Downton Abby - Social Status and Camera Shots

As part of my media course I was asked to to watch a four minute clip of Dowton Abby and then pick out certain Camera Angles and Shots that were used.

At the beginning of the dialogue the camera showed a long shot of two women one who was dressed in black while the other one was dressed in grey. The grey women was shown as being closer to the camera as well as being closer to the the centre frame. This shows us that the women in grey is more upper class and more significant than the women in black. In Downton Abbey we saw two women sitting on the lawn with the mansion in the background. This is called a long shot and in this clip it is used to show us as the audience the setting of the scene and from that we get the impression that the two women who are in the shot are very important as the camera focuses on there conversation. In addition, we learn from the long shot that the butler who serves the two ladies there afternoon tea on the lawn is not as important and his from a working class as the camera only shows him briefly serving the ladies before switching to a mid shot of him walking back to the mansion. One of the most important characters that we saw in the 4 minute clip was the owner of the house. Also in Downton Abbey different angles are used when the Butler and the Chauffeur are talking . When the Butler is talking we see the camera angle go up to make the Butler look more important compared to the Chauffeur where the camera angle goes down to show that the Chauffeur is less important than the the Butler who is in a higher position within the house. This is in contrast to to when the owner and the butler are speaking as the buttler is always shown to the side of the shot compared with the owner who is nearly always in the middle which show that he is the most important person in the shot.


Thanks for reading