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A simple camera movement can change the mood of a scene.
And there are few camera movements simpler than the pan and the tilt.
But great pans and tilts aren't always as easy as they may seem.
"- Full tilt all the way."
- This is "The Ultimate Guide to Panning and Tilting".
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Let's begin.
"- Are you saying pan?
Or pam?"
- A pan refers to when a camera turns onto a central axis horizontally.
It derives from the word panorama, meaning a wide, unbroken view.
A tilt, meanwhile, is when the camera pivots vertically on an axis.
There are many ways to achieve these movements.
A filmmaker can use a tripod, or they can execute the movements with handheld,
on a dolly, or on a crane.
However, panning and tilting are different from dolly or crane movements.
Dollying refers to a camera moving through space horizontally,
while craning or booming refers to moving vertically.
"- Get up here, you're too slow! Move it, move it!"
- But the moves aren't mutually exclusive.
For example, a dolly can include a tilt, or a crane could include a pan.
Panning and tilting may be used for a multitude of reasons,
to establish a space, follow movement, or reveal information.
All without requiring a cut.
What effect a filmmaker is aiming for
will alter how they pan or tilt.
Let's look at types of movement.
No two pans or tilts are alike.
A slow pan can emphasize the grandeur of a location.
In this shot from "The Passenger", a slow pan is used to
illustrate how stuck David is.
Or, it can build tension.
In "It Follows", slow pans are used to create suspense.
If director David Robert Mitchell decided to simply cut to a scare,
this suspense would be deflated.
Mitchell explains how approach creates tension.
'It's sort of like you're looking around, but we're controlling it.
Scan quickly, keep looking, and maybe things will pop up, and maybe they won't.
It's really just about trying to give you a real sense of space'.
The slow but constant movement of the camera also serves as a
visual motif, aligning with the slow constant movement of it.
"- To say, I am Lazarus.
Come from the dead.
Come back to tell you all.
I shall tell you all."
- Director Apichatpong Weerasethakul often uses slow pans to bolster the
meditative quality of his films.
This slow pan in "Syndromes In a Century" is combined with a dolly
to make the camera seem as though it's floating through the hallway.
A slow tilt, meanwhile, can make for a dramatic character reveal, as it
does in "Terminator 2: Judgment Day".
The tilt makes the T 800 all the more intimidating.
Faster movement can add energy to a scene.
In the final shot of "The Fabelmans", a quick tilt is used as a punchline,
adjusting his shot in accordance with John Ford's advice...
"- When the horizon's at the bottom, it's interesting.
When the horizon's at the top, it's interesting.
When the horizon's in the middle, it's boring as sh*t."
- Cinematographer Janusz Kaminski explains this was Spielberg's idea.
'He shook the image like someone almost kicked the camera to look much more
organic and brutal and force you to think of the lesson Sammy had just gotten.
I wish I could take credit for that, but that was purely his creation'.
Wes Anderson will often use quick pans for comedy, highlighting the jarring
nature of certain reveals in a way which wouldn't come across if he just cut.
"- These stories will continue to...
Stop it! Stop it! Don't! Don't do it!"
- These fast pans are typically referred to as whip pans.
In "The Red Shoes", Pressburger and Powell use whip pans to create
Vicki's point of view, emphasizing her scattered state of mind.
Tilts and pans can also be differentiated
by just how much a camera turns.
"- I dreamed a dream and time gone by."
- In this shot from "Les Miserables" the tilts and the pans are subtle, following
the face of Fantine so that she doesn't need to stay completely still.
While not moving too much to where it would distract from the performance,
the static camera in this emotional moment may have felt too impersonal.
Smaller movements often mean that the information in the shot remains the same.
It is just being slightly reframed.
A fuller movement can reveal much more information.
In "Barry Lyndon", Stanley Kubrick utilizes a long pan to fully situate
the audience in the space, first seeing the performers, and then the audience.
A pan can go a full 360 degrees.
In "Elephant", the camera rotates in an entire circle
show the audience all the details of the shooter's room.
With this dramatic tilt in "The Sacrifice", Andrei Tarkovsky
allows the audience to take in the amount of destruction before us.
The length of a pan or tilt is also important.
In many oners, they are necessary to follow the action.
In this elaborate shot from "Children of Men", the camera both dollies
and pans to create different compositions without cutting.
By not cutting, Alfonso Cuaron emphasizes that these characters
are trapped in this car.
DP Emmanuel Lubezki notes,
'By doing everything in real-time, I think you feel the
desperation and the claustrophobia of the characters'.
This lengthy shot from "Paranormal Activity 3", meanwhile, revolves around a pan.
