Crane shot
Also known as: jib shot, boom shot
A shot that rises or falls through the frame on a mechanical arm, which in action filming is almost always flown rather than built.
Updated
What it means
A crane moves the camera vertically through space. The effect is a change of viewpoint rather than of framing, which is why it reads completely differently from a tilt taken from a fixed position.
The traditional version is a counterweighted arm. In action sports almost nobody carries one, and the same move now comes from a drone rising while the gimbal holds its angle.
It is the vertical relative of a Pedestal shot, and the difference between them is mostly scale. One lifts a metre or two and the other can lift fifty.
How it works in practice
A drone does it more easily than a crane ever did. A slow climb with Gimbal pitch held level is one stick movement, and the result is the move that used to require a crew and a truck.
It wants something to reveal at the end. A rise over a ridge or a wall that uncovers a landscape is a Reveal shot built from the vertical movement, which is the useful version of this.
Speed is what separates it from a drone going up. Slow and even reads as deliberate camera work, and the same climb flown quickly reads as somebody repositioning between shots.
What to watch out for
Without a foreground the move does nothing. A rise over open ground changes the altitude and changes nothing in the frame, which is a lot of effort for a shot that reads as drifting.
Exposure shifts as the camera climbs. Rising from shade into sunlight moves the whole frame, so Exposure lock before the climb starts is what keeps the shot usable.
It gets overused in openings. A rise at the start of every edit becomes a signature nobody chose, and one per piece is the honest ration for a move this emphatic.
How RawClip handles it
Vertical moves read as deliberate camera work during analysis, which places them near the start or the end of a sequence rather than among the action. A slow, settled climb scores better than one still accelerating when the clip ends.