The Master Guide / 10 Voice and lip sync · Speaking shots and lip sync

Harder speaking shots

Three tools for speaking shots that need more than the plate's basic lines.

Option: use it when a hero line plays flat [single strong source]. Add a DELIVERY MAP block, direction only and never spoken.

Split each line into phrases of a few words at the take's word timestamps.
Give each phrase one physical cause, timed: "0.9–1.6 s she holds a breath before the words; 1.6–2.4 s her shoulders drop and her eyes go to the window".
It directs the face and body only. Its words are never quoted.
Why: a single emotion held across the whole line plays back flat.

For horror and night scenes:

Keep the frame dark, but light the mouth from a motivated source in frame: a torch held low, a phone screen, a dashboard, or a practical within a metre of the face.
Set it about one stop above the shadow side of the face.
If the scene can't hold that source, move the line: to an off-screen read, to a silhouette, the line heard over the picture without lip sync, or to a cut-away.

Use the two-hander pattern [best available, not yet validated]:

One continuous master, the camera moving, carries the touch, the looks, the reactions and the geography. Nobody speaks in it.
Each speaker gets a sound-off speaking shot (the default route), cut into the master at real cuts on clearly different angles.
In the edit, a recorded line runs over the master only where the speaker's mouth doesn't read.
Why: the master's reactions sit between the lines, so the scene keeps its breath while every line keeps exact sync.