I was trying to find out what a "wide shot" is. I figured it should be an industry standard term.
I searched Google with various search terms like:
- photography what does it mean to take a wide shot
- videography what does it mean to take a wide shot
- videography photography what does it mean to take a wide shot
(In quoted material below, emphasis is mine).
I found this on Google (this was shown in full, at the top of the Google results):
Long shot - Wikipedia
In photography, filmmaking and video production, a long shot (sometimes referred to as a full shot or, and to remove ambiguity, wide shot) typically shows the entire object or human figure and is usually intended to place it in some relation to its surroundings.
Then below that, under "People also ask:", the next result I looked at was:
What does a long shot mean in film?
Definition: Long Shot - purdue.edu
LONG SHOT: In film, a view of a scene that is shot from a considerable distance, so that people appear as indistinct shapes. An extreme long shot is a view from an even greater distance, in which people appear as small dots in the landscape if at all (eg. a shot of New York's skyline).
And then I found this one:
What is the definition of very wide shot?
Camera Shots - Media College - mediacollege.com
EWS (Extreme Wide Shot) The view is so far from the subject that he isn't even visible. Often used as an establishing shot. VWS (Very Wide Shot) The subject is visible (barely), but the emphasis is still on placing him in his environment.
Then on another search:
Filmmaking 101: Camera Shot Types | B&H Explora
Extreme Long Shot (aka Extreme Wide Shot) Used to show the subject from a distance, or the area in which the scene is taking place. ... Medium Long Shot (aka 3/4 Shot) Intermediate between Full Shot and Medium Shot. Shows subject from the knees up.
Across all these definitions, there is very little agreement and a whole lot of conflicting statements.
I would tend to discount the Wikipedia definition, especially since some of the other results are about videography/photography/filmmaking education, but in this case, the Wikipedia definition seems to be one that could be correct.
Which is correct (for "wide shot"), and, what would be considered an "industry standard" source for terminology definitions?