overcomposed

en-adj

overcomposed (comparative more overcomposed, superlative most overcomposed)

more overcomposed (comparative)
most overcomposed (superlative)

Mr. Berlinger added that there is a risk in documentaries that are overcomposed.

2015 June 26, Ben Kenigsberg, “Documentary Filmmakers Talk About Manipulation in Their Work”, in New York Times:

(film) Having undergone too much composition or arrangement; excessively posed, to the point of seeming artificial.


said-bookism

From The Said Book + -ism; coined by James Blish, writing under the pen name William Atheling Jr., after The Said Book, the title of a booklet for aspiring writers listing countless alternatives to the word “said” in writing dialogue.

Jim Blish once dedicated a book to me. He introduced me to the music of Charles Ives, to the taste of Vander Flip, to the urgency of avoiding the said-bookism, to the concept of the watershed, to the pleasures of Indo-Ceylonese food.

1980, Harlan Ellison, Shatterday, Houghton Mifflin, Dedication

(authorship, rare) A verb (such as "explained", "shouted", or "uttered") used to indicate dialogue when writing fiction, chosen so as to avoid using the word "said".

(authorship, uncountable) The studious avoidance, in writing dialogue, of the word "said".


stage combat

(film, theater) The art of arranging, designing or performing sequences of simulated fighting, especially in theatrical productions.


fight choreography

(film, theater) The art of arranging and designing sequences of staged combats, such as for use in theatre or film productions.


PLF

(film) Initialism of premium large format (large-format screens similar to IMAX)


precolor

They also bring to mind stylish movie sets in precolor Hollywood; Fred and Ginger or a phalanx of Busby Berkeley dancers could easily drift among their mirrored, ethereal forms.

2009 June 19, The New York Times, “Art in Review”, in New York Times:

(film) Before the advent of color film, and thus presented in black and white.


starry eyes

(chiefly anime and manga) Eyes with exaggerated starry highlights, with an expression of wonder or delight.


bumper music

(broadcasting) short clips of signature or theme music used to buffer transitions between programming elements of the radio broadcast


shota

en-noun

shota (usually uncountable, plural shotas)

From Japanese ショタ (shota) or a clipping of shotacon.

(uncountable, anime) Hentai anime or manga, or other Japanese-inspired erotic art featuring young, usually prepubescent boys.

(countable, anime) A fictional young boy character, especially one featured in such material. Typically drawn with exaggerated or stylised cute features.


bottle episode

/ˈbɒtəl ˈɛpɪsəʊd/

Said to be from the term “ship-in-a-bottle episode”, the nickname given by the cast and crew of the television series Star Trek (originally broadcast 1966–1969) to an episode set entirely on board the starship USS Enterprise.

That's pretty much what a "bottle" episode is; one that uses minimal sets, guest stars, effects, etc, and/or uses lots of clips from past episodes, in order to make a much cheaper episode.

1996 February 12, Janet A. Dornhoff, “What are they filming now?”, in alt.tv.forever-knight (Usenet), message-ID <4fno37$t28@vixen.cso.uiuc.edu>:

One of Wright's great strengths as a screenwriter and producer is his ability to design bottle episodes—shows filmed with the goal of saving money—and turn them into riveting, compelling dramas where the viewer forgets that they are watching a bottle show.

1998, Cinefantastique, volume 30, Oak Park, Ill.: Frederick S. Clarke, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 82:

Even though they are moving, for large stretches 'Spiral' is a bottle episode.

2004, Roz Kaveney, “Writing the Vampire Slayer: Interviews with Jane Espenson and Steven S. DeKnight”, in Roz Kaveney, editor, Reading the Vampire Slayer: The New, Updated, Unofficial Guide to Buffy and Angel, 2nd revised and expanded edition, New York, N.Y.: Tauris Parke Paperbacks, I.B. Tauris, →ISBN, page 125:

By the 2000s, the airwaves seemed full of shows not just making reference to other pop culture "images," but wholly based on pop culture. [...] Community regularly turned episodes into extended homages to M*A*S*H, Doctor Who, and Christmas Claymation specials. In "Cooperative Calligraphy," the show presents a "bottle episode," during which Abed repeatedly reminds everyone they are in a "bottle episode," pointing out each characteristic of such episodes as it occurs.

2018, M. King Adkins, “‘These are Their Stories’: Postmodern Spaces”, in Television Storyworlds as Virtual Space, Lanham, Md.: Lexington Books, Rowman & Littlefield, →ISBN, page 122:

(originally US, television) An episode of a television series designed to be inexpensive and restricted in its use of sets, effects, cast members, etc.


triniscope

Originally the proprietary name for a system developed by RCA. See tri- (“three”), and -scope.

(television, historical) An early color television system using three separate video tubes with colored phosphors producing the primary colors, combining the images through dichroic mirrors onto a screen for viewing.


flopover

flopover (countable and uncountable, plural flopovers)

Now you have mirror-clear TV without picture flopover, jitter, tear!

1956, LIFE, volume 41, number 11, page 41:

(television) A form of television signal distortion where the displayed image appears to scroll vertically rather than remaining still.


lip flap

lip flap (countable and uncountable, plural lip flaps)

(film) A failure in audio-video synchronization, so that an actor's lips move but no sound is heard.

[…] pick it up earlier or later where there is no lip-flap. But if you must take it there, then you must precede it with another shot of the same speaker at a different angle, hopefully closer.

1972, Filmmakers Newsletter, volume 5, number 7, part 12, page 46:

“So when we translate,” Lam was saying, “it's all about what we call lip flaps. Like, how many times does mouth move? We match translation more to mouth than to what words really mean.

2009, Shawn Klomparens, Two Years, No Rain, page 49:

For the dubbed version, we would start with this translated script and then work to create a new script, which would closely match the lip flaps and intonations of the character onscreen

2010, Josef Steiff, Tristan D. Tamplin, Anime and Philosophy: Wide Eyed Wonder:

(film) A movement of an actor's lips, which is to be matched as closely as possible in a dubbed version of the film.


kidcom

(informal, television) A sitcom designed for children.


tone meeting

The final aspect to completing your preparation [as a director] is the tone meeting with the showrunner. (...) Generally, the two of you go through the script, scene by scene (...).

2013, Bethany Rooney, Mary Lou Belli, Directors Tell the Story: Master the Craft of Television and Film Directing, →ISBN, page 73:

These particular meetings are called tone meetings and require the showrunner meet with every new director hired. The idea is to go over what the episode will look like and how it will fit in with the rest of the season.

2016 January 5, Julia Alexander, “Former Walking Dead showrunner slams AMC in new testimony”, in Polygon:

(television) A meeting between the showrunner of a television series and the director to discuss an episode that is to be produced.


pattern budget

The main order of business will be to discuss how to meet the requirements of the script that are beyond the pattern budget, which is the cost of a typical episode. The pattern will dictate what the usual demands are […]

2013, Bethany Rooney, Mary Lou Belli, Directors Tell the Story: Master the Craft of Television and Film Directing, →ISBN, page 68:

(television) The cost of producing a typical episode of a television series.


writers' room

The showrunner ist the ringmaster for the writers' room—the final authority. There is some form of a whiteboard on the walls of the room, where the plots for future episodes are outlined.

2013, Bethany Rooney, Mary Lou Belli, Directors Tell the Story: Master the Craft of Television and Film Directing, →ISBN, page 66:

(television) The room in which the showrunner and the writers of a television series collaborate on the plot and develop the script.


superregeneration

(radio) The superregenerative technique.


shortform

a shortform article; a shortform news broadcast

(journalism, broadcasting) Relatively short and punchy, lacking detail or in-depth analysis.


longform

a longform article; a longform news broadcast

(journalism, broadcasting) Longer and more detailed than is normal.


digislate

A DigiSlate is a clapperboard with the ingenious addition of a digital timecode display (hours : minutes : seconds : frames).

2003, Chris Jones, Guerilla Film Makers Movie Blueprint, page 318:

A DigiSlate can be set to display either SMPTE or internal (real time) time code.

2010, Richard W. Kroon, A/V A to Z: An Encyclopedic Dictionary of Media, Entertainment and Other Audiovisual Terms, page 207:

(film) A clapperboard with a digital display.


newstalk

"The most obvious and basic expansion of media talk has come with the general boom in newstalk and news magazine programs on both radio and TV."

2014, Peter Gibian, Mass Culture and Everyday Life:

(broadcasting) A television or radio programme in which host conversation with guests or audience members is mixed with news programming.


retroscripting

(film, television) The technique of preparing a plot but leaving the actors to improvise their own dialogue.


standard definition

Coordinate term: high definition

high-definition television
high-definition television

(television) A system that uses a resolution that is not considered to be either high-definition television (720p, 1080i, 1080p, 1440p, 4K UHDTV, and 8K UHD) or enhanced-definition television (EDTV 480p).


local time

local time (countable and uncountable, plural local times)


Dynamation

(film, historical) A stop-motion technique involving animated models integrated into live-action scenes.


practical effect

practical effect (plural practical effects)

(film) A special effect produced physically, without computer-generated imagery or other postproduction techniques.


one shot

When composing a one shot, the subject should usually be centered in the frame.

1998, Jerry Martin, Active Video: A Teaching Tool for Every Classroom, →ISBN, page 19:

Close ups are often one shots, which means that close-up one shots often come at the high points of scenes.

2011, Dennis J. Packard, The Film Novelist: Writing a Screenplay and Short Novel in 15 Weeks, →ISBN, page 19:

(film) A camera shot that focuses on a single subject.


DCT

DCT (countable and uncountable, plural DCTs)

digital component tape
digital component tape#English

(television) Abbreviation of digital component tape.


spot effect

(cinematography) A sound effect representing a single discrete event, such as breaking glass, as opposed to ongoing background sounds.


Shatnerize

en-verb

Shatnerize (third-person singular simple present Shatnerizes, present participle Shatnerizing, simple past and past participle Shatnerized)

Shatnerizes (present singular third-person)
Shatnerizing (participle present)
Shatnerized (participle past)
Shatnerized (past)

From Shatner + -ize, after the Canadian actor, author, producer, and director William "Bill" Shatner.

(rare, slang, chiefly film) To intentionally produce something that is perceived as both bad and good.


telop

A genericization of the trademark TELOP; an acronym of television opaque projector.

A telop can be made simply by printing on a 4 × 5 cardboard, or by making a mat print from a 35mm negative.

1969, Herbert Zettl, Television Production Handbook, 2nd edition, Wadsworth Publishing, page 259:

(television) A text or image superimposed on a television screen.


ROT

(broadcasting) Initialism of record of transmission.


chicksploitation

From chick + -sploitation (from exploitation film).

The chicksploitation image of Nobu Kitamura's Hysteric Glamour seems to have evolved from hazy stoner dreams of rock 'n' roll groupies.

