This piece of paperwork tells us how much the production is going to cost as a whole, including travel along with what props/costumes that need to be bought. For our piece, we didn't have to purchase anything, and we didn't travel anywhere.
Location Recce
This piece of paperwork is used for scouting out locations to film at, in this case, we covered the whole of the college.
Production Schedule
This gives us a time table of events, telling us what needs to be completed on what day. Without this, we wouldn't know what we were filming on what days, and so on.
Location Release
This piece of paperwork gives us permission to film on the location that we chose. In this case, we chose East Norfolk Sixth Form College as a whole for recording.
Actor Releases
Actor releases are pieces of paperwork that give us the rights to show the people within the film/documentary.
Primary research is research that has been conducted by myself, and in this case, I used a questionnaire to get answers on my documentary idea, asking people if they would watch it, and what they would like it to include.
The primary research taught me that a lot of people would be interested in a documentary that revolved around the idea of showing how it has changed our daily lives, being done in a timeline method. Many people also said that it would appeal to a large audience that use technology in their everyday lives, and that they would find it interesting to see how it has changed their lives.
Secondary Research:
Secondary research is research that has been conducted by others on the topic that I am looking at, that allows me to get a feel for the reactions of people in general to my documentary idea.
Secondary research has told me that technology has had both a positive and negative impact on our lives. In many cases, it has vastly improved the student aspect of live, but it has also led us to become less sociable, and also have problems such as people getting addicted to media, that is easily accessed through technology.
All of my ideas have been noted in the prezi above, but I have to choose the one that I like the most and give a more in-depth explanation about how I would do it, the target audience of the documentary.
The idea that I like the most is "Advanced Technology". The basic concept of this idea is to go over the advancement of technology over the past, talking about the first breakthrough and then going on to talk about the rapid increase in technology, and how fast it was improving. It would give a small timeline from how it all started to the point that we are at today. If there was still enough time at the end, it would then talk about what could happen in the future with the rapid advancement of technology.
There won't be many interviews about this, if any. This would be presented using an expository documentary style, however, if it had interviews, it would be an interactive documentary instead. The genre of the documentary would be education, but it could also come under special interest. The primary target audience would be people who show interest into the progression of technology. The secondary audience would be those who have a general interest in technology, The Demographics would be A & B, and the psychographics would be explorers. The main aim of the documentary would be to show the audience the incredible speed of which technology has advanced, especially over the last 50 years. The majority of it will be filmed within the college grounds, but some of it will need to be done outside of the college grounds, so we can get the opinions on how technology has affected the elderly, and how they find it useful. The crew for this would need to be small, mainly the cameraman and an person to do the voice-over, but it would also need to include people who we would be interviewing. There would be questions such as "How has technology affected your life?" and "Do you know how much technology you use everyday?" The only equipment that we will need would be a Camera, Tripod and SD card, possibly a microphone, just so that the people being interviewed can be easily heard. Nothing will need to be bought in, meaning the budget would only include travel; the maximum budget would be around £5.
Feedback:
We had to share our idea for the documentary to the class, and then receive feedback on the idea. One piece of feedback that I received is that I should make sure that the documentary is focused on a specific part of of the advancement of technology, meaning the social side of it. This would mean interviewing a range of different people, getting them to say how they use technology in their everyday lives. This is changed from the original idea of showing the progression of technology, and how it has advanced.
Three minute wonders are small clips of people talking about a certain subject. As the name suggests, they are three minutes in length, and some can be strange. I had to find three of these three minute wonders that I liked, and then state what I like about them.
Karl Pilkington - Life
In this three minute wonder, Karl Pilkington talks about his opinions on life, and his impressions of how far we have come. What I like about this three minute wonder is that he is completely blunt with his opinions, even when they have no logic behind them. These clips of his are usually on big subjects (such as this one - Life), that people debate and think about extensively, but he just gives his opinions on it, speaking how he feels about the subject.
Though it isn't very informational, it has an aspect of humour to it, and allows the audience to appreciate his opinions.
The Wall - Pure Evil
In this three minute wonder, the street artist "Pure Evil" creates a piece of art combining a unicorn and a rocket launcher. In this, I really liked the piece of art that he created, but he also had an interesting commentary about what he was doing, and what it was like, giving some story to what it is like to be a street artist. He states his views about it. I really liked the part where he was talking about his habit of repainting "welcome to hell" outside of a nursery, before then realising and being considerate, and moving his art elsewhere.
Jeff Koons - "Three Ball Total Equilibrium Tank"
In this three minute wonder, it is a bunch of school kids commenting on a piece created using three basketballs, and suspending them within the air. What I liked about this was that everyone who had something to comment on it had a different opinion, and interpreted the art differently. Someone were narrow-minded, whereas others tried to look into what the artist was thinking when he came up with the idea. I especially liked the conflicting opinions that people were giving, some annoyed that it managed to make money of such a piece, and others really trying to understand and interpret the piece.
a documentary is a piece of media that aims to be informative and give the audience the truth about a topic. The true definition is "A Film, TV Programme, or Radio Programme that provides a factual report on a particular subject." The defining characteristic of a documentary is that it aims to provide the audience a factual representation of a subject.
