A film transition is a technique by which scenes or shots are juxtaposed. Usually accomplished through a cut to the next scene. Most films will also include selective use of styled transitions, usually to convey a tone or mood, suggest the passage of time, or separate parts of the story. These transitions can include dissolves, L cuts, fades (usually to black), match cuts, wipes, and morphs. Jump cuts are considered a technical flaw, unless used to disorient the audience or in an action sequence to show speed. Most jump cuts occur between dissimilar scenes or significantly different views of the same scene to avoid the appearance of a jump. Every effort should be made to make cuts invisible, unobtrusive.

~ Continuity Editing ~

     Continuity Editing is the preferred style of film editing. The purpose of continuity editing is to establish aesthetic and logical coherence between shots. In most films, logical coherence is achieved by cutting to continuity, which emphasizes smooth transition of time and space. However, some films incorporate cutting to continuity into a more complex classical cutting technique, one which also tries to show psychological continuity of shots. The radical montage technique relies on symbolic association of ideas between shots rather than association of simple physical action for its continuity. Montage is a technique of temporal and spatial obscurity rather than a continuous form in its own right, based on symbolic relationships between images.

     Continuity editing falls into two categories: temporal continuity and spatial continuity. Within each category, techniques can either aid or destroy a sense of continuity. In other words, techniques can transition continuously, giving the viewer a logical physical narration to follow, or discontinuous, causing viewer confusion, disorientation, distortion, or even subliminal interpretation or reaction, as in the montage style.

     To preserve temporal continuity films need to avoid ellipsis, using continuous diegetic sound, and match on action. An ellipsis is an obvious break in natural time continuity as it is implied in the film's story. Diegetic sound is what actually occurred within the story during the action being viewed. It is sound that comes from within the narrative world of a film (including off-screen sound). Continuous diegetic sound helps to smooth temporally questionable cuts by layering the shots. Here the logic is that if a sonic occurrence within the action of the scene has no breaks in time, then it would be impossible for the scene and its corresponding visuals to be anything but temporally continuous.

     The match on action technique can preserve temporal continuity where there is an action that is unrepeated and uniformed within the transition. For example, a shot of an actor coming down a flight of stairs can be edited to show two different views, while maintaining temporal continuity by being sure that the second shot shows the continued movement of the subject on the stairs.

     Fade transitions can be used to show a passing of time. A long transition into black will show a long ellipse in time. However, a use of a dissolve from one image to another shows a short transition of time. The nature of the temporal displacement should depict the use of the transition.

~ Flashback Editing ~

     The flashback is a temporal reversal of time within a story, or more accurately, a window through which the audience can see what happened in time before what is considered to be the present.Flashbacks make their time-frame evident only through the scene's action. For example, if after viewing a grown man in the present time-frame of the story, a cut to a young boy being addressed by the man's name occurs, clueing the viewer that the young boy in the scene depicts the character in a time previous to the story present.

~ Montage Editing ~

     The montage technique is one that implies no real temporal continuity whatsoever. Montage is achieved with a collection of symbolically related images, cut together in a way that suggests psychological relationships rather a temporal continuum.

     Spatial continuity like temporal continuity, can be achieved a number of ways: the establishing shot, the 180 degree rule, the eyeline match, and match on action. The theory is that it is difficult for an audience to become disoriented when the story space is presented in fulland not displaced.

     The establishing shot is one that provides a view of the entire space in which the action will occur. The establishing shot can be used at any time as a reestablishing shot if it is deemed necessary to re-orient the audience following a series of complex sequences.

     In order to prevent disorientation of the audience is to adhere to the 180 degree rule. This rule prevents the camera from crossing the imaginary line connecting the subjects of the shot. Another method is the eyeline match. The audience is tricked into following the direction of sight rendered through the looking motion of a character.

     Transitioning through a movie fluidly is what can turn a cheap idea into a sensation of artistry. Where a multi-million dollar epic can be crumbled by the misuse of the film language and bad interpretations in transitions. Once an audience is lost and disoriented, they lose interest in the story. When too much time is devoted to "what just happened?" and "wait, where are we?", the audience no longer cares about the plot or the action, the attention is lost.