2007, Tiffany Godoy, Style Deficit Disorder: Harajuku Street Fashion - Tokyo:

(film, rare) A genre of exploitation films starring attractive young women.


crimance

I like the way Brant herself describes the book as crimance... a perfect genre description.

2003, Lucinda Brant, Deadly Engagement: A Georgian Historical Mystery:


mysterama

Owen Wilson is fantastic in this mysterama-crime flick.

1999, “The Minus Man (1999)”, in The Movie Crew:

This mysterama about two cops and a serial killer in a small Texan town would be a fantastic made-for-TV film but it's missing a feature-film story.

2012 February 27, “New In Movies This Week”, in My.McKinley.com:


thrillmance

/ˈθɹɪlˌmæns/

Psycho-logic, an eight minute Hitchcock-type part-thriller-part-love story (which we’ve dubbed ‘thrillmance’), tells the story of a young woman finding her ultimate fantasy at the new Hollywood Louboutin store, and sees the supreme shoe sire make a cameo appearance alongside Elisa Sednaoui.

2009 September 28, “Christian Louboutin, film director?”, in – My Fashion Life:

This film is a romance, suspense and thriller all rolled into one. A thrillmance!

2013 February 19, “Film Review – Safe Haven”, in 4 Manchester Women:

(informal, film, rare, neologism) romantic thriller


dramystery

Fans of last season’s intricate plot twists certainly won’t be disappointed with the Season 2 opener of FX’s legal dramystery (yes, that’s what I said).

2009 January 5, Steve 'Frosty' Weintraub, “DAMAGES Season 2 Review - FX”, in Collider:

Perhaps it won’t be long until we will hear that Witherspoon or Reynolds is doing a movie, and we’ll immediately think, “Probably another silent existentialistic docu-dramystery!”

2012 February 27, “Reese Witherspoon and Ryan Reynolds Team Up for Tim Burton’s ‘Big Eyes’”, in Hollywood.com:

For eight seasons Showtime brought us “Dexter” which—in its own way—defined a serial killer in a serial “dramystery.”

2013 August 5, “Death, Drugs & Drama”, in Ion Television Arizona:


TV timeout

(Canada, US, sports television) A time-out taking place during a televised sports match where the game clock is stopped for a period of time to allow for TV commercials to air before the resumption of play. The delay is usually after a whistle or other stoppage of play occurs, and not an interference with gameplay in and of itself.


break character

break character (third-person singular simple present breaks character, present participle breaking character, simple past broke character, past participle broken character)

breaks character (present singular third-person)
breaking character (participle present)
broke character (past)
broken character (participle past)

Once Lynne and I realized that Jim was going to approach the role of Kaufman in a “method acting,” Kaufmanesque kind of way—i.e., he would become Andy or Tony Clifton for the entire shoot, never breaking character […]

2014, Bob Zmuda, Lynne Margulies, Andy Kaufman: The Truth, Finally, BenBella Books, →ISBN, page 43:

(intransitive, acting) To fail to act as a certain character; to be or act out of character.


twintail

From twin + tail. Sense 2 is a calque of Japanese ツインテール (tsuintēru).

(fandom slang, chiefly anime and manga) Either of a pair of unbraided tails worn on the sides of the head; an unbraided pigtail.

(in the plural) A hairstyle with a pair of twintails; unbraided pigtails.


be a hundred years too early

head

be a hundred years too early (irregular; see conjugation of "be")

Calque of Japanese 百年早い (hyaku-nen hayai).

cal

Don't make me waste my time! You are a hundred years too early to be an opponent worthy of fighting me!

(idiomatic, anime and manga fandom slang) To be so immature and unprepared as to have no hope of achieving an accomplishment.


green band

From the green color of the horizontal bar on the cinematic rating screen at the start of the show.


red band

From the red color of the horizontal bar on the cinematic rating screen at the start of the show.


TBBT

The Big Bang Theory
w:The Big Bang Theory

(television) Initialism of The Big Bang Theory, an American television sitcom.


HIMYM

How I Met Your Mother
w:How I Met Your Mother

(television) Initialism of How I Met Your Mother, a US sitcom first aired in 2005.


below the line

(film) Who do not guide and influence the creative direction, process, and voice of a given narrative in a film, such as the boom operators, hair stylists, and location managers.

(television) Of expenses: paid for standard ongoing concerns such as insurance and technical equipment and crew.


tragic heroine

(drama) A heroine who suffers from a tragic flaw that eventually causes her downfall; a female tragic hero.


backtime

en-verb

backtime (third-person singular simple present backtimes, present participle backtiming, simple past and past participle backtimed)

backtimes (present singular third-person)
backtiming (participle present)
backtimed (participle past)
backtimed (past)

(broadcasting, transitive) To time an item according to the scheduled time of the item that will follow, cutting or padding it as necessary.


Scandi-noir

en-noun

Scandi-noir (countable and uncountable, plural Scandi-noirs)

(film, uncountable) Synonym of Nordic noir (“subgenre of film noir”).

Alternative forms: Scandi noir, Scandinoir

(film, countable) Synonym of Nordic noir (“film or show of this subgenre”).


gangsploitation

(film) A genre of exploitation films about criminal gangsters.


storyliner

(television) A person employed to write storylines.


soapumentary

(television) A reality show presenting people's lives in a sensationalistic manner across a number of episodes.


rocksploitation

(film) A genre of exploitation film that deals with the lives of rock musicians.


queersploitation

(film, rare) A genre of exploitation films dealing with queer or homosexual people.


room tone

room tone (countable and uncountable, plural room tones)

(film, sound engineering) The ambient sounds in a room or on a set.


Japanime

Japanime (countable and uncountable, plural Japanimes)

Blend of Japan (“the country”) + anime (“an animated work”)

blend

(anime, dated) Synonym of anime; Japanese animated cartoons.


telecop

OK gossip mongrels, see what you can make of these bits of scurrilous gleaning.
#1- Which young telecop isn't re-signing further series options?

1998 July 6, peeby, “**BLIND ITEM FUN**”, in aus.tv (Usenet):

The brain scooping has been occuring^([sic]) in situ. The evidence cited by the FBI woman was that that it happened in that room. When hiro finds' Isaac in the future, there's blood and stuff around him. By comparison, the telecop was drugged and taken to a laboratory where he received some not terribly invasive monitoring. Completely different modus operandi.

2006 October 18, William George Ferguson, “Re: 1st Season Heroes - Collision - 5 star poll - SPOILERS AHOY !”, in rec.arts.tv (Usenet):

As portrayed by the marvelous actor Michael Kitchen in the British series “Foyle’s War,” he is sometimes so reserved – not eerily quiet or threateningly quiet, just quiet – that he actually appears to be thinking, something few American telecops are likely to be accused of.

2009 September 25, Mike Hale, “Smarts and Stiff Upper Lip in Times of War and Murder”, in The New York Times:

(informal, television) A police officer (especially a detective) as portrayed on television.


tear-cat

Fie upon't, mere fustian; I had rather hear two good bawdy jests then a whole play of such tear-cat thunder-claps.

1606, John Day, The Isle of Gulls, in White, Thomas, editor, The Old English Drama, volume 4, published 1830, Induction, page 15:

I am cal'd by those that have seen my valour, Tear-Cat.

1611, Thomas Middleton, Thomas Dekker, The Roaring Girl, act 5, scene 1:


B roll

en-noun

B roll (usually uncountable, plural B rolls)

The Bleeding Edge isn’t an audacious or essayistic piece of filmmaking; it’s overstretched with talking-head interviews, montages of corporate videos, and creepy B-roll shots of hospital equipment.

2018 July 26, Ignatiy Vishnevetsky, “A documentary muckraker takes on the tech sector of health in The Bleeding Edge”, in The Onion AV Club, archived from the original on 2018-07-29:

(television, film) Supplemental or alternative footage intercut with the main shot, used, for example, to indicate simultaneous action or flashbacks.


continuity announcer

continuity announcer (plural continuity announcers)

(television) A television presenter, usually an unseen voice, who identifies the broadcaster and the upcoming programmes.


sound film

(cinematography) A film with sound, as opposed to a silent film

խոսուն շարժապատկեր

a film with sound, as opposed to a silent film


Marvel

(fiction, film, television) Ellipsis of Marvel Studios.


starrish

en-adj

starrish (comparative more starrish, superlative most starrish)

more starrish (comparative)
most starrish (superlative)

From Middle English sterrish, sterryssh, equivalent to star + -ish.


Stallone

en-proper noun

Stallone (countable and uncountable, plural Stallones)

First critic: […] By the way, did you hear about the new film Stallone is making? It's titled Rocky Balboa Enters a Nursing Home. Stallone plays an aging Rocky—false teeth, hearing aid, Depends.

2011, S. L. Varnado, Funny Side Up: Senior Citizen Scenarios, Bloomington, IN: iUniverse, page 115:

His dark hair was cut short, brushed forward, speckles of white adding texture, and I imagined he modelled himself on ERs George Clooney, although he looked more like Stallone—Stallone' gone wrong, if you can imagine that;[…]

2011 [2000], James Herbert, Others, Pan Macmillan:

George Cosmatos, the director of Rambo II and Cobra, has died from cancer aged 64. Apart from shooting Stallone vehicles, Cosmatos was best known for the 1993 western Tombstone, starring Kurt Russell and Val Kilmer.

2005 April 26, “In brief: Tombstone director George Cosmatos dies”, in The Guardian:

(film) used specifically of Sylvester Stallone (b. 1946), an American actor, director, screenwriter, and producer, known especially for his acting roles as boxer Rocky Balboa and soldier John Rambo.


IMAX

en-noun

IMAX (usually uncountable, plural IMAXes)

(uncountable, cinematography) A 70mm motion picture film format and set of cinema projection standards.


G-rated

(US, film) Of a motion picture, suitable for a general audience, including children.


RTK

Radio Television of Kosovo
w:Radio Television of Kosovo

(broadcasting) Initialism of Radio Television of Kosovo.


death slot

First the network bounced the series around the schedule like a beach ball, preempted it often, and then settled the show into the death slot […]

So they program shows exactly when TV networks don’t. They debut series on Fridays (considered “the death slot” in network TV) and over holidays.

2015 December 16, James Poniewozik, “Streaming TV Isn’t Just a New Way to Watch. It’s a New Genre.”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:


playworthy

en-adj

playworthy (comparative more playworthy, superlative most playworthy)

more playworthy (comparative)
most playworthy (superlative)


cabbit

(anime, manga) A fictional hybrid of a cat and a rabbit.


Craft Service

(film, television) Alternative letter-case form of craft service


craft service

Though the Craft Service Person works on set making food available to the crew and cast between meals, the Coordinator can be the one to hire this person.

1997, Debora Patz, Surviving Production: The Art of Production Management for Film and Television, page 35:

(film, television) The department that provides food to workers, especially between meals.

