How to prepare a university film class with scene-study materials

StoryFolder — 2026-09-13

Last updated: 11 September 2026.

Pick a sequence of about two minutes that students can watch legally. Break it into shots and check the cuts. Decide which formal features students will record for each shot, then work one observation through to a claim in front of them. Hand out a printed board, set the assignment, and tell them exactly what to submit. That is the whole preparation, and most of the work is in choosing the clip and designing the fields. The shot list itself is the quick part.

To build the board, import the clip into StoryFolder, a desktop app for Mac and Windows. It detects the shots, puts a thumbnail next to each one, and gives you fields for the notes you want students to take. It doesn't supply the film, streaming rights or a place to hand in work. Your library and your LMS still do those jobs.

Seton Hall's digital humanities blog describes the job this replaces. Branden Buehler's earlier version of a shot-analysis assignment for Introduction to Visual Theory & Technique had students "making a new slide for each shot in the clip", and short clips "can still contain upwards of 50 individual shots." The screenshot work was, in his words, "a burden that potentially distracts from the broader goals of the assignment" (Seton Hall University).

What should students be able to do after this scene study?

They should be able to identify what is on screen, describe it in the course's vocabulary, spot a pattern across shots, and argue for what that pattern does. Write that down as the learning outcome before you choose a clip, because it decides the fields.

University assignments line up on this. The University of Washington's Comparative Literature 270 asks for "a numbered, shot-by-shot breakdown of the sequence", usually two to three pages, covering "type of shot, mobile framing, lighting, transitions". That's followed by a four-to-five-page essay on "how these various elements of film technique and style construct meaning in the sequence" (UW CL 270). San Jose State's RTVF 10 sequence analysis has students fill in a shot list for a 12-shot, two-minute sequence from Psycho first. The essay only starts after the instructor has corrected the shot list (SJSU).

So the log and the argument are two separate stages, and the log exists to feed the argument. York's writing guide on reading film puts the same move to students plainly: "Choose a sequence of two or more shots and discuss how they are edited together" (University of York).

Which clip will survive close viewing in class?

Short. Julia Keblinska's classroom guide for Ohio State's East Asian Studies Center calls shot-by-shot sequence analysis "the bedrock of film analysis", and warns that it means "potentially hours of work for minutes of film" (Ohio State). The SJSU choice of 12 shots in two minutes is a good first-exercise size.

Check a candidate against this list:

Rights come first, before import. StoryFolder works on a file on your computer and doesn't grant you any right to that file. Where a clip can be used for teaching is a question for your library or your institution's copyright guidance. The University of Sussex's Video Essays module, for one, puts "how to approach issues of copyright law and fair use" inside the course itself (Sussex, P3099).

If the source has no captions, StoryFolder transcribes speech on your own computer and exports SRT and WebVTT subtitle files for free. Check the transcript before you hand it out, because transcription gets worse with overlapping speech and noisy audio.

How do I turn the clip into a verified shot board?

Import the excerpt, let StoryFolder find the cuts, fix the ones it gets wrong, and pick a good frame for each shot. For a two-minute clip that is minutes of work.

1. Import the file. Click + New, then Import from File…, and choose your excerpt, or drop the file onto the window. StoryFolder accepts .mp4, .mov, .mkv, .avi, .webm and .mts, and it reads the file where it sits without changing it (Import from a video file).
2. Scroll the board. Each detected shot appears as a thumbnail in order. Look for two kinds of mistake: one thumbnail that clearly holds two setups (a missed cut), and two thumbnails of the same framing side by side (a false cut). Dissolves and fades are the usual place for a missed cut. Camera shake and someone crossing the frame are the usual cause of a false one.
3. Open Analyze and read the shortest shot. The duration panel lists your shortest shot. A tenth of a second is usually a stray frame or two that got split off, so jump to it (Shot duration metrics).
4. If the whole board is off, move the sensitivity slider and let it re-detect. Too few shots, raise it. Too many, lower it. Do this before anyone writes notes. The slider rebuilds the shot list, and notes only survive intact on shots whose boundaries didn't change (Detection sensitivity).
5. Fix single mistakes with Split and Merge. Press C and click the frame where the missing shot should start. Press J and click the first and last shot of a range to merge them. Splitting copies the notes to both halves (Splitting & merging).
6. Choose the thumbnail. By default each shot shows its first frame, which can be motion blur or the tail of a dissolve. Press F, click the shot, scrub to the frame that shows what the shot is, and set it. That frame is what prints on the handout (Custom thumbnails).

Three detected shots from scene 13 of Run Rabbit*, a short film used with permission. The ringed gap is the cut the detector found at 00:13:14.*

Then decide, as the instructor, where the boundaries are. SJSU corrects student shot lists before the essay for good reason: boundary disagreements are real teaching material. A slow dissolve can reasonably be logged as one shot or two. Choose, and write down which.

Scale matters for the plan. The free plan holds 6 boards of up to 50 shots each, which fits a normal teaching excerpt with room to spare. A whole feature runs to thousands of shots and needs Pro.

Which fields belong in this lesson?

Only the fields your learning outcome needs, usually six to eight. Students will fill in every one for every shot, so each field is labour you're assigning.

A workable starting set, mapped to what each one teaches:

Use a Dropdown or Tag wherever the answers come from a known list. Everyone then writes MCU the same way, and you can filter the board to every medium close-up in one step. Keep Text for description and argument, where a fixed list would do the thinking for them. The six field types and what each does are in Field types.