This can be achieved in many ways, and there are many different directors that use different types of documentary to portray the facts. In total, there are five different types of documentaries that a director can produce, depending on what style they prefer and is most suitable to the subject.
Expository Documentary
An expository documentary usually has a voice-over that will address the audience about what is going on within the scene. This, however, is only giving meaning to what it happening in the scene, not giving opinions about what subject. All the facts that are in the documentary are provided by the voice-over. The images within the scene are to compliment and show what the voice-over is talking about.
Expository documentaries has the effect of objectivity, along with direct and transparent representation of what is happening in the subject.
An example of an expository documentary is one by David Attenborough, called 'Desert Seas'. In the documentary, he talks about two oceans that are right next to each other, yet have completely different characteristics.
(A small trailer about what the documentary is about) This is an expository documentary as it has characteristics as described above. David Attenborough is simply a voice-over, explaining what is happening within the two seas without actually being there, and it has images that accompany his voice, showing what he is talking about. It has the aim of objectivity, with showing the audience the beauty of the two seas without including any bias opinions about the subject.
Observational Documentary
An observational documentary presents a slice of life, without getting involved with the scene. The director does nothing to interfere with what is happening within the documentary, and instead is a passive bystander watching how things occur and the end of life. The recording is neutral, and stays non-judgmental, leaving the audience to decide what they think about the documentaries subject.
An example of an observational documentary is Armadillo, directed by Janus Metz. This documentary shows what is it like in the Danish army, presenting the audience with what happens when they are on duty.
This is observational, as the director doesn't get involved within the film at all, and instead, simply films what happens as it occurs. It is completely non-judgemental, and just aims to provide the audience with an insight about what happens out on the battlefield. All of the scenes that are in the documentary are how they played out at the actual time, with no major editing to change show the subject in a different light.
Interactive Documentary
An interactive documentary involves the filmmaker has a direct role within the documentary, as they participate as one of the people in the documentary. They will be interactions between the interviewees, the presenter and event the audiences. Generally, these will have the presenters argument/agendas out in the open. This type of documentary will usually be edited to manipulate the text and what happens within it. Because they are sometimes edited to manipulate the facts, this type will often get criticised, but it is defended by filmmakers saying that the projected imagine is more important than the fine details.
An example of an interactive documentary is Louis Theroux, 'Drinking to Oblivion'. This documentary follows Louis Theroux as he meets those who have an alcoholic problem, and who are slowly killing themselves due to it.
This is an interactive documentary because the camera follows Louis Theroux, the filmmaker, as he interviews and follows the experiences of those who are killing themselves with alcohol. He will usually address the audience when he isn't with an interviewee. Though he addresses the audience, he will only do this if he believes that he has got everything he can from a certain scene, and that it is time to move on.
Reflexive Documentary
A reflexive documentary is one where the filmmaker attempts to expose the conventions of documentary to the audience. This will use shots from everyday life, however, these will be edited in order to portray a subject in a different light than it might appear than if it was unedited.
An example of a reflexive documentary is 'Driving Me Crazy' by Nick Boomfield. This documentary follows a musical being produced, following all the dancer/singers/choreographers as they put together their musical for the world to see.
This is a reflexive documentary as the filmmaker doesn't get involved, but it is edited in such a way that it produces a different view to what it would have been like at the time, making sure that it was still engaging for the audience to watch.
Performative Documentary
This type of documentary represents the world indirectly, and has emphasis on the presentation rather than content. It will use a lot of re-enactments, exaggerated camera positions and soundtracks to help the audience become submerged within the diegesis (the world of the manner). This type of documentary aims to present the subject matter in a subjective, expressive, stylised, evocative and visceral manner.
An example of a performative documentary is 'Tongues Untied', by Marlon Riggs. The documentary follows Riggs, as it depicts him growing up. This is a performative documentary as it is very subjective with it's views, and will involve the audience within the documentary by submerging them into the diegesis. It has an emphasis on presentation rather than the content.
Conclusion:
In my opinion, I believe the best documentaries are those that manage to get the facts out to the audience, without having to twist the footage in order to make it suitable for their needs. How they present this is their choice, but they also have to make sure that it isn't a dry documentary to watch. Because of this, I think interactive documentaries are the best types of documentaries, when it isn't heavily manipulated to skew the facts onto one side.
However, all documentaries have elements of truth to them, just some more than others, so they're all good for their purpose, allowing the audience to find out about subjects they usually wouldn't be able to.