Usually featuring an assortment of hot and cold drinks, fresh fruit, vegetables, candy, and snacks, craft services helps keep everyone going during long production days.

2008, Jason Tomaric, The Power Filmmaking Kit, page 328:

But a day or two to hang out on a pal's set, eat craft service and bask in the schadenfreude of their best friend's production nightmares? Who wouldn't want to do that?

2016, Dan Mirvish, The Cheerful Subversive's Guide to Independent Filmmaking, pages 97–98:

(film, television) Food and drinks made available to workers during film or television production.

On "Deadwood" there is a Craft Service guy who cleans up after the horses. [...] Now that's not the same guy who makes your sandwiches, but still it's a Craft Service person who specializes in keeping the set clean.

2009, Paul Salamoff, On the Set: The Hidden Rules of Movie Making Etiquette, page sn:

(film, television) The department that provides miscellaneous general services on the set.


match moving

(cinematography, computer graphics) A technique that allows the insertion of computer graphics into live-action footage with correct position, scale, orientation, and motion relative to the photographed objects in the shot.


anticinematic

anticinematic (comparative more anticinematic, superlative most anticinematic)

more anticinematic (comparative)
most anticinematic (superlative)


undirectable

undirectable (comparative more undirectable, superlative most undirectable)

more undirectable (comparative)
most undirectable (superlative)


channel-hop

(television) The act of changing the channel on a television

(television) The act of a programme changing from one channel to another


vanity card

(television) A production logo briefly shown at the beginning or end of a show.


MSNBC

An initialism from the names of its founders, Microsoft and the National Broadcasting Company.

(television) An American news-based television channel and website.


shadow mask

(television) A plate punched with tiny holes that separate the coloured phosphors in the layer behind the front glass of the screen. Three electron guns at the back of the screen sweep across the mask, with the beams only reaching the screen if they pass through the holes.


TRF

(radio) Initialism of tuned radio frequency.


in the can

(film, of a take) Having been shot and stored in a film can, or at the equivalent stage for a digital take.


step on

en-verb

step on (third-person singular simple present steps on, present participle stepping on, simple past and past participle stepped on)

steps on (present singular third-person)
stepping on (participle present)
stepped on (participle past)
stepped on (past)

(radio communications, transitive) To interrupt, overpower, or override (another transmission on the same frequency) with one's own transmission.


admag

The admag was unique to Britain, and there was a kind of backdoor bravado about them in the way every admag transmission cheekily bumped up the amount of advertising per clock hour.

1980, Jo Gable, The Tuppenny Punch and Judy Show: 25 Years of TV Commercials, page 74:

This particular admag focused on a married couple who ran a pub in the fictional village of Wembleham, and they would discuss the price and quality of various real consumer products with their customers.

2007, Rob Turnock, Television and Consumer Culture: Britain and the Transformation of Modernity, page 145:

[…] ABC operated under the same advertising structures as the BBC when it came to programme material – the parameters of which had been tested by the controversy surrounding the advertising magazine, or 'admag'.

2007, Su Holmes, "A friendly style of presentation which the BBC has always found elusive?", published in Re-viewing Television History: Critical Issues in Television Historiography, page 75

(UK, television, dated) A television programme in which actors advertise real products in a fictional setting.


top billing

en-noun

top billing (usually uncountable, plural top billings)

She had top billing on the past three films.

(theater, film) The most prominent name on lists of cast and crew, or in advertising.


VOP

Voice of the People
w:Radio Voice of the People

(broadcasting) Initialism of Voice of the People, a Zimbabwe radio station.


MTS

multichannel television sound
multichannel television sound#English

(television) Initialism of multichannel television sound. (a standard for encoding additional audio channels within an NTSC signal)


camera rehearsal

camera rehearsal (plural camera rehearsals)

(cinematography) A filmed rehearsal of a televised scene


golden hour

(television) In Japanese television, the period between 7 and 9 pm, the equivalent of the American prime time.

Goodbye 'golden hours': As pressure mounts for ITV to set its house in order, Andrew Dickson explains the nature of its restrictive practices and what lies at stake if the unions refuse to make concessions.

1988, The Listener, volume 119, page 14:

'Golden hours' were introduced nationally in 1972, ostensibly to protect staff from having to work unsocial hours and to compensate them for 'grief' if required to do so. Formerly those working after midnight could claim three times the normal rate; […]

2016, Jeremy Potter, Independent Television in Britain, volume 4, page 23:

(television, in the plural) Hours worked outside of normal working hours, for which additional money is paid.


shotlist

The shotlist should be short — if you find yourself typing up more than one page per scene, you're not really getting the hang of it. Use common terminology whenever possible. From the shotlist, the DP can figure out, to some extent, how many lighting changes each scene will require.

2013, Arthur Vincie, Preparing for Takeoff: Preproduction for the Independent Filmmaker:

(film) A detailed list of all the shots required for a film.


docucomedy

(film, television) A comedy presented as though it were a documentary.


eyeline

They realise that trajectories, space expansion and crushing are different with different lenses, whether wide angle or telephoto, and that actors' eyelines will be altered.

2010, Birgit Bräuchler, John Postill, Theorising Media and Practice, page 319:

Jake: Really? Well, I still chose you.
Paula: Why? Because I happened to be in your eye line?

2015, Leslye Headland, Sleeping with Other People:

(cinematography) The direction in which an actor is looking.


ATWT

(television) Initialism of As the World Turns, an American television soap opera aired between 1956 and 2010.


prefade

en-verb

prefade (third-person singular simple present prefades, present participle prefading, simple past and past participle prefaded)

prefades (present singular third-person)
prefading (participle present)
prefaded (participle past)
prefaded (past)

(broadcasting, transitive) To fade (an audio track) before it is broadcast, by listening in advance.


prefade

(broadcasting) An audio fade prepared before broadcast.


oil opera

The oil operas pretty much do away with questions of social conscience. There are no moral values as such, only instrumental values which either work or don't work in advancing one to still greater heights of wealth and corporate power.

1992, Michael Parenti, “Affluent Class and Corporate Brass”, in Make-Believe Media, St. Martin’s Press, Inc., →ISBN, page 100:

(rare, television) An amoral drama focussing on corporate and domestic struggles, the lead character being a businessman (or businesswoman) fixated on pursuing a resource by any means necessary.


hagsploitation

All these aforementioned films confirm that the genre still has cinematic potential. Obviously, the emergence of this "new school" of hagsploitation does not collide with the underground popularity of the retro hag movies.

2014, Justyna Stępień, Redefining Kitsch and Camp in Literature and Culture, →ISBN, page 50:

This expressive, challenging and ambiguous over-production of the affectively, abundantly feminine is a characteristic of hagsploitation, which overlaps the seemingly barren and excluded with outright excess.

2017, Erin Harrington, Women, Monstrosity and Horror Film: Gynaehorror, →ISBN:

Crawford’s replacement in Sweet Charlotte was 48-year-old Olivia de Havilland, who had already been terrorised by home invaders in the surprisingly vicious Lady in a Cage (1964), though her career low point was probably being stung to death by killer bees in The Swarm (1978) as disaster movies replaced hagsploitation as the last refuge of the fading Hollywood star.

2018 January 18, Anne Billson, “'Hagsploitation': horror's obsession with older women returns”, in The Guardian:

(film) A subgenre of horror/thriller that features a formerly-glamorous older actress who plays an insane woman who terrorizes those around her.


AFRA

An upcoming problem to be thrashed out at a meeting of diskery reps and execs of the American Federation of Radio Artists (AFRA), is the degree of AFRA's jurisdictional claim over singers on records. AFRA has claimed the jurisdiction generally, and for some months has been having exploratory talks with diskeries.

1950 October 28, “Diskers, AFRA Puzzle Singer Jurisdictions”, in Billboard, page 13:

American Federation of Radio Artists
w:American Federation of Radio Artists

(historical, radio) Initialism of American Federation of Radio Artists.


quota quickie

(slang, film, historical) A typically low-cost, low-quality film commissioned to satisfy the quota requirements of the Cinematograph Films Act 1927.


cucoloris

Unknown; a connection with American film director George Cukor has been suggested. Compare also dialectal German Kokolores (“nonsense, silly display”).

(television, film) A device for casting shadows or silhouettes to produce patterned illumination.


S&P

standards and practices
standards and practices#English

(US, television) Initialism of standards and practices.


She is a 2.5D actress.

(theater, drama) Of, belonging or relating to 2.5D musicals, a type of modern Japanese musical theater production which adapts stories originally presented in a two-dimensional medium (anime, manga, or video games).


BBG

Donald Trump intends to nominate Michael Pack, a controversial ally of Steve Bannon, as the next head of the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), according to a recent statement by the White House. […] BBG has sometimes been accused of being a propaganda outlet; perhaps because some of the networks it manages were set up for precisely that purpose.

2018 June 6, Arwa Mahdawi, “Michael Pack: the Bannon ally critics fear will become Trump's global propagandist”, in The Guardian:

Broadcasting Board of Governors
w:Broadcasting Board of Governors

(US, broadcasting) Initialism of Broadcasting Board of Governors.


mystery guest

Guess who will be our mystery guest this week.

On this show the celebrity guest came out dressed in a costume that hid his or her identity. Based on the costume the panel asked questions until they figured out the identity of the guest. The mystery guest in this sentence is dressed as Cap'n Andy, the captain in Jerome Kern's classic Show Boat, and the set was the deck of a paddle-wheel steamer.

2009, William Shatner, Up Till Now, Pan Macmillan, →ISBN, page 158:

(television) A guest star whose identity is kept secret.


voice wrap

For example, one radio bulletin may feature one central issue, like a state election, and will focus on that issue. The bulletin might contain only a few voice wraps but many grabs, leaving the focus firmly on the newsreader.

2008, Melissa Agnew, Here is the (Australian) News:

A voice-actuality report is constructed in the manner of a voice wrap, the editing and production structure explained in Chapter 5.

2015, Carl Hausman, Frank Messere, Philip Benoit, Modern Radio and Audio Production: Programming and Performance:

(radio) A spoken segment by a single narrator that surrounds other material.


scenarise

scenarise (third-person singular simple present scenarises, present participle scenarising, simple past and past participle scenarised)

scenarises (present singular third-person)
scenarising (participle present)
scenarised (participle past)
scenarised (past)

On the basis of an exceptionally interesting story, skilfully scenarised by Eliot Stannard, Frank Crane has built a photo-play in which humour, tragedy, and romance blend exquisitely.

1922, Motion Picture Studio - Volume 1, Issues 31-52, page 21:

Directed by Joseph de Grasse from a Harvey Gates story scenarised by Ida May Park (Mrs. de Grasse), Hell Morgan's Girl presented Chaney in the role of Sleter Noble, a tough but sexy politician gang leader of San Francisco's Barbary Coast.

