Month: July 2017

For project brief 1, we were asked to create a short video discussing our motivations for making documentary, and other various elements. In mine, I used mostly found video clips of different documentaries I had watched and found that not only inspired me, but also offered up ideas to me about my own documentary making.

Within this studio, I hope to do some experimenting with the kind of documentary I make. I myself have made very little documentary, only one video portrait with documentary elements, so much of what I do will be using experimentation to decide what exactly I want to make. I was drawn to the studio by the ‘not-for-profit organisation’ element, as making campaigns for organisations is something I may be hoping to do in the future. With a lot of campaigning, you don’t often see the use of documentary, so I would like to experiment with how I could use documentary to make something worthy of use to a NFP.

Throughout this class, I hope to do some experimenting, not just with the actual documentary ideas, but also with the way I shoot the documentary. I have been quite inspired by the show ‘Catfish’, which falls more on the reality TV side of things rather than documentary, but it does have certain elements that really draw me in. In the show, one of the hosts carries around a digital camera and, while there is a proper crew there shooting the show, he shoots different elements using a digital camera, making it seem more personal. Throughout the show the actual camera men are often seen as well with their cameras, rather than hiding or editing them out. It makes everything feel so much more authentic and real, which is what I hope to achieve with whatever I make in documentary.

 

If you want to see Project Brief 1, head to : https://vimeo.com/227367581

While it feels like the holidays only began yesterday, this week I am back at it again, week one of semester two. This semester in media I joined the studio ‘Documentary as Action’, which is quite out of the box for me, as i’ve never really thought of myself as much of a documentary maker.

I was initially drawn to the studio at the mention of the not-for-profit organisations. While I am extremely indecisive about what I want to do in the future, I do like the thought of making different campaigns for organisations, and learning how to do this with documentary, something that could be seen as unusual or unique.

I haven’t made many of my own documentaries. so doing this studio is a bit of a challenge for me. I’ve made some basic things, one in particular about a friend for an earlier media class, but nothing major, though I am hoping to change that.

In terms of the documentary I am interested in, I quite enjoy documentaries that tell a strong story. I enjoy crime documentaries that draw me in with facts and twists, those in particular that use actors to act scenes out and demonstrate what happened. I also enjoy documentaries about peoples lives. I enjoy following along and learning something along the way.

This week in class, we have done a number of activities to try and not only define documentary, but also try to work out what sort of documentary we want to make, by looking at issues that are important to us, what makes us happy and sad, and what type of documentary we ourselves enjoy.

Truth be told, i’m still not sure what documentary I wish to make. As I said, I do enjoy the idea of making something that could be used as a campaign of some sort with a not for profit organisation. From our talks in class, I have also thought about the idea about the issue surrounding over use of phones and social media. I myself have been trying to limit my own social media usage, so making a documentary surrounding this would be interesting to me. We also discussed, during one of our group discussions, making a documentary about a retail worker and their experience on the job.This lead me to thinking about school crossing guards, and the interesting stories they would have, not just about their experiences, but also about their life stories.

 

This week has been an interesting introduction to documentary, and has begun to open my eyes to what documentary is and what I hope to make. I do still have further to go, and hope in the next couple of weeks to really nail down my ideas!