CONTINUITY

The Battleship of Kung Fu Masters

Synopsis

Brandon and Greenie are going to have a Kung Fu battle at a park. They are fighting with each other with their own tricks. They resorted the Chinese Zodiac, 12 animals including rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, goat, monkey, rooster, dog and pig. Suddenly, a woman, Angeline, which is Brandon's wife, comes to the park and takes Brandon away. She takes Brandon back to their home while pulling Brandon's ear all along the journey.

Discussion

Continuity is used when combining many different shots together, yet the film could flow naturally. Continuity is mainly depending on the editing techniques. There are some rules that should be applied and putting in together in order to achieve continuity.

180 degree rule is where the camera is not allowed to place over the 180 degree line. If it is over, then it will be considered as crossed the line. However, the line can always be changed by introducing neutral shots, the character can also move around to change the line.

The continuity created in the video is about time, space and action. The time is set consistently as it happens around 6pm in the garden. The two characters are fighting in the environment of warm tone. The shots are all in same color to show that everything is happening in a short period of time. Space is used as the characters are placed in the frame using the rule of third. In the video, the same location and same angle, also show the continuity of the visual. 

Editing is very important in showing continuity of a film. Different cuts are used as in motion cut to motion to show the consistency of the images through editing, to create the natural continuity.

In the video, 180 degree rule is used. To look more interesting, we used several shots to present the Kung Fu battle. First, a long shot as the establishing shot.

The long shot is the very first and the most durable shot in this video.

Next, there's a close up of Brandon's hand, which does not cross the imaginary line.

Eyeline match is basically showing how a person's eyeline can link to another person or something. But here, the hand of Brandon also created the eyeline match. This shot not only fulfilled the 180 degree rule, but also create a eyeline match for the audience, to make them wonder what he is pointing at. The next shot is revealing the person that his hand is pointing at, which is shown in the picture below. This shot is shot right in front of Greenie's face, so this shot is a neutral shot which lands right on the line.

The effect of eyeline match can be created by editing. If after Brandon's hand's close up, the following shot is showing Brandon himself, the visual will be weird and then ruin the continuity. Next, Brandon's hand also shows continuity in the video. In the next shot, Brandon's hand movement is changing from pointing to another movement.

From here, the shot will cut to a close up of Brandon's face.

From here, Brandon's gesture can be seen as the same with previous shot even when the shots are different. Because of editing technique, the exact point of his movement in the close up shot is chosen to allow smooth continuity of his hand's movement from previous shot. Next shot is a medium shot to show Greenie's reaction to Brandon's provocation.

From here, we can see that Greenie's action is same with the action from the medium shot above, which shows the continuity during the changes of shots.

The next continuity shown in the short video is from the shot below, when Brandon's right leg is going to touch the ground, and the next shot, which is the close up of his foot.

From here, it can be clearly seen that this is Brandon's right foot stepped on the ground. Besides, the moment when his foot is stepping on the ground, the sound effect is also enhancing the sense of power.

Greenie's movement and facial expression is syncing with the small screen at the right bottom from Snapchat application.

Here is another close up for a woman's feet. This will make audiences curious about who is this person with a purple rubber shoe while not revealing the face.

Next will be the establishing shot, to show that the place is a resident area, with road, cars and houses. The camera is standstill, Brandon and the woman is slowly walking into the scene.

There are shots that shoot on different days and with different whether, so the color of the shots are different. This also need to create continuity with editing technique, to make the footages that shoot from two different days to look like happened on the same day.

Conclusion

In our opinion, continuity is challenging in both shooting and editing stages. If the shots taken are lacking in continuity, it'll be hard to achieve continuity through editing too. The continuity rules are important in creating good visuals as well. Hence, we should follow the rules to achieve continuity.