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Basic Training Cutting on Action

Every day on TV and in the movies, we see conventions of editing that build upon the hard work and genius of those who have come before. Actually breaking editing down into its constituent parts and figuring out how they work, however, can be very difficult. Although we see so much of it, we don't notice a lot. Good editing is, for the most part, invisible. A good editor can take an audience from point A to point B, and, when it's over, we won't remember how we got there - only that it looked seamless.

One powerful convention of editing is cutting on action, which is a way of preserving continuity and making cuts flow together. It helps you make your cuts invisible and draws viewers into your story. Sometimes called cutting on motion, it is a very useful way to transition between shots, especially shots which may otherwise have nothing to tie them together. One common example is a person walking up to a door and reaching for the knob. Just as his hand touches the knob is the perfect opportunity to cut to a shot of the door opening from the other side. The second shot should have a level of action equivalent to the first. The motion carries us from one image to another.

Very often in moviemaking, we might shoot exteriors and interiors on different days, and the locations might be far apart. Without action tying the two shots together, we have no clues that tell us that the exterior door is the same as the interior door and not the inside of a different house. The action stretching across two or more shots becomes the continuity that carries the viewer from one shot to the next. It tells us that the door opening on the interior is the same one we just saw on the exterior, even if it's not really the same door. The hand reaching for the handle to open the door is the first part of the story. It carries into the door opening from the inside, which is the second part of the story. Cutting at the point of action, while everything is in motion, makes the edit smooth and less notic…