Documentary Research Part 1

 And so it begins... 

So as I briefly mentioned in my last blog post we have begun documentaries in Aice Media. And creating documentaries or beginning to understand how to produce one comes with a lot of excess research. Mrs. Stocklosa, my aice media teacher exposed my class to many different impactful documentaries to show us not only different narratives and techniques but the proper way a documentary can be planned, shot, and edited. 

The first documentary I watched in class was one called American Promise by Joe Brewster and Michele Stephenson. This story showcases two black students who get put into a prestigious Dalton school where they not only face academic struggles but also get stereotyped for the color of their skin. It is truly such an incredible documentary and taught me a lot of different techniques that can be used when filming something such as this. For example, when Saun and Idris were little kids (as this was shot from their Kindergarten year until their Senior year) the interviews were direct interviews as the boys may not have known how to thoroughly answer the questions. This was something I never really thought of doing and thought it was very clever to utilize this type of interviewing when the maturity of the interviewee needs to match the type of questions being asked. Also, the candid b-roll used was well done and showed me how even with shaky shots they can be thought of as purposeful so long as they allow the meaning to develop throughout the piece. 

The next documentary I watched was called Exit Through The Gift Shop by Banksy. This documentary focused on the rise and exploitation of the street art genre. Without giving too much away from this piece it was truly shown how much time they put into this piece. For example, in one of the shots you can see the almost 10,000 hours of raw footage that they had to go through in the creation of this documentary. I especially in this piece liked how real the b-roll shot going up close and personal with the artists and getting to see their stories portrayed individually throughout the piece. One thing that was interesting to me was the use of first-hand interviews - meaning that Banksy the director was one of the major interviews throughout the piece. 

Aside from the two major documentaries that we watched, we also were exposed to many Op Docs from the New York Times Website. This showed us shorter more concise documentaries that were submitted by anyone who wished to submit them. For example, some were student-made documentaries and some were more professionally made meaning by adults. 

All of this research in watching documentaries also allowed us to submit assignments where we answered questions discussing techniques and ways in which each documentary developed meaning. For me, I felt like this helped me to keep in mind ways in which to create in own documentary. 

Also, after all our viewings of these documentaries, we got a chance to discuss with our fellow classmates which was a really nice way to enrich my thoughts on these documentaries. For example, after watching "Exit Through the Gift Shop" by Banksy we had an entire conversation about the way in which they recorded broll as well as the shift in documentary style. This allowed me to understand ways to make my own creative vision as well and I'm really glad that I developed my education in documentaries so much over the past month. 

But yeah that's all for part one of my research for documentaries...

Until Next time 

- Emma <3