1976, DeWitt Bodeen, From Hollywood: The Careers of 15 Great American Stars, page 212:

In fact, Spencer Williams was maligned by the studios, forcing the Pittsburgh Courier to express it's disapproval of such practices by stating, 'Spencer Williams is said to have lost a golden opportunity at Christie Studios by kicking too soon for screen credit for pictures he claims to have helped scenarise. He is said to have forgotten that we have to abide our time.'

1997, Film History - Volume 9, page 105:

(film, theater) To create the physical set and staging for a film or play.


toddlercon

From toddler + -con (“abnormal sexual attraction”).

suf

(anime) Japanese-inspired erotic or suggestive art depicting very young children, of toddler age.


honey shot

(television) A shot of an attractive woman in the audience of a sporting event etc.


tear-mouth

You grow rich, do you, and purchase, you twopenny tear-mouth?

1601, Ben Jonson, Poetaster, act 3, scene 1:

How would you, or how do you think I should, relish being the object of such a letter as Kean wrote t'other day to a poor author, who, though a pedantic blockhead, had at least the right to be treated as a gentleman by a copper-laced two-penny tearmouth, rendered mad by conceit and success?

1819 April 5, Sir Walter Scott, [Letter to Robert Southey]:


talkover

en-noun

talkover (countable and uncountable, plural talkovers)

(film, radio, television, broadcasting) An instance of commentary or narration in a broadcast, film, piece of performed music, etc.


makeup call

The director scheduled the makeup call for 30 minutes before the play started.

The model had to rush to get to her 8:30 makeup call.

(acting, modeling) A verbal or written request, or a scheduled time, for actors or models to be available for the application of cosmetics, hairstyling, etc. prior to a performance or photography session.


jockless

Then CBS fired them outright this summer as part of a national purge. The station now features a bland, jockless eighties-heavy playlist.

2006, Chicago, volume 55, numbers 10-12, page 30:

Unfortunately, there is now a trend for large station conglomerates to run “jockless” stations—music preprogrammed and run by computer with only a single person providing station-imaging announcements.

2006, Marjorie Eberts, Careers for Culture Lovers & Other Artsy Types, page 85:

When a station voice-tracks or employs a jukebox format like Jack or Bob or John or any of the dozen or so jockless formats now popular in the industry, it strips the one thing that radio has over the alternative digital formats... it strips away the personality.

2014, John Allen HEndricks, Keith's Radio Station: Broadcast, Satellite, and Internet:

(radio) Without a live disc jockey or host.


dialogue tag

Not every paragraph of dialogue needs to have a dialogue tag attached to it.

Sometimes inexperienced writers will discover the useful tool of tacking on detail to a dialog tag with a present participal or adverbial phrase: "It's too late," she said, closing the door.

2000, Tom Romano, Blending Genre, Altering Style: Writing Multigenre Papers, →ISBN, page 63:

A dialogue tag has to indicate sound

2004, Leslie Wainger, Writing a Romance Novel For Dummies, John Wiley & Sons:

An alternative style forsakes italics altogether and assigns a dialogue tag: This is going nowhere, he thought.

2011, Deborah Halverson, Writing Young Adult Fiction For Dummies, John Wiley & Sons:

A line of dialogue followed by a dialogue tag looks like this: “Nothing suits me better than a fried egg on toast early in the morning,” Billy said.

2015, Kris James with Laura E. Koons and Stefanie Spangler Buswell, Beyond the Style Manual: Bundle #1, Red Adept Publishing:

(narratology, authorship) A sentence part that attributes a piece of written dialogue to its speaker. (e.g. In "Get out of here," he said, "he said" is a dialogue tag.)


A-story

(authorship) The main plot in a story, especially a television show.


narrative hook

(authorship) A highly exciting opening to a book intended to peak a reader's interest.


radioplay

(authorship) A script for a story to be produced as a radio show, such as a radio drama.


self-edit

en-verb

self-edit (third-person singular simple present self-edits, present participle self-editing, simple past and past participle self-edited)

self-edits (present singular third-person)
self-editing (participle present)
self-edited (participle past)
self-edited (past)

(authorship) To edit one's own writing while it is being written.


camera shot

(cinematography) Any technique to film images at particular angles, distances, etc, such as close-up or long shot.


content mill

Coordinate term: paper mill

The crux of the hostile narrative was that Demand Media was a “content mill.” An article in Wired magazine actually triggered the drama by comparing Demand Media's system to Henry Ford's production line for cars in the early twentieth century.

2011, Peter Guber, Tell to Win, Profile Books, →ISBN, page 72:

Think of the content mill as a modern-day literary sweatshop—writers hunkering down at hot keyboards, plowing away at 3,000 word articles for, literally, pennies. Content mills were born because someone figured out that by targeting popular search result terms, they could commission an army of crappy posts catering to these terms and dominate Google's results.

2015, Zachary Petit, The Essential Guide to Freelance Writing, Penguin, →ISBN:

One night in early 2019, Magana and Alvarado went to a party at a gaudy, largely unfurnished Los Angeles mansion, the sort of place rented by packs of influencers to use as content mills.

2023 October 19, Brendan I. Koerner, “Watch This Guy Work, and You’ll Finally Understand the TikTok Era”, in Wired, →ISSN:

(Internet, authorship) Synonym of content farm


book tour

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-book tour.wav

(authorship) A series of public events performed by authors in order to promote a newly-released book, including book signings, media appearances, etc.


expository lump

en-noun

expository lump (plural expository lumps)

(authorship) A portion of a story that contains an excessive amount of exposition.


page-one rewrite

page-one rewrite (plural page-one rewrites)

(authorship) A complete rewrite from the beginning, most commonly of a screenplay.


earn out

en-verb

earn out (third-person singular simple present earns out, present participle earning out, simple past and past participle earned out or earnt out)

earns out (present singular third-person)
earning out (participle present)
earned out (participle past)
earned out (past)
earnt out (participle past)
earnt out (past)

Until the total of advances in that contract has been earned out by royalties from any or all books in that contract, the author will not receive additional royalties.

2014, Richard Curtis, Mastering the Business of Writing:

(authorship) To make more money from a book than it cost to run an advertising campaign for it; to make enough in royalties to cover the advance a book received.


splice edit

(film) An edit in which lengths of film are cut and then spliced together.


yes and

yes and (third-person singular simple present yes ands, present participle yes anding, simple past and past participle yes anded)

yes ands (present singular third-person)
yes anding (participle present)
yes anded (participle past)
yes anded (past)

From a well-known rule in improv acting, wherein improvised lines must (figuratively) be answered with yes and... in order to continue the scene.

If Lord Buckley made standup courageous, then Lenny Bruce “yes anded” that and ushered in standup for a new age

2011, Margaret Hicks, Chicago Comedy: A Fairly Serious History:

(acting) To go along with what is offered, especially in a performative context, and to accept and expand upon it; to go with the flow; to take it in stride.


colorburst

(television) A generated video signal used to keep the chrominance subcarrier synchronized in a color television signal.


wetdown

Water trucks needed for wetdowns are used often. Camera cranes and scissor lifts used to lift a camera and one or more operators high above the ground are also frequently requested.

1990, Michael Horwin, Careers in Film and Video Production, page 70:

That confidence will buy you a lot of good will when you ask them all for finishing funds because you blew your production budget on a Luma crane and a wetdown for Hollywood Boulevard.

2016, Dan Mirvish, The Cheerful Subversive's Guide to Independent Filmmaking, Taylor & Francis, →ISBN, page 38:

(film) The application of water to objects and surfaces on a film set, for example when shooting a rainy scene during dry weather.


subfeed

(television) A customised or selected part of a video feed.


bridge bunny

(television, science fiction, slang) An attractive female character who serves on the bridge of a spaceship on a science-fiction television show, as eye candy.


push-in

The smaller frame means that Hill uses a lot of tight one-shots, mixed in with more expressive images like an endless sea of skaters fleeing from cops or a slow push-in on Stevie and Ian having an uncomfortable conversation while playing video games on their couch.

15 October 2018, Jesse Hassenger, AV Club Jonah Hill makes his auspicious if uneven filmmaking debut with a Mid90s nostalgia triphttps://web.archive.org/web/20181015200214/https://film.avclub.com/jonah-hill-makes-his-auspicious-if-uneven-filmmaking-de-1829744755

(cinematography) Alternative form of push in


BBT

(television) Initialism of Big Bang Theory, a US sitcom first aired in 2007.


channel drift

(television) The gradual shift of a television network away from its original programming in order to target a broader or more profitable audience.


westernish

en-adj

westernish (comparative more westernish, superlative most westernish)

more westernish (comparative)
most westernish (superlative)

It was a westernish film, but with robots instead of cowboys.

(informal, film) Characteristic of the western genre of action films.


iris shot

(film) The use of an expanding or contracting black circle to open or close a cinematic scene.


full service

(radio) A radio format having a mix of music with locally-produced programming and segments focusing on local issues.


Kuleshov effect

en-noun

Kuleshov effect (plural Kuleshov effects)

Demonstrated by Soviet film-maker Lev Kuleshov in the 1910s and 1920s.

(film) A mental phenomenon by which viewers derive more meaning from the interaction of two sequential shots than from a single shot in isolation.


wild track

(television) A soundtrack that is not synchronized with the visuals and may be inserted at any point, such as the background sounds of a city or jungle.


wild line

(television) A line of dialogue recorded outside of the normal recording session, sometimes to replace a line that was delivered poorly.


whiparound

(television) The technique of panning around a number of people on a panel, newsdesk, etc. by way of introduction.


whip pan

(film) A type of pan shot in which the camera pans so quickly that the picture blurs into indistinct streaks, commonly used as a transition.


upcut

en-verb

upcut (third-person singular simple present upcuts, present participle upcutting, simple past and past participle upcut)

upcuts (present singular third-person)
upcutting (participle present)
upcut (participle past)
upcut (past)

(television, radio) To cut (audio or video) too short, so that a small portion is lost or overlaps the adjoining item.


upcut

(television, radio) A cutting too short, so that a small portion is lost or overlaps the adjoining item.


running W

He became one of the industry's top horsemen, specializing in Running Ws, pit falls, and cable jerk-offs.

2014, Gene Scott Freese, Hollywood Stunt Performers, 1910s-1970s:

(film, historical) A dangerous stunt used to trip a horse by means of a tripwire.


idiot girl

(television, slang) A woman employed to hold up the "idiot boards" used to prompt the presenters.


inherited audience

en-noun

inherited audience (plural inherited audiences)

(radio, television) The section of a broadcast's audience who had no specific intention of viewing or listening, but who continued doing so after the immediately preceding broadcast.


chromakeyer

(television) A device for producing chromakey effects.


