ABSTRACT
Medium long shots show a single or multiple characters from approximately the knees up; they are wider than medium shots, but tighter than long shots. According to film history lore, medium long shots first appeared in American Westerns, and were created out of a necessity to include a cowboy’s gun holster in a fairly tight shot, which cannot be done using a conventional medium shot. Medium long shots pull away from intimate proximity and only provide a general sense of a character’s mood or emotion through their facial expressions; however, they showcase body language and their surrounding area simultaneously, making them ideal for situations when a narrative connection between these elements needs to take precedence. Medium long and wider shots taken indoors generally require large, powerful lights to illuminate the more spacious areas included in the frame.
