Viewfinder: The Video Montage of Emotions

One of our chief goals in video editing is to engage the audience in our story. We can achieve this particularly well if we can evoke an emotional response like happiness, fear or anger.

Soviet filmmaker, Sergei Eisenstein recognized the importance of this and originated the idea of cultivating a predetermined emotional response by way of film editing. In 1924 he introduced an editing technique, still in wide use today, which he called a "montage of attractions." He discovered that he could evoke specific emotions in the audience by linking a series of visual images together. He selected a group of contrasting images and spliced them in rapid succession. As simple as it seems today, no one had done it before. The montage is now a fundamental editing technique that utilizes both the editor's and the viewer's mental resources.

Most music videos and TV commercials are comprised entirely of the montage. The average music video montage is about four minutes in length, while most TV commercials are 30 seconds long. The editor has a limited amount of time to draw the viewer in and make an impression that lasts long after the video or commercial is over. One of the quickest and most effective ways to do this is to evoke an emotional response in the viewer. In fact, the well-executed montage can generate the greatest impact in the shortest amount …