PSRA

presunrise authorization
presunrise authorization#English

(broadcasting) Initialism of presunrise authorization.


key light

Age lines were drawn on McCarthy's face in red makeup, and when key lights with red filters were used, the lines were not visible.

2015, Don Presnell, Marty McGee, A Critical History of Television's The Twilight Zone, 1959-1964, page 57:

(photography, film, television) The most important light, used to highlight the form and dimension of the subject.


disaster film

(film) A film (movie) whose main plot device is a natural or man-made disaster.


multicam

(videography, Internet slang) A video of one event created using footage of different cameras.


voiceunder

But even though English soundtracks are left intact— as sort of exotic voiceunders — the situation is dreary for the average American news junkie.

1984, Edith Terry, The executive guide to China, →ISBN, page 297:

The commercials have a "voiceunder" reciting the words of Ralph Waldo Emerson.

1988, Adweek: Western advertising news - Volume 38, Issues 16-30, page 85:

Underneath, something else is moving. A stream running beneath the ice. A voiceover. Or, I guess, a voiceunder.

2017, Matthew Goodwin, Frederick Aldama, Latin@ Rising An Anthology of Latin@ Science Fiction and Fantasy, →ISBN:

(cinematography) An audio track spoken or sung in the background.


tabloid talk show

tabloid talk show (plural tabloid talk shows)

(television) A talk show dealing with sensational topics like those found in a tabloid newspaper.


cut-in

Inasmuch as leaders and cut-ins use up film a foot to a word, they should be resorted to only when absolutely necessary. For the producer has sufficient expense in his company and plant, without adding to it in film for cut-ins and leaders.

1916, Carl Charlton, How to Write Photoplays, page 23:

(film) A section of film inserted into another sequence.


phasecal

(radio astronomy, attributive) A system that injects a frequency comb signal in order to disambiguate phase in multiple basebands downconverted from the input signal.


subchanneled

(radio, electronics, zoology) Divided into subchannels.


back-door pilot

back-door pilot (plural back-door pilots)

(film, television) A film, miniseries, or episode that serves as a proof of concept for a new full television series, but may be broadcast on its own even if the full series does not come to fruition.


DIT

DIT (countable and uncountable, plural DITs)

In 2022, nearly every movie and TV show has a dedicated DIT who works with the cinematographer and the director to figure out what an image might look like after it’s been run through a series of digital filters.

2022 January 10, Emily VanDerWerff, “Colors: Where did they go? An investigation.”, in Vox:

digital imaging technician
w:digital imaging technician

(film) Initialism of digital imaging technician.


nouvelle vague

/nuːˌvɛl ˈvɑːɡ/

Unadapted borrowing from French nouvelle vague (literally “new wave”).

ubor

Coordinate term: cinéma du look

The light of the nouvelle vague—the “new wave” in French cinema that crested in the early sixties—was special.

2000, Gilberto Perez, The Material Ghost, JHU Press, →ISBN, page 336:

Perhaps the great connection between the American film noir and the French nouvelle vague is best thought of in terms of the philosophical implications of life and death as seen in the disruptions and resumed continuity of the French narratives, which never forsake their graceful ritual.

2002, Andrew Dickos, Street with No Name, University Press of Kentucky, →ISBN, page 222:

(film) An influential French film movement of the 1950s and 1960s which experimented radically in editing, visual style and narrative


microdrama

en-noun

microdrama (countable and uncountable, plural microdramas)

...he also attempts to show how editing causes audience "identification" with the image and allows for the subtler "microdrama" of realism; and leaving editing aside, he sees the expressive possibilities in the "panorama" or long-take, shots — all of which goes well beyond the "make-it-strange" aesthetics of the Russians.

1997, James John Griffith, Adaptations as Imitations: Films from Novels, page 19:

What becomes visible at close range is the rapid to-and-fro motion that occurs within a single situation, the microdrama of the moment. The closeup enables the action, the story to develop a deeper dimension.

2010, Béla Balázs, Erica Carter, Béla Balázs: Early Film Theory: Visible Man and The Spirit of Film, →ISBN:

Hypotheses H1: Audience viewing of the microdrama [up-close camera perspective] format will induce higher levels of identification with the candidate than the televised town meeting or political spot formats.

2014, Erik P. Bucy, R. Lance Holbert, Sourcebook for Political Communication Research, page 1317709349:

(cinematography) A filming style characterized by close-up camera work focusing on the reactions of a single character.


MBC

Middle East Broadcasting Center
w:en:Middle East Broadcasting Center

Munhwa Broadcasting Corporation
w:en:Munhwa Broadcasting Corporation

(television) Initialism of Middle East Broadcasting Center, Munhwa Broadcasting Corporation.


airshift

Announcer respondents most frequently worked a daily four-hour airshift (M = 4.23, s = 1.28; Mo = 4) , as either a morning daypart announcer (n = 60) or as an afternoon daypart announcer (n = 34)

1988, Steven Owen Shields, Creativity, Climate, and Creative Control in the Work of American Music Radio Announcers, page 113:

Canty's daily hour-long airshift on WQMC does not involve control over any other WQMC programming nor any of the station's policies.

1992, FCC Record: A Comprehensive Compilation of Decisions, Reports, Public Notices and Other Documents of the Federal Communications Commission of the United States, volume 7, numbers 9-12, page 2577:

My first gig at KMPX was a six-hour airshift each night.

1997, Michael C. Keith, Voices in the Purple Haze: Underground Radio and the Sixties, page 100:

(radio broadcasting) A block of continuous broadcast time, often four or six hours.


back-announce

en-verb

back-announce (third-person singular simple present back-announces, present participle back-announcing, simple past and past participle back-announced)

back-announces (present singular third-person)
back-announcing (participle present)
back-announced (participle past)
back-announced (past)

It helps after long interviews, to back-announce the interviewee and the subject.

1978, Barrie Redfern, Local radio, page 78:

You back-announce the music just played, making a few appropriate comments about the music or the performers.

1991, Stuart Wallace Hyde, Television and radio announcing, page 335:

Two further examples will illustrate the functions of cue material – that is, to obtain the listener's interest, provide context, explain background noise, clarify technicalities and to 'back-announce'.

2005, Robert McLeish, Radio Production, page 112:

Z100, the Top-40 station in freestyle epicenter New Yor City, would plug many holes in its playlists with freestyle tracks, usually neglecting to back-announce them so that to the non-clubgoer, the songs would only be identifiable by lyrics or synth sounds.

2012, Maura Johnston, The Season Came To An End:

(broadcasting) To briefly identify the music or story that has just aired.


back announce

A tertiary tone on the theme cart directly fires a sub-source cart loaded with a daily synchronized voice track, running the back announce over the theme.

1973, FM radio station operations handbook, page 140:

Often, there are no front or back announces on the AM either, so if the listener didn't know who did the song, we aren't about to tell them.

1986, Michael C. Keith, Joseph M. Krause, The Radio Station, page 243:

But the intro was easy compared to the back announce.

2010, Elisabeth Soep, Lissa Soep, Vivian Chavez, Drop that Knowledge: Youth Radio Stories, page 135:

(broadcasting) A brief statement or synopsis identifying a piece of music or story when it completes; outro.


opinion show

(television) A program that offers news heavily mixed with opinion-based commentary.


trackout

en-noun

trackout (countable and uncountable, plural trackouts)

[…] the programme-devisers proceeded to obfuscate his words by visual gimmickry — laborious trackouts to accommodate superimposed graphics and slogans; stills and film cuts which were either banal or funny.

[…] Alfred Hitchcock's distorted-vision effect employing a trackout combined with a forward zoom in Vertigo (1958).

1977, John Aquino, Film in the Language Arts Class, page 14:

As the shot reaches its conclusion, it transforms itself, through a trackout, from a medium-shot into a long-shot, as if to emphasize further the already disconcerting mixture of intimacy and distance we feel in the scene.

2012, Steven Rybin, Terrence Malick and the Thought of Film, page 44:

(countable, film, television) A backward movement of the camera, showing a wider field.


cue-to-cue

(theater, music, film) Of a rehearsal: moving from one cue to the next, so that lighting etc. can be tested, without rehearsing scenes in their entirety.


soft reboot

(television, film, fiction) A reboot of a series etc. in which continuity is retained with the previous material.


howl-round

(television) feedback (high-pitched howling noise caused by a loop between microphone and speaker)


top-slicing

(UK, television) A proposed system whereby part of the television licence fee would be used to fund the rollout of superfast broadband.


Tele-snap

Trade name (Tele-snaps), from tele- + snap.

(television, historical) A still photograph of a television broadcast, taken and sold for commercial use in the days before video recording.


flag-waving

They eliminate picture rolls, tearing, flag waving, hue shift, skew error or color streaking.

1973, Signals, volume 28, numbers 1-11, page 109:

The picture may also show a horizontal jitter at the top left appearing as flag waving.

1999, A. M. Dhake, TV and Video Engineering, page 497:

(television) Undesirable horizontal skewing of frames in a video signal.


outcue

(radio, television) A cue indicating that a portion of broadcast material will shortly end.


sync up

en-verb

sync up (third-person singular simple present syncs up, present participle syncing up or synching up, simple past and past participle synced up or synched up)

syncs up (present singular third-person)
syncing up (participle present)
synching up (participle present)
synced up (participle past)
synced up (past)
synched up (participle past)
synched up (past)

(television, transitive) To synchronize (footage) so that the audio and video components play together in correct alignment.


Irving the Explainer

(Canada, US, film, informal) Any character who serves to provide exposition, such as explaining how an elaborate murder was committed, sparing the writers from having to convey it indirectly.


crispener

(television) A circuit or device that modifies a video signal to make the picture look more crisp.


step deal

(film) A scriptwriter's contract paid in installments as progress is made.


standards and practices

(US, television) The department at a television network that is responsible for the moral, ethical, and legal implications of what is broadcast.


stagger-through

Deverbal from stagger through, on the model of readthrough and walkthrough; so called because there may be mistakes, pauses for discussion, etc.

And so I went there with the rehearsal pianists and we just did stagger-throughs, so that we could time it, so that we could know what was going on.

1998, Opera, volume 49, numbers 7-10, page 1036:

There may be a “stagger-through” in between, a run-through with occasional stops for critical discussions and changes.

2016, Don Harmon, Producing in Theater, page 45:

(music, television) The rehearsal of an entire show.


cross-trail

cross-trail (third-person singular simple present cross-trails, present participle cross-trailing, simple past and past participle cross-trailed)

cross-trails (present singular third-person)
cross-trailing (participle present)
cross-trailed (participle past)
cross-trailed (past)

BBC Two cross-trailed a new costume drama that was starting on BBC One that week.

(broadcasting) To broadcast a trailer on one channel or station advertising content that will appear on another.


rip-and-reader

Suggesting the tearing off and reading of printed sheets from incoming news transmissions.

