Framing a Interview - The Rule of Two Thirds - Rizwana Jawid

The rule of two thirds is a concept in film and video production where the framing of the scene is divided into nine imaginary fragments. The image above shows an example of how the frame is divided. When framing an interview, it is necessary to make sure that there is not too much head room and that the main focus of the scene is taking up two thirds of the screen. The camera should be positioned so that the interviewee in the documentary does not have direct eye contact with the camera.

Another issue that needs to be taken into consideration is that the background which is being used should not be distracting the main focus of the shot. For example, plant pots sticking out from behind the interviewee’s head.