Letting the shot go on for so long, paired with the slow, constant pan,
builds the suspense of the scene.
Another major consideration for panning and tilting are framing and lenses.
By definition, framing will evolve throughout a pan or tilt.
But at the very least, filmmakers will typically decide on how
they want the beginning and the end of the movement to look.
Wide-angle panning can be great for establishing a large location.
This shot from "Vertigo" follows the action while also
showing the skyline of San Francisco, the setting of the film.
A wide-angle tilt can help establish more vertical locations like a skyscraper,
which uses leading lines to create a deliberate composition.
"Star Wars" always begins with a tilt from space, emphasizing the
intergalactic scope of the franchise.
The wide angle tilt and pan near the end of "The Leopard" juxtaposes
an impoverished Sicilian town with the wealthy, Corbera.
The quiet and poor village is a far cry from the lavish party which was
just suffocating the Patriarch and illustrates that despite the festivities,
Sicily is facing a crossroads.
Director Terrence Malick often uses wide-angle lenses, which
exaggerate any camera movement.
These dynamic moves add to the ethereal roaming quality of Malick's films.
A medium angle pan, or tilt meanwhile, can give the audience
visual information more deliberately.
In "Easy Rider", an extended medium close-up pan lets us take in each character's
facial expression one at a time.
This intimate portrayal of the hippie commune represents what made
the film such a surprise success.
It closely and patiently documented the counterculture movement at a time when
most of Hollywood was brushing it off.
In "Raiders of the Lost Ark", a medium close-up pan creates a jump scare,
pivoting to a close-up.
Fritz Lang uses a medium tilt with a dolly to relay important information in "M".
We now link the girl with the murderer described on the poster,
and the shadow which appears over the poster becomes all the more foreboding.
This is the killer being described.
Close-up tilts and pans can emphasize the small details of a subject.
"- I came here to see you.
Cause I know that now you'll tell me what you're after."
- In "Once Upon a Time in the West", Sergio Leone pans and tilts to maintain
the intensity of Harmonica's gaze.
"- Only at the point of dying."
- Filmmakers can also zoom during the movement.
This is a favorite technique of Robert Altman.
In this shot from "Nashville", the camera zooms out to emphasize the expanse of
the junkyard while panning and tilting to keep Opal in the same area of the frame.
"- I'm reminded of...
of an elephant's secret burial ground."
- Framing is crucial when considering how to pan or tilt,
and so is blocking and staging.
Blocking refers to actors movement, or lack thereof, in a scene.
Staging refers to the camera's placement in relation to the actors.
Both elements can affect how a pan or tilt will be executed and perceived.
For example, movement may be synchronized with a subject's blocking.
In this scene from "Possession", the camera dollies, tilts, and
pans with Anna, mirroring her wild and out-of-control movements.
In "Beau Travail's" training sequence, Claire Denis moves the camera in
concert with the characters, tilting up and down, and panning back and forth.
These repetitive movements forefront both the monotony and
the difficulty of the exercises.
In this moment from "Ran", Akira Kurosawa pans across multiple planes of action.
Horsemen fly by in the foreground while the camera follows the
foot soldiers in the background.
By following their movement with the camera, Kurosawa adds an extra layer of
momentum that a static camera would lack.
The camera's positioning too is important.
Panning or tilting while the camera is moving can make it seem like
the camera is soaring through a scene, as it does in "Donnie Darko".
Here, the camera guides us through the busy school
hallways using dollies and pans.
Director Richard Kelly explains the effect of the movement.
'We choreograph Steadicam's sequences to songs.
They're part of the blueprint for the movie.
I like to create moments of lyricism because it adds a
magical element to the narrative'.
Low-angle pivots meanwhile can give shots an epic quality.
"Gladiator" uses a low-angle pan to illustrate the power of the massive crowd.
This tilt from "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone" begins at a high angle.
And ends as a low-angle of Hogwarts.
By craning down through the tilt, the students are dwarfed
by the majesty of the school.
An eye-level pan, meanwhile, can highlight a character's point of view.
In "Eight and a Half", a pan is directed by Guido shifting attention.
A high-angle pan or tilt are often used to clearly lay out a location.
This pan from "Me and Earl and The Dying Girl" gives us a bird's eye
view of the bustling high school.
In "Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol", a high-angle tilt with a push in
emphasizes the height of the Burj Khalifa.
This will become important later on, and Brad Bird uses a high
angle tilt to make the point again.
"- I'm telling you, we can get to it from outside. - We?
- I'm... I'm on a computer."
- Don't underestimate a simple camera movement.
Whether it's to establish a location, reveal information, follow movement,
or something else entirely, panning or tilting can make a good shot great.
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