Planning · DirectingNO.163 / 166

Watch: She sits at the table in a wide shot; cut in a close-up of a phone screen lighting up, then back to the wide. The audience knows what she received, and the cut also hides the mismatch between the two shots.A line-art demo that only illustrates the technique, not finished footage.

Planning · Directing

Insert Shot插入镜头

Cut in a close-up of an object in the middle of a scene: a letter, a message, a trembling hand.

Category: Directing
Group: Basics
Medium: Planning
Library: 163 / 166

This is a step in making a film, not a visual technique. For the whole process, see Make an AI short from scratch.

Prompt templates are written from how generation models usually behave and have not yet been verified one by one with real generations. “Common pitfalls” are judgment from experience, not official limits.

When to use it

Delivering key information, foreshadowing, covering a continuity gap between two shots.

Prompt template

insert shot, close-up of a phone screen lighting up on a table with an unread message, shallow depth of field, blurred room behind, locked-off, 2 seconds.

Sample prompt · generate a video directly

The technique comes first, followed by the scene, action, performance and duration. Paste it straight into a video model and swap in your own characters and plot.

Insert shot, close-up: the delivery rider's cold-reddened hand holds his phone as the screen lights up with a message from his mother: a photo of the New Year's Eve dinner table, an empty bowl and chopsticks set at one place. Shallow depth of field, blurred station lights in the background, locked-off camera, 2 seconds. (Add the on-screen text in post.)

Common pitfalls

The inserted object looks different from the shots around it (color or model changed).
Garbled text on the screen, so the information can't be read.
An insert held so long it breaks the rhythm.

Parameter tips

1 to 3 s; add any on-screen text in post rather than letting the model generate it.