In between the all-news stations and the rip-and-readers are a substantial number of stations which sometimes have one or two newsmen and which try to do a respectable job with a limited budget.

1977, Ronald G. Hicks, A Survey of Mass Communication, page 145:

Leave the rip-and-readers to the tender mercies of the Associated Press. Major market radio and television stations are another matter entirely. Their news interests and requirements are similar to those of newspapers.

1987, Presstime, volume 9, numbers 1-6, page 15:

News director Griff Potter says he wants “a journalist, not a rip-and-reader. Someone who understands that highlights, runs, and errors are boring television.”

2012, Bradley Schultz, Sports Media: Reporting, Producing, and Planning, page 254:

(broadcasting, slang, derogatory) A newsreader or station that delivers the news in a formulaic, uninspired manner.


gaffer grip

From gaffer (“lighting electrician”) + grip.

(television) A clamp that can be attached to part of a set and used to hold lights.


topless radio

Similar to much of today's “adult talk” radio and TV, topless radio was a format in which audience members called in to discuss graphically sexual issues with hosts who tried to titillate the audience by teasing every explicit detail out of a caller.

2004, Christopher H. Sterling, editor, Encyclopedia of Radio, Routledge, →ISBN, page 2326:

(radio, dated) A radio talk show format, popular in the 1970s, focusing on intimate sexual discussion with callers.


four-waller

With their audience's desires carefully measured and films made to match those desires, four-wallers then saturated local television markets with advertisements for their movies […]

2009, Joshua Blu Buhs, Bigfoot: The Life and Times of a Legend, page 155:

(film, theater) A company that rents a cinema or theater under a four-wall arrangement.

The sets and corridors were all built with very low ceilings. They were four-wallers, so that meant lighting through grills or hiding lights or having in-shot lamps. I think the look of the film is due to the nature of the sets […]

1979, American Cinematographer, volume 60, page 768:

Now it is more common for studios to operate as 'four wallers', that is just the buildings with very limited supporting facilities and for all the personnel to be engaged by the production company.

2004, Robert Angell, Getting Into Films & Television, page 24:

(film, television) A studio consisting of buildings but little in the way of equipment.


clapper-loader

(film) A person employed to operate the clapperboard and to load film into the camera.


dog station

Again, available evidence indicates that fewer than one percent of all radio and television properties are controlled by minority persons. […] Minority owners claim that only the so called "dog" stations are offered to them.

1978, United States. Federal Communications Commission. Minority Ownership Task Force, Minority Ownership in Broadcasting, page 9:

And, as you know, most of the black broadcasters and Mexican-American broadcasters and minority broadcasters in the United States have wound up with the dog stations in various markets, mainly daytimers. Very few of us are in the large markets […]

1979, United States. Congress. House. Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce. Subcommittee on Communications, The Communications Act of 1979: Hearings, page 339:

(television, radio) A minor television or radio station with little chance to succeed.


pay or play

(film, often attributive) A kind of contract ensuring that an actor, director, etc. is paid even if their work is ultimately not used.


continuous wave

en-noun

continuous wave (countable and uncountable, plural continuous waves)

(radio, historical, uncountable) An early method of radio transmission in which a sinusoidal carrier wave is switched on and off, and information is carried in the varying duration of the on and off periods.


desert dolly

We packed it in on desert dollies for about a mile and used it down next to a lake where it was absolutely forbidden to have any motorized equipment. We couldn't have gotten the shot that we got with any other piece of equipment.

1980, American Cinematographer, volume 61, page 1128:

(film) A wheeled platform for moving heavy lamps over difficult terrain.


Charlie bar

Adding texture to lights. Charlie bars (vertical bars, in this case made from tape on an open frame) and also some lace create texture in the scene.

2012, Blain Brown, Motion Picture and Video Lighting, page 56:

[…] traditionally these include things such as vertical Charlie bars — vertical wooden bars used to create shadows.

2013, Blain Brown, Cinematography: Theory and Practice, page 115:

Charlie bar A 1- to 6-inch wide by 3-foot long strip of wood with an attached pin used to create shadows on an object (thin long flags, gobos).

2013, Michael Uva, Sabrina Uva, Uva's Rigging Guide for Studio and Location, page 260:

(film, television) A vertical bar positioned in groups to break up the illumination from a light source.


unblooped

[…] and the track abounds in unblooped splices.

1951, Film Music, volumes 11-12, page 23:

An unblooped splice can cause a large signal spike, which blows out the voice coil.

1991, Tony Zaza, Mechanics of sound recording, page 372:


good-bad

en-adjective

good-bad (comparative more good-bad, superlative most good-bad)

more good-bad (comparative)
most good-bad (superlative)

1945, November 2. George Orwell, "Good Bad Books", Tribune, 2 November.
The existence of good bad literature--the fact that one can be amused or excited or even moved by a book that one's intellect simply refuses to take seriously--is a reminder that art is not the same thing as cerebration.

Touch of Evil is not a good movie, but it is a good bad movie, which is more fun than the mediocre or even the adequate.

2014, Sarah Nilsen, Projecting America, 1958, McFarland:

2015, July 6, David Fear et al, 25 Best Modern Exploitation Movies. Rolling Stone.
Is Showgirls good-bad or just bad-bad?

The Shoes of the Fisherman is a good-bad film that owes no duty to history or to what were then current affairs.

2019 November 29, Donald Clarke, “The Two Popes: one giant leap of faith”, in The Irish Times:

(film, literature) Enjoyably schlocky, poor in quality but nonetheless compelling.


movie jail

"They have this term in Hollywood, movie jail. When a director does this horrible movie that fails, he's in movie jail, where they're not letting him make another movie again."

2010, Alison Macor, Chainsaws, Slackers, and Spy Kids: Thirty Years of Filmmaking in Austin, Texas., University of Texas Press:

2016, June 10, "10 Actors Who Got Sent to Movie Jail", Screenrant.

2019, April 15, Gabe Worgaftik, AV Club.
"Movie jail is real. He's been there. He was excommunicated at Fox for a decade after turning down Speed 2 to go play Hamlet onstage in fucking Winnipeg."

(film, informal) A state of derailment of a career or limited opportunities to which a film industry professional is seemingly relegated, usually as a result of making an unsuccessful film.


dead cat

Named for its resemblance to an actual dead cat.

"A camera operator needs batteries, lenses, cards, filters. A wardrobe supervisor has racks of costumes. A sound recorder carries a dead cat on a stick. But a director only needs his folder."

2012 August 16, Neil Oseman, Inside the Director's Folder:

2019, July 2. "Film 101: What Is a Boom Operator? Understanding the Job of a Boom Operator", Masterclass.com.
"The mic blimp is a wind-resistant cover that goes over the boom mic to reduce environmental background noise. It's commonly referred to as a "dead cat", because it's covered in fuzzy gray hair."

(cinematography, sound engineering) A furry coverlet placed over a microphone to muffle the sound of wind.


frame fuck

en-verb

frame fuck (third-person singular simple present frame fucks, present participle frame fucking, simple past and past participle frame fucked)

frame fucks (present singular third-person)
frame fucking (participle present)
frame fucked (participle past)
frame fucked (past)

The rig was so janky that I wound up frame fucking the entire shot.

According to Cartoon Network Atlanta circa spring of last year, the main reason would be that they would send an episode package overseas, and have it come back with no regards toward comic timing, and hence they'd have to take the finished product in post and do what they described as "frame fucking" in order to get the proper timing they wanted.

2003 November 18, EllisBB, “Re: Harvey Birdman Attorney at law - what happened?”, in rec.arts.animation (Usenet), retrieved 2020-04-03, message-ID <20031117211110.05888.00000483@mb-m13.aol.com>:

You can sit there for hours removing frames or putting frames back in. It’s frame fucking.

2010 January 28, Mickey Rapkin, “What Does a Film Editor Actually, You Know, DO?”, in GQ:

(film, animation, transitive, vulgar, slang) To make minute adjustments in editing, to nitpick.


retroprojection

en-noun

retroprojection (countable and uncountable, plural retroprojections)


in other news

(conjunctive, idiomatic, broadcasting) Used by newsreaders to introduce an unrelated piece of news.


PVOD

(television, film) Abbreviation of premium video on demand.


chosen one

Many of these fantasy novels feature a main character portrayed as a chosen one who will save everyone else.

Qui-Gon: He... is the Chosen One. He... will bring balance... Train him.

1999, Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace:

(authorship, informal) A character in a narrative work who is predestined to save the world or do some other grand and heroic accomplishment; one who is predestined to become the one


double-headed

(film) Synonym of sepmag (“having separately recorded picture and soundtrack”)


tech noir

tech noir (countable and uncountable, plural tech noirs)

Blend of tech (“technology”) + film noir. From the close association of high tech with sci-fi. Folk etymology suggests this was coined by director James Cameron, when he named the dance club in the 1984 film The Terminator "Tech-Noir", and the fandom and critics labelled similar IP properties as "tech noir".

blend

(uncountable, film) A genre of film, science-fiction film-noir cinema.


poison at the box office

(film, theater) An unappealing play or film that sells very few tickets.


Hong Kong harness

en-noun

Hong Kong harness (plural Hong Kong harnesses)

(film, television) A stunt performance harness, typically used for wire fu, that resembles a rock climber's harness. It allows performers to be jerked up and suspended without much displacement of clothing, and to perform in the air.


PiP

(television) Initialism of picture-in-picture.


CGTN

(television) Initialism of China Global Television Network.; a global TV network composed of a group of satellite TV channels, owned by the government of the People's Republic of China; formerly CCTV International.

China Global Television Network

An international English-language TV news channel run by the network, formerly CCTV-9 or CCTV News.


ghost character

ghost character (plural ghost characters)

Beside this detailed information which Hall provides about Matthew Gough, Shakespeare's Gough is a ghost character. There is, indeed, no way in which an audience could pick up who he is when he appears only to be killed immediately.

2003, Catherine M. S. Alexander, The Cambridge Shakespeare Library, Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, page 231:

A ‘ghost’ character is one who is marked as present on stage, but given no lines to speak: many editors consider the inclusion of these characters to be an oversight on the part of the writer or printer, and so remove them from modern stage directions; […]

2010, David Coleman, John Webster, Renaissance Dramatist, Edinburgh University Press, →ISBN, page 68:

Joseph A. Porter's discussion of the ‘ghost character’ of Valentine in Romeo and Juliet is also illuminating: Porter describes Valentine as a ‘symptom or by-product of Mercutio's transformation’ from rival lover (in Shakespeare's source) to friend […]

2014, Lena Cowen Orlin, Othello, A&C Black, →ISBN, page 277:

(drama, literature) A character who is mentioned as appearing on stage, but who does not do anything, and who seems to have no purpose.


inky-dinky

You know you cannot get smaller lights than inky-dinkies but when you push one stop, you can use an inky-dinky for key lighting.