The lesson's fields on shot 239. Every Autofill switch is off, which is how every field starts. The values are examples written for this page.

You create them in Preferences → Notes & Data with + Add Field (Custom fields). Fields belong to your account, so a set you build for one class is there when you import the next scene. If you'd rather start from a suggestion, type what the lesson is about into AI field discovery, "shot-by-shot analysis of a film sequence for an introductory class", and add the fields you want. It suggests a structure and fills in nothing (AI field discovery). Rename its suggestions to match the terms your course textbook uses.

What should the instructor model before students begin?

One complete worked chain on your own board, projected: a single shot described, a pattern across neighbouring shots, a careful claim, and a reading that pushes back.

• One shot, described. Fill in every field for one shot, out loud. Show that Observation holds only what is on screen: "the camera stays at eye level on her while he's framed from slightly above."
• One pattern. Filter the board by one field value and show what's left. Every CU in the sequence, say, and when they arrive.
• One claim. Say what the pattern might do, and say it tentatively: "the closer framings come as she stops answering, which puts us with her silence."
• One counter-reading. Name a shot that doesn't fit, and show how the claim has to change to cover it.

Stop there. The rest of the sequence is theirs.

StoryFolder's AI Autofill can fill in fields like Shot scale or Angle by looking at each shot, and it's included on every plan (the free plan covers an account's first 100 shots). It fills only the fields you switch on, and every field starts switched off. For your own master board that can save typing on the visible, list-type fields. For a student assignment, leave the analytical fields to the student, and treat anything the model wrote as something to check. Naming shot scale correctly is often the point of the exercise.

Which artifact belongs at each teaching moment?

Four versions of the same board, each for a different moment:

The PDF prints only the fields visible in the editor, so one board gives you two handouts (PDF storyboard export). Leave Observation and Question visible on the shots you're studying and you have a discussion handout. Hide everything but the list fields and students get a worksheet with the thumbnails already in place and room to write. It's formatted for letter-size paper, and PDF export is free.

A discussion handout exported as a PDF. The notes are examples written for the page.

The share link is a web page with Storyboard, Grid and List views, and viewers don't need an account. Two limits matter here. Viewers can read it but can't comment on it or edit it. And when the board came from a local file, which a teaching excerpt usually will, the page shows thumbnails and notes but no video player (What viewers see). Publishing with notes included shows every shot-level field, so publish the master only when you want students to see the answers, and open the link yourself before sending it.

What someone sees at a share link: notes to read, nothing to edit, and no player for a board made from a local file.

How do students submit work and how is it reviewed?

Through your existing LMS or email, as a file. StoryFolder has three things a student can hand in:

• A PDF of their board, with thumbnails and their notes. Free on every plan.
• A spreadsheet, one row per shot with start time, end time, duration and a column per field. That's Pro.
• A share link you open in a browser. It's read-only, so your feedback goes back through the LMS, not onto the board.

StoryFolder has no class roster, no shared editing, no comment threads and no assignment collection. If the assignment itself is a discussion on the timeline, where students reply to one another's notes, a hosted-video annotation tool fits that better. The comparison sibling covers when.

For a student working on their own computer, the free plan's 50-shot boards cover a short sequence. Students are the ones doing the logging, so it's worth them having their own copy: StoryFolder runs on a student's Mac or Windows laptop, and boards are built in the desktop app. It won't run on a Chromebook or iPad.

What changes for a 50-shot scene or a feature film?

The same method, with more checking of boundaries and a narrower question.

Past 50 shots you're on Pro, or on the education plan. Scroll the board for doubled and merged thumbnails and read the shortest shots in Analyze, the same as with a short clip. Nobody should watch a feature at full speed to check cuts. Two hours of film is two hours of watching, and the board and the shortest-shot list find the mistakes faster.

Give students a narrower question than "log everything". Most useful questions about a feature are about one pattern: how the reaction shots change between the first and last scene, or where the long takes fall. Have them fill one or two fields across the whole board and leave the rest empty. Filtering then does the comparison. The Analyze view's shot-duration numbers (total, average, median, longest, shortest) are free and follow whatever filter is active. The duration-over-time chart and the per-field charts are Pro.

Is there an education plan?

Yes. Approved educators get a year of Pro free, and approved students get Pro at a reduced rate for a year. Each person applies individually on the education page, and an educator's approval doesn't cover their class. Start on the free plan with one short scene first. The education plan only matters once you need more than 50 shots or the spreadsheet.

FAQ

How long should a clip be for a first shot-by-shot exercise? One to three minutes. San Jose State's RTVF 10 uses a 12-shot, two-minute sequence from Psycho.

Can students use StoryFolder for free? Yes. The free plan holds 6 boards of up to 50 shots each, with custom fields and PDF export included. Spreadsheet export and the charts are Pro.

Does StoryFolder supply films or clip licences? No. It works on a video file you already have, so access and permission come from your library or institution.

Can students comment on a shared StoryFolder board? No. Share links are view-only in Storyboard, Grid and List layouts, so feedback goes through your LMS or email.

Will the shared board play the clip? Only for boards imported from a public YouTube link. A board built from a local file shows thumbnails and notes without a player.

Does AI Autofill do the analysis for students? No. It fills only the fields you switch on, by looking at each shot. It suits visible traits like shot scale, and its output still needs checking.

What should a student hand in? A PDF of their board, or a spreadsheet on Pro, plus the essay. Collection and grading stay in your LMS.

Does StoryFolder run on Chromebooks or iPads? No. Boards are built in the desktop app on Mac or Windows, and a published board opens in any browser.

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