insert (thing)

The film's screenplay will often note when inserts are needed, and the shots themselves are usually small in scale, which is why they can be "picked up" anywhere. (A pick-up is also a shot made after-the-fact, the difference being that it will often require the actors and the set for matching purposes.) Inserts often actually involve, for example, somebody else's hands manipulating an object.

Good examples of typical inserts are:

• anything appearing in a magazine or newspaper (Why waste the actors' and technicians' valuable time when such a small item can be filmed anywhere?)
• A gun or other weapon (to help clarify for the audience just exactly what is happening.)
• Computer screens (are often inserts, particularly in low-budget films. In an elaborate feature film, the actor would be integrated into the scene involving the computer, walking past it, reflected in it, etc., thus making the shot more expensive and difficult to achieve.)
• Drug preparation and other Small Objects (anything that needs intricate manipulation is often shot as an insert.)
• Signs, license plates (anything that can be separated from the larger, more expensive set.)

Since inserts can be shot literally months after the film is completed, frequently the process is overseen by the film's editor, who--more than anyone-- knows just exactly what shot is needed in order for the film to make sense.

The most famous insert sequence I can think of occurs in Francis Ford Coppola's Vietnam War masterpiece, Apocalypse Now. All the footage of Martin Sheen's character, Willard, going through Col. Kurtz's dossier on the way up the river consists of inserts. High quality, very expensive comparatively, but none-the-less shot long after the fact, inserts.

There are specialists in Hollywood--prop men, cameramen, lighting experts--who do nothing else except shoot inserts. Frequently they will even insert another actress's legs (or other pertinant body part) into a film, that the audience might thus enjoy the scene more.

1. Hecho en Mejico
   
2. Entrances
   
3. Sam's Song
   
4. Hemingway and Fortuna
   
5. Hummingbird on the Left
   
6. The Long and Drunken Afternoon
   
7. Safe in the Lap of the Gods
   
8. Quetzal Birds in Love
   
9. Angela in Paradise
   
10. And the machine ran backwards