technique · 10 recipes
Dolly Shot (Push In)
The camera translates on a smooth supported path, changing viewpoint and spatial overlap rather than only image scale.
Selected recipe
Dolly
This is the default recipe for the Dolly Translation family.
Free short AI video prompt
A starter line you can copy. The full timed recipe, still-image and production prompts are on the shot card.
Prompt rule: Translate the camera through the declared path at fixed focal length. Let foreground/background perspective change; focus may track distance, and only explicitly declared aiming compensation is allowed.
Dolly: The camera translates on a smooth supported path, changing viewpoint and spatial overlap rather than only image scale. Keep the subject readable; motivate camera and light.
Technique guide
- When to use
- Let the audience get close to a detail, or step back from the character to reveal the context.
- How it works
- Given the start and end distance, movement time, and spatial channel, first rule out passing through tables or collisions. Move the camera along the actual path and track focus; verify using near and far layer parallax instead of simple image scaling.
- Common mistakes
- Fixed camera position zoom pretending to be tracking movement Unintentionally entering the subject at the endpoint or turning a waist shot into an extreme close-up of the face
How to read this page
Dolly Shot (Push In) is one technique in Camera Movement. The definition states the single mechanism the frame has to show. The technique guide covers when to use it, the steps, the usual mistakes, how it differs from the neighbors, and what a successful take looks like.
The clip above is one reading, made with a third-party video model. Another model, or the same model on another day, can land on a different frame. It is an example, not a promise that a prompt will match it.
The free short prompt is a starter sentence. The shot card is the timed recipe: scene, start and end frames, action, light, and color. Three sample cards are free on the site. The rest are part of GrokCine Pro. A second name for the same shot keeps its own URL and points back at this definition.
When you write a prompt, keep the one mechanism in the definition, then name the subject, the motion, and why the light is there. Do not stack a neighboring technique into the same sentence. If the name or the example is wrong, send this page's URL from the contact page.
Prompt versions
Same technique, different prompts. Version A is the latest prompt; older versions are the exact prompts that kept clips were made from. Each version shows every model that used it.
Version A · latest：Last carver · narrow shoemaker's room
Version A · Scene of this version (English, verbatim)
A last-carver in a grey shop coat stands by a maple shoe last clamped in a vise inside a narrow cobbler bay, with a leather-roll rack near the left edge and a frosted alley door far behind.
The full prompt of every version comes with the member recipe.
sha256 60223810fd07
Recipe
8 seconds · single take
A last-carver in a grey shop coat stands by a maple shoe last clamped in a vise inside a narrow cobbler bay, with a leather-roll rack near the left edge and a frosted alley door far behind.
Shot cards
The full recipe for Dolly is a shot card
The full recipe for Dolly is a shot card. The start and end frames, timed action, lighting and color specs, a camera parameter table, copy-ready still-image and video prompts and negatives are open to GrokCine Pro members on the web.
Related families
- Zoom Shot (Crash Zoom)
Zoom Shot (Crash Zoom)A zoom changes focal length from a fixed camera station, altering field of view and image scale without dolly-style parallax. - Dolly Zoom (Vertigo Effect)
FreeDolly Zoom (Vertigo Effect)A dolly zoom pairs forward travel with zooming wider, or backward travel with zooming tighter, to hold subject size while changing perspective. - Tracking Shot (Follow Shot)
Tracking Shot (Follow Shot)A tracking shot travels through space with a moving subject along a defined route. - Pan Shot (Whip Pan)
Pan Shot (Whip Pan)A pan turns the camera around its vertical axis from a fixed station, changing horizontal direction without sideways travel. - Tilt Shot
Tilt ShotA tilt pitches the camera around a horizontal axis from one fixed station, changing vertical direction without changing support height. - Crane Shot (Jib / Boom)
Crane Shot (Jib / Boom)A crane shot transports the camera on a supported arm through a designed vertical and horizontal path rather than rotating from a tripod.
Seen in these film styles
More in Camera Movement
References
Sources we studied for this technique. External links; we don't embed them.
Articles & definitions
- Wikipedia: Camera dolly
Wikipedia · Web
A wheeled cart or track platform that carries the camera for smooth moves toward, away or alongside the subject.
Videos
- Spielberg's dolly-in toward a face, after John Ford
@doctorfrusna · 2022-02-21 · X
Spielberg, following John Ford, almost always has a dolly-in toward a face.
- The Texas Chain Saw Massacre: swing-chair dolly shot
@Film89UK · 2024-10-20 · X
The swing-chair dolly shot in The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974).
- The Shining: a dolly shot capturing the film's themes
@WritingValentin · 2021-03-02 · X
A dolly shot from The Shining capturing the film's themes.