene’s sense of power or authority.

Low Angle Shot

A Low-Angle Shot frames the subject from below, looking up at them. This shot makes the character appear powerful, dominant, or imposing, as the upward angle suggests superiority or control. Depending on how the character is portrayed within the frame, it can also evoke feelings of awe or intimidation.

High Angle Shot

A High-Angle Shot is filmed from above, looking down on the subject. This angle often makes the character appear smaller, vulnerable, or weak.

High-angle shots are often used to express a loss of power or inferiority or to create a sense of the character being overwhelmed by their circumstances.

Hip Level Shot

A Hip Level Shot positions the camera at the height of a character’s hips, often used in Western or action genres. It’s especially useful in scenes involving gunfights, quick-draw duels, or action moments, as it draws attention to a character’s hands or holstered weapons. This shot can give a dynamic sense of readiness or tension.

But it can also direct the audience’s attention to a person sitting (so you feel what it’s like to be in that person’s seat), as in the example from Reservoir Dogs.

Knee Level Shot

A Knee Level Shot places the camera at the height of a character’s knees or lower. It emphasizes the lower body and often captures details like walking, running, or other leg movements.

Knee-level shots are also useful for showing characters in movement while keeping the focus on their body language and creating a sense of urgency or physicality.

Ground Level Shot

A Ground-Level Shot positions the camera directly on the ground, often giving the scene an insect-like perspective. It can create tension, show the vastness or detail of a setting (fx from an insect’s perspective), or emphasize a character’s connection to the earth or floor.

Ground-level shots are frequently used in action scenes or to give a fresh, unusual angle that contrasts conventional shots.

Shoulder-Level Shot

A Shoulder-Level Shot positions the camera about the same height as a character’s shoulders. It’s a very common shot.

Shoulder-level shots can be combined with subtle low-angle shots to establish dominance in conversations or moments where one character is meant to have a slight psychological edge over another.

Dutch Angle Shot

A Dutch Angle Shot tilts the camera on its axis, creating a slanted horizon line. This shot is often used to create a sense of unease, tension, or disorientation, as the tilted angle visually represents imbalance or instability in the scene. It’s commonly used in horror, thrillers, or scenes of psychological distress to amplify an unsettling atmosphere.

Read more about the difference between horror and thriller movies.

Bird’s-Eye-View Shot

A Bird’s-Eye View Shot (or Overhead Shot) places the camera directly above the scene, looking straight down. This shot provides an omniscient, almost god-like perspective, giving the audience a full view of the environment and its characters.

It’s often used to showcase a scene’s spatial arrangement or to highlight a character’s insignificance within a larger world.

Aerial Shot

An Aerial Shot or Helicopter Shot is taken from above, typically from a helicopter or drone. They are commonly used as establishing shots or tracking shots showing large landscapes, cityscapes, or environments.

Aerial shots are often used to express a sense of grandeur, freedom, or isolation, depending on how they frame the surroundings and subject from a distant, sweeping perspective. They’re often used at the start of scenes to set the tone and give context to the setting.

Lastly, there are camera shots referred to by how the camera moves. Normal camera angles often refer to static shots, where the camera is relatively still on a tripod.

In filmmaking, these shots are defined by the camera’s movement (or lack of movement). Each shot type shapes the viewer’s perspective and enhances a scene’s emotional or narrative focus.

Static Shot

A Static or Fixed Shot is where the camera remains completely still during the shot, with no movement. This shot often allows the action within the frame to unfold naturally without any distractions.

Static shots are ideal for scenes where you want the viewer’s attention to focus entirely on the characters or events without drawing attention to the camera itself.

Dolly Shot

A Dolly Shot involves moving the camera toward or away from a subject on a dolly, a wheeled platform that allows for smooth motion. It creates a sense of depth and can be used to bring the audience closer to or farther from a character, object, or setting.

Subtly “dollying or pushing in” can the viewer into a character’s emotional state or emphasize a discovery by pulling away (“dollying/pushing out”).

Zoom Shot

A Zoom Shot uses the camera’s lens to magnify or reduce the subject’s size in the frame without physically moving the camera. Zooming in can create a sense of intimacy or focus while zooming out can reveal more of the setting.

Zooms can be either slow and subtle or fast and abrupt:

Unlike a dolly shot, a zoom shot changes the focal length, which can flatten the image and alter the perspective, sometimes creating a more artificial look.

Dolly Zoom

A Dolly Zoom Shot, also known as the “Vertigo Effect” or “Zolly,” combines a dolly shot and a zoom. The camera moves forward or backward while zooming in the opposite direction, creating a disorienting effect where the background appears to change size while the subject remains the same.

Dolly zooms are often used to show a sudden realization, intense psychological impact, or a shift in perspective.

Pan Shot

A Pan Shot is when the camera rotates horizontally from a fixed position, left to right or right to left, following the action or revealing new information in the scene.

Pans are commonly used to show a wide landscape, follow a moving subject, or slowly introduce important environmental details. Panning can also create suspense by gradually revealing or withholding information.

Tilt Shot

A Tilt Shot involves moving the camera vertically from a fixed position, up or down. Like the pan, this shot is often used to reveal something or emphasize a character’s stature or size.

Tilting up can make a subject appear grand or powerful while tilting down can diminish a character or provide a bird’ s-eye view of the surroundings.

Whip/Swish Pan Shot

A Whip Pan Shot is a fast, energetic version of the pan shot in which the camera moves rapidly from one point to another, often causing motion blur.

Whip pans are frequently used in action scenes or to transition between two points quickly, creating a sense of urgency, excitement, or even confusion. The blur can also function as a stylistic tool for dynamic scene transitions.

Whip Tilt Shot

A Whip Tilt Shot is the vertical equivalent of the whip pan, where the camera tilts rapidly up or down, creating a similar sense of motion blur.

Whip tilts are great for fast action or a sudden shift in focus. They add intensity or surprise when moving between subjects or revealing something unexpected in the frame.

Tracking Shot

A Tracking Shot is when the camera moves with the subject, typically following alongside, behind, or in front of the character. Tracking shots often immerse the viewer in the character’s journey, creating a continuous sense of motion.

Tracking shots are great for long takes where the camera stays with the action, maintaining a sense of real-time movement.

Arc Shot

An Arc Shot involves the camera moving around the subject in a circular or semi-circular path. It is often used to emphasize the subject’s importance, create a sense of dynamic energy, or reveal different aspects of the subject from multiple angles.

An arc shot gives us a feeling of closeness to the subject, adding visual interest and a sense of momentum.

Since film and video are essentially a series of photographs played at high speed to create the illusion of movement, the frame refers to everything seen on screen.

A shot is typically considered a series of frames united by a set start point and endpoint for a set duration. You can tell a shot has ended because there will be a cut to another angle. If a camera moves, it’s still part of the same shot until there’s an official cut.

It’s also why we, as a filmmaker community, have developed an obsession with “one-shots” and their duration. It can be tricky to film continuously for long durations and have everything go according to plan.

Every decision that goes into making a film is a form of communication, from the blocking of action to the set’s dressing and design to the casting and costumes and down to the hair and make-up.

Camera shots stress the director’s vision, guide the audience’s view into the diegesis, and help us understand which fine details are the most important.

I hope this guide has helped you get an overview so you can be more confident when you make a shot list for your next film.

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