2013, Dennis Schaefer, Larry Salvato, Masters of Light, page 323:

A regular package here would give you six pieces of 1K tungsten lights, ten pieces of inky-dinkies, one HMI if you're lucky.

2015, Harriet Margolis, Alexis Krasilovsky, Julia Stein, Shooting Women: Behind the Camera, Around the World, page 151:


dress off

en-verb

dress off (third-person singular simple present dresses off, present participle dressing off, simple past and past participle dressed off)

dresses off (present singular third-person)
dressing off (participle present)
dressed off (participle past)
dressed off (past)

(film) For an actor to position themselves relative to another person or object in a scene.


drive-in theatre

en-noun

drive-in theatre (plural drive-in theatres)

(film) A drive-in cinema; Pedantic form of drive-in.


martini shot

In reference to the martini cocktail: after the final shot of the day, the crew can depart for a drink.

(cinematography) The final shot of the day.


block upconverter

block upconverter (plural block upconverters)

(radio communications) An electronic device that converts a band of frequencies from a lower frequency to a higher frequency, used in satellite uplinks.


cinephobia

Straud/Hulliet's insistence upon the use of direct sound ... is a very radical example of ... "cinephobia, a revulsion against the commercial film industry and its standard product, the fictional narrative film" (Elsaesser 1996, 25)[.]

2001, C. M. White, Gender and the German Autumn:

(film) The fear or hatred of films and the cinema.


telecording

telecording (countable and uncountable, plural telecordings)

The tendency is towards more and more pre-recorded material, employing either telecording or video recording, and whatever one's views may be towards this trend it is more often than not a necessity in the field of agrarian information.

1962, EBU Review: Programmes, Administration, Law, volume 71, page 24:


ecocinema

The academic scholarship on both Wildboyz and Green Porno has been virtually nonexistent heretofore […]. When it comes to Wildboyz, one could attribute this treatment to the program’s youthful intended audience or its general lack of sophistication. But those same features have not stopped ecocritics, ecocinema scholars, or other academics from writing about children’s environmental programming, environmentally themed animation, […]

2018, Nicole Seymour, Bad Environmentalism, page 77:

(film) A branch of filmmaking and film criticism dealing with the representation of the environment in film.


Andersonian

(film) Of or pertaining to Lindsay Anderson (1923–1994), British film and theatre director and film critic.

At other points, the film suggests the motive is financial, depicting the Kobayashi clan as staging an industrial coup of sorts, like a quirky Andersonian take on the zaibatsu (a term for the family-controlled business monopolies that dominated Japan until the end of World War II).

2018 March 31, Nina Li Coomes, “Unpacking the Fictional Japan of ‘Isle of Dogs’”, in The Atlantic:

(film) Of or pertaining to Wes Anderson (born 1969), American film director, producer, and writer.


split screen shot

split screen shot (plural split screen shots)

(film) A scene in which the frame is split into two or more frames each with their own subject, often taking place simultaneously.


cough and a spit

Ray Wise managed his back-to-black-hair role before joining Tim Robbins in Bob Roberts and James Marshall squeezed in his cough and a spit between Gladiator and joining the big boys (Nicholson, Cruise) in A Few Good Men […]

Everybody gargling madly and mugging up their lines as though Shakespeare himself was out front. Don't know why I bothered, I only had a cough and a spit.

1998, Ken Whitmore, Alfred Bradley, The Final Twist: A Play, page 20:


dual-frequency

(radio communications) Able to receive and operate on two different radio frequencies.


respeaker

(television) One who repeats the words of a televised person so that they can be electronically recognised and used to generate subtitles.


black and burst

(television) An analogue composite video signal with a black picture, used as a reference signal to synchronise timings.


WQHD

There has been speculation that the Galaxy S5 might include new technologies like an eye scanner that would allow the phone to identify its owner, or a so-called Quad HD, or WQHD, display, with ultra-high resolution.

[2014 February 5, Eric Pfanner, “Samsung Reins In the Theatrics for Galaxy S5”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:

(television) Initialism of wide quad high definition (“2560×1440 pixels”).


QHD

Abbreviation
* (quad HD): Four (quad) times as many pixels as HD (1280×720).

(television) Initialism of quad high definition (“2560×1440 pixels”).


postsync

en-verb

postsync (third-person singular simple present postsyncs, present participle postsyncing or postsynching, simple past and past participle postsynced or postsynched)

postsyncs (present singular third-person)
postsyncing (participle present)
postsynching (participle present)
postsynced (participle past)
postsynced (past)
postsynched (participle past)
postsynched (past)


hand-basher

(television, slang) A small hand-held light used to illuminate specific areas.


overcrank

overcrank (third-person singular simple present overcranks, present participle overcranking, simple past and past participle overcranked)

overcranks (present singular third-person)
overcranking (participle present)
overcranked (participle past)
overcranked (past)

From over- + crank; dating from a time when film was advanced in a camera by the turning of a crank.

(film) To shoot a scene while advancing the film in the camera more quickly than it will advance on playback. This results in slowing down the action in the final film.


out of rack

(film) Misaligned so that partial frames are seen on screen instead of the proper projection.


Obie

Named after the actress Merle Oberon, whose husband Lucien Ballard used this kind of lighting to hide small scars on her face after a car accident.

(television, film) A small lamp positioned over the camera, sometimes used to produce catchlights in the subject's eyes.


terrorsploitation

“London Has Fallen – into a pit of manure.” Hollywood’s latest take on the War on Terror has been condemned by critics as a racist “terrorsploitation” fantasy designed to spread fear after the Paris attacks.

2016 March 6, Adam Sherwin, “London Has Fallen movie condemned as racist 'terrorsploitation' for Donald Trump era”, in The Independent:

In fact, in structure, theme, and success, American Sniper isn’t so much a war film as a terrorsploitation shoot-em-up. Forget Billy Lynn; closer analogues are the television show 24 or London Has Fallen (2016).

2016 November 21, Noah Berlatsky, “Hollywood's war on terror: why audiences prefer gung-ho Iraq films”, in The Guardian:

(film) A genre of exploitation films focused on terrorism or terrorist attacks, often provoking fear.


lap dissolve

(film) A dissolve from one image or scene to another.


Latin lover

I began to consider the contradictions in these descriptions: that although Mastroianni, as commodity, was often marketed as the quintessential Italian man, his characters betrayed instead a much more conflicting image of Italian masculinity than the category of Latin lover allowed.

2008, Krin Gabbard, William Luhr, Screening Genders, Rutgers University Press, →ISBN, page 49:

(film) A stereotype of a passionate and attractive male of Latin or Romance European origin.


station time

(broadcasting) The period during which a television or radio station can air its own local content, rather than material provided by the network.


stretch printing

Coordinate term: skip printing

(film) The process of duplicating certain frames of a film so that it can be played back at a higher frames-per-second rate without the action seeming too fast.


skip printing

Coordinate term: stretch printing

(film) The process of removing certain frames of a film so that it can be played back at a lower frames-per-second rate without the action seeming too slow.


hard R

Sugar Cookies would probably rate a 'hard-R' today, but six years ago it got an X, made a brief appearance on the 42nd Street porno circuit, and disappeared without a trace.

1979 January 11, Berkeley Art Museum, Pacific Film Archive, “Sugar Cookies”, in Program archive:

For a "soft R" like "Four Weddings and a Funeral," which features a smattering of profanity, a theater might check identifications only lightly. But it will turn tough for a "hard R" like Oliver Stone's "Natural Born Killers," one of the most violent movies of recent years.

1996 February 18, Trip Gabriel, “The Ratings Game At the Cineplex”, in The New York Times, page Section 2, Page 1:

I believe we'll hear later from the movie industry's lobbyist, Mr. Valenti, that not all "R"s are really "R"s. More specifically, and I quote from Mr. Valenti's written testimony: "Some R-rated are hard "R"s and some are soft "R"s."

2003, United States. Congress. Senate. Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, Marketing Violence to Children: Hearing Before the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, United States Senate, One Hundred Sixth Congress, Second Session, September 13, 2000, page 51:

A HARD R rating would seem to be between “R” — which has meant restricted to adults, because of various elements — and “NC-17.”

2018 July 28, Caitlin Lovinger, “Three in One; Will Nediger’s puzzle breaks it down for us, in a funny way.”, in DAILY CROSSWORD COLUMN, The New York Times:

(US, film) a movie that is intentionally written to be R-rated ("Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian.") by the Motion Picture Association (MPA), typically due to having multiple scenes of violence or nudity.


fake Shemp

Coined by film director Sam Raimi in reference to Shemp Howard of the Three Stooges, whose sudden death in 1955 necessitated the use of these techniques to finish the films to which he was already committed.

(film) A person who appears disguised in a film as a replacement for another actor or person.


New French Extremity

(film) A transgressive group of films by French directors at the turn of the 21st century, having themes of sex, violence, and mental derangement.


beatscript

(cinematography) A visual adjunct to a screenplay


dead spot

(cinematography) A part of a scene that has insufficient lighting.


busted pilot

Another would-be series dealing with stock car racing—this a live-action one—was a busted pilot in 1962 for ABC called Tack Reynolds. It starred Michael Parks as a hot-dogging driver.

2008, Alvin H. Marill, Sports on Television, page 40:

His television luck ran out with two unsuccessful comedy series and no less than three busted pilots.

2017, Everett Aaker, Television Western Players, 1960-1975: A Biographical Dictionary, page 1995:

(television) A pilot that fails to be developed into a series.


on a bell

[…] and putting the set "on a bell," the First Assistant Director will call "Roll 'em!"

1970, Michael Pate, The Film Actor: Acting for Motion Pictures and Television, page 30:

When the beauty team departs the set, the AD will say, “Let's go on a bell.” A bell sounds throughout the stage, and […]

2013, Bethany Rooney, Mary Lou Belli, Directors Tell the Story, page 184:

(film) Warned by the ringing of a bell to remain silent during a period of shooting.


jail bars

(television) A display fault in which the picture is disrupted by evenly-spaced vertical bands.


retro-noir

en-noun

retro-noir (countable and uncountable, plural retro-noirs)

(film, uncountable) A subgenre that closely imitates or recreates the aesthetics and tropes of the classical noirs.

(countable, film) A work that closely imitates the classical noirs.


crab dolly

In reference to the sideways motion of a crab.

(film) A camera dolly whose front wheels steer in the same direction as the rear wheels.


back anno

Back annos may take a very simple form such as a name check of the last voice heard on the package and stations have been known to ban their use on the basis that anything in the radio text that looks back at what has been said is redundant communication.

2002, Pete Wilby, The Radio Handbook, page 136:

The 'landing' is the back anno, which is the follow-up to the item, and which leads the listeners smoothly from the item and back into the rest of the programme ready for some more signposting, an ident or some music, perhaps, […]

2013, Guy Starkey, Radio in Context, page 131:

(radio, informal) An announcement at the end of a broadcast item and relating back to that item.


