academy | How to shoot
Motion emotion What was once considered a technical failure is increasingly a creative choice, using softness and movement to inject images with energy and character
Rule 4: Sometimes more is more Confusingly, one of the other major trends says almost the opposite of the previous rule. Controlled chaos embraces rapid cuts, unexpected pacing, dense sound design and even multiple music tracks inside a single short commercial. The crucial word, though, is controlled. A relentless barrage quickly becomes exhausting. What makes the technique effective is contrast. A frantic montage suddenly falling into one sustained shot, a wall of music and effects collapsing into silence or an intense sequence interrupted by an unexpectedly calm moment. It’s a style influenced by the visual literacy audiences have developed from TikTok, YouTube and Instagram. Viewers are comfortable processing fast edits and dense streams of information. But simply cutting faster isn’t enough. Sound design becomes particularly important: perhaps turning something like a car-door slam into percussion or overlapping snippets of dialogue with music and effects.
The key is to think in waves rather than maintaining maximum intensity. Build speed with short shots and layered sound, then deliberately create a pause. Drop the soundtrack, hold a frame longer than expected or let one piece of natural sound punch through. The quiet moment makes the next burst of energy feel faster. Rule 5: Don’t think in one frame Split screens aren’t new, but audiences are changing. Social platforms have trained viewers to understand several pieces of visual information simultaneously, which is making multi-frame storytelling increasingly useful. Two, three or four windows can show parallel action, different viewpoints or multiple stages of a story within the same few seconds. This is particularly valuable when a social media piece may last only 15 or 30 seconds. Vertical delivery opens another opportunity. Instead of treating 9:16 as an irritating crop, stacking several images vertically can make the format part of the creative intent.
Think about these variations at the shooting stage. Capture complementary wide, medium and detail shots. Look for movements that can match across frames. Leave compositions capable of working beside rather than just after one another. Plan the finished composition before you shoot. Decide which elements will appear simultaneously and give each one a job. Avoid filling every panel with competing movement. Repeated shapes, matched action, complementary camera moves and consistent colour can help separate shots feel like one deliberate composition. Rule 6: Put music in before pictures Music is often chosen when the edit is already under way. Perhaps the biggest creative change on the audio side is bringing that decision much further forward, sometimes making the track part of the original treatment. One trend takes this to its logical extreme: the song is the concept. Here, a film is constructed around one track from the outset. Its rhythm, lyrics and emotional
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September/October 2026
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