Continuity Editing

Continuity editing is an editing technique that shows continuous action within a scene and making it appear natural.  It is also referred to as 'invisible' editing.


We were given a task to create a scene showing continuity editing.  Within this scene we had to include the following things:

- A person crossing a room
- Two people having a conversation
- A person opening a door

The scene begins with a wide shot, showing two people sitting opposite each other as the brief instructed.  They exchange a few lines of dialogue, using shot-reverse-shot between them, one of the invisible editing techniques.  This also keeps to the 180-degree rule.

After a shoot out, the remaining character stands and picks up the bag, as shown by the seamless cut from an over the shoulder shot to a wide shot.

The character then walks across the room, opening a door and walking out into the corridor.  The opening of the door and stepping out demonstrates the match on action, making the two separate parts seem like one fluent motion.

The fluent movement continues as the character walks towards the camera and out of shot, cutting to a wide shot of the corridor as the character walks down it, away from the camera.  As he walks, it fades to black to end the scene.