Brat Pack

(informal, film, historical) A group of young actors who frequently appeared together in teen-oriented coming-of-age films in the 1980s.


Production Code

From 1930 to 1956 the Production Code's sixth regulation on matters of “sex” boldly declared: “Miscegenation (sex relationship between the white and black races) is forbidden.”

2005, Susan Courtney, Hollywood Fantasies of Miscegenation, Princeton University Press, →ISBN, page 103:

Motion Picture Production Code
w:Motion Picture Production Code

(film, historical, 1930–1968) Ellipsis of Motion Picture Production Code.


shooting ratio

(film, television) The ratio between the total duration of footage created for possible use in a project and the duration used in the final cut.


showprint

(film) A release print made directly from the original camera negative rather than an internegative.


shoot around

en-verb

shoot around (third-person singular simple present shoots around, present participle shooting around, simple past and past participle shot around)

shoots around (present singular third-person)
shooting around (participle present)
shot around (participle past)
shot around (past)

Pressured to deliver his film on time and within budget, Asher finally refused to give in to another of Cummings' demands. The irked actor stormed off the set. Bill shot around him for the rest of the day but then had to approach his unhappy star.

2015, Thomas Lisanti, Hollywood Surf and Beach Movies: The First Wave, 1959-1969:

(film, television) To record footage in the absence of (one of the actors), with the intention of editing in their sequences at a later stage.


phone-out

Coordinate term: phone-in

(broadcasting) An event in which a person is telephoned from the studio for an interview.


FHD

(television) Initialism of full high definition (“1920×1080 pixels”).


CNTV

(television) Initialism of China Network Television.: a global internet-based television network, owned by the government of the People's Republic of China, using content from CCTV.


rough cut

From the early days of filmmaking when film stock was physically cut and reassembled.

Coordinate term: fine cut

(film) The second of three stages of offline editing of a film, recognizable as a conventional film but having notable defects such as incomplete narrative flow and missing visual or sound effects.


fairness doctrine

(US, broadcasting, historical) A policy of the United States Federal Communications Commission (FCC), introduced in 1949 and abolished in 1987, requiring the holders of broadcast licenses (i) to present controversial issues of public importance and (ii) to do so in an honest, equitable and balanced manner.


rolling spider

(film) A kind of spider (support for a camera tripod, preventing it from sliding) with lockable wheels allowing it to be moved around easily when needed.


autodyne

(radio, historical) A circuit that improved radio signal amplification by means of an audion.


manga mark

Compound of manga + mark. Compare Japanese 漫符(まんぷ) (manpu, “manga icon”).

Cultural learning experiences are required to understanding manga''' marks. For example, adults of Botswana interpreted a sweat mark used in Western comics as blood, rain, and tears (Byram and Garforth, 1980).

2006, David Shwalb, Jun Nakazawa, Barbara J. Shwalb, Applied Developmental Psychology: Theory, Practice, and Research from Japan, page 29:

In a previous preliminary experiment, we determined facial expressions for the robot KOBIAN-R with manga marks. Those expressions included four manga marks as “Cross popping veins” for “Anger”, “Tear mark” for “Sadness”, “Vertical lines” for “Fear” and “Wrinkle” for “Disgust”.

2014, Tatsuhiro Kishi, Hajime Futaki, Gabriele Trovato, Nobutsuna Endo, A Robotic Head that Displays Japanese “Manga” Marks:

Nakazawa (2005b) asked the meaning of the twelve manga''' marks to a sample of kindergartners, first-, fourth-, sixth-, and eighth-graders. Understanding of manga''' marks progressed along with grade level (Figure 7.2)

2016, Jun Nakazawa, “Manga literacy and manga comprehension in Japanese children”, in Neil Cohn, editor, The Visual Narrative Reader, page 248:

The comprehensive techniques that composes manga is immature. But there is a very high expressiveness in some aspects, such as the creation of a face viewed from the front and the expression of expressions using manga marks.

2020, Kurobokuya, Kurobokuya manga lesson 4:

(cartooning, manga, anime) A cartoon icon; a symbol used to indicate emotion, movement, etc. in a drawing; especially one used in or associated with Japanese-style manga.


HDRI

en-noun

HDRI (countable and uncountable, plural HDRIs)

(photography, videography, uncountable) Initialism of high dynamic range imaging.

(photography, videography, countable) Initialism of high dynamic range image.


focus puller

(cinematography) A member of a film crew whose primary responsibility is to maintain the camera lens' optical focus on whatever subject or action is being filmed.


shoot and protect

(film) The technique of shooting material in such a way that the areas of interest lie within a rectangular "protected area" within the frame, ensuring that nothing significant is lost when converting to different aspect ratios.


microgenic

(broadcasting, of a voice) Suitable for use with a microphone (and thus for broadcasting)


hair in the gate

hair in the gate (countable and uncountable, plural hairs in the gate)

(film) Dirt, debris, or slivers of emulsion in the aperture of a camera or projector.


film horse

In addition there is a reel holder known as a 'film horse' which consists of a pair of upright arms spaced so that a roll of film can be located on a simple spindle between them, with or without spool. The base is generally made of heavy metal […]

1959, North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Advisory Group for Aerospace Research and Development, AGARDograph (issue 33, page 77)

Position a film horse on the left hand side and free unbent split spools on a rewind arm on the right.

1976, John Burder, 16mm Film Cutting, page 86:

(film) A device for holding rolls of film during editing.


second team

(film) The stand-ins used for setting up a shot, as opposed to the first team of actors who will actually appear in the filmed scene.


paintpot

[…] vertical joystick or 'paintpot' may be used, that will pivot hemispherically to any degree within a color circle.

2013, Gerald Millerson, Lighting for TV and Film, page 390:

(dated, television) A lever on a telecine machine that controls the range of colors in an image.


space work

(acting) The skill of handling imaginary objects and locations as part of a performance, especially in improv acting.


sustaining program

sustaining program (plural sustaining programs)

(broadcasting, dated, chiefly US) A radio or television program that airs on a commercial station but does not have commercial sponsorship or advertising.


fluff one's lines

en-verb

fluff one's lines (third-person singular simple present fluffs one's lines, present participle fluffing one's lines, simple past and past participle fluffed one's lines)

fluffs one's lines (present singular third-person)
fluffing one's lines (participle present)
fluffed one's lines (participle past)
fluffed one's lines (past)

(drama) Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: To stumble over or otherwise misspeak one's lines.


diagonalizer

(radio) A device that diagonalizes the branches of radio antenna in order to reduce fading


glass shot

Glass shots are possibly the simplest of special effects. The technique involved placing a glass several feet in front of the camera and in effect painting over the area of the scene that must be changed.

2009, James Monaco, How to Read a Film: Movies, Media, and Beyond, page 149:

(film) The shooting of a scene with part of the background painted on glass rather than constructed as an actual set.


master shot

(film) A film recording of an entire dramatized scene, from start to finish, from a camera angle that keeps all the players in view.


limbo set

Get the best actors you can find, make sure they know their lines, and rehearse them over and over again. Choose inexpensive “real” locations over limbo sets with limited props and borrowed furniture.

2012, Nick Iuppa, Terry Borst, Story and Simulations for Serious Games: Tales from the Trenches, page 180:

The room existed only as a still photograph, and the Actor playing old Adolf was in fact walking around on a limbo set. But it was all done in real time, and when Adolf rested his hands on the table, I would have sworn that it was all real.

2013, Robert Koster, The Budget Book for Film and Television, page 196:

(film, television) A nondescript set that does not represent any particular place.


negative cost

en-noun

negative cost (countable and uncountable, plural negative costs)

(film) The net expense to produce and shoot a film, excluding such expenditures as distribution and promotion.


hard-ticket

a hard-ticket film

a hard-ticket movie

(US, film, historical) Being or relating to a long-running blockbuster film with the possibility of seat reservations.


bin stick

(film, historical) A stick or rod on which strips of film can be hung during editing.


lower third

(television) A graphic overlay placed in the title-safe lower area of the screen.


spider box

(film, television) A unit for distributing power via cables to a number of lights.


roundie

(historical, television) A television set with a round cathode ray tube.


programme-maker

But there are, of course, TV programme-makers who see beyond the easy opportunities to show conflict and false jeopardy.

2021 June 30, Tim Dunn, “How we made... Secrets of the London Underground”, in RAIL, number 934, page 46:

(television, radio, British spelling) A person responsible for the creation of television or radio programmes.


linear television

Retronym for television, coined after the invention of streaming video

(broadcasting) Conventional television viewed at the same time as transmission.


talkgroup

(radio) A group of users communicating over one or more channels.


rotoartist

(film, television, video, special effects) A person who creates masks for frames, to crop in and out backgrounds and objects, frame-by-frame in video and film, for rotoscoping.

video; special effects; video; special effects


sadcom

Clipping of sad comedy, following romcom and sitcom.

But the emerging American comedy, whether it be animated or live-action, carries with it neither sincere escapism nor cynical nihilism. Consider them sadcoms — the raw, honest, surprisingly hopeful, long-gestating progeny of M*A*S*H.

2015 September 3, Jenny Jaffe, “The Rise of the Sadcom”, in Vulture:

If 1990s sitcoms were characterised by sexually liberated pals cracking wise, and the 00s by docu-realist, workplace-based cringe comedy, this decade has been dominated by the sadcom, a strain of comedy-drama shuddering under the weight of personal hardship and the idea that actual jokes are largely unnecessary.

2019 August 13, Rachel Aroesti, “'Horrifyingly absurd': how did millennial comedy get so surreal?”, in The Guardian:


off camera

We have some of the best off-camera talent in the business.

(television, film) In or related to a role behind the cameras, e.g. in production, lighting, editing, etc.


fourth wall joke

fourth wall joke (plural fourth wall jokes)

(theater, film, television) A joke that intentionally draws attention to the illusion of separation between the audience and the fiction itself.


teen drama

More often than not, they employed this term when referencing various teen dramas that occurred between friends and classmates that required insider knowledge to decode. In other words, teens subtweet to talk behind someone else's back.

2014, danah boyd It's Complicated: The Social Lives of Networked Teens (page 69)

Director George Tillman Jr. gets pulled in different directions, too, juggling teen drama and teachy diatribe.

2018, Bob Brown, Lives in the balance: The Hate U Give tackles important topics but offers hollow advice:

one place where age-appropriate casting is kind of necessary is in an intimate teen drama that hinges entirely on the raw-nerve energy of its youthful lead to sell his character’s manipulative, cruel, selfish behavior as sympathetic rather than horrifying.

2021 September 22, Caroline Siede, “Dear Evan Hansen is a misfire on just about every level”, in AV Club:

(film, television) A drama based on teenagers, or set in a teenage environment.