Work on your shooting script---consider A-Roll and B-Roll material.
Also, work on your film treatment for Mr. Craddock.
Wednesday, May 15, 2013
Thursday, May 9, 2013
Documentary Planning
Go over the previous post and check out POV documentaries.
Start planning your own documentary. Here are some useful web sites to read and learn about making documentaries.
http://www.desktop-documentaries.com/making-documentaries.html
Start planning your own documentary. Here are some useful web sites to read and learn about making documentaries.
http://www.desktop-documentaries.com/making-documentaries.html
Tuesday, May 7, 2013
Social Issue documentaries
Stylistic categories include:
Public affairs essays: Food, Inc.; Critical Condition; Waging a Living; Good Fortune
Personal/Memoirs: the works of Alan Berliner; Bright Leaves; Traces of the Trade: A Story from the Deep North; In the Family; In the Matter of Cha Jung Hee
Narrative history/Biography: Revolution '67; Chisholm '72: Unbought and Unbossed; Wrestling with Angels: Playwright Tony Kushner; The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers; Brother Outsider: The Life of Bayard Rustin; William Kunstler: Disturbing the Universe
Cinema verité: Flag Wars; My Country, My Country; Street Fight; Election Day; Hold Me Tight, Let Me Go; High School
Poetic: Hybrid; The Beaches of Agnès; SALT
Once you have selected the topics and films, explore the related resources — particularly the relevant filmmaker interviews and production journals. Use these to hear and read filmmakers' own stories of why they chose the approaches they did.
2. Ask the group to work together to analyze the implications of the different styles. Below are some options for organizing this discussion:
Organize a discussion (either with the group as a whole or with the class broken into smaller groups) comparing different styles. The comparison should address these general questions: What expectations do filmmakers who work in this mode have for their films? To what kinds of issues does this style lend itself? What are the particular advantages and disadvantages of this approach? You may want to contrast two or more different styles (e.g., public affairs essay and personal/memoir, or poetic and narrative history/biography). You can also develop a chart to use for group discussion; the number of rows will depend on the number of styles you discuss:
This discussion should reveal that any style can be used to address any topic, and that each one has advantages and disadvantages in terms of achieving different goals. During the discussion of these advantages and disadvantages, cover the need to identify desirable goals, in order then to determine which style should be used.
Another approach is to select a theme or topic from the POV list of topics on the Discover Films page:
Break the class into groups, assign each group a different style of documentary, then ask each group to brainstorm a short documentary on its topic as that topic plays itself out in their lives, their town or at a local institution. For instance, if assigned the topic of race relations they might explore race relations at their school. Have the groups compare their material. Show clips from the relevant POV pages to demonstrate how artists have approached the same topic with very different results. For instance, with regard to race relations you could show clips from films with different styles, such as a public affairs essay film (Every Mother's Son), a personal/memoir film (Twelve Disciples of Nelson Mandela), a narrative history/biography film (Brother Outsider: The Life of Bayard Rustin) and a work of cinema vérité (Flag Wars).
3. Summarize discussion/takeaways:
Lesson Four: Production and Producing Challenges
Read about production issues in pages 18 to 22 and pages 125 to 128 of Documentary Film: A Very Short Introduction (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008) by Patricia Aufderheide. For deeper treatment of production issues, read Michael Rabiger's Directing the Documentary.
What is involved in making a documentary film? This segment exposes students to questions documentarians must answer in the process of making a film; it should give students an awareness of the nature and magnitude of the task of making a documentary film. (Note: this unit does not teach filmmaking skills.)
1. Identify the issues you want to address. You can determine these yourself, or the class can work on a list of issues together. Possible issues include:
Filmmakers routinely stress that documentary filmmaking is not a lucrative field, and that they are driven by passion rather than a desire to make a lot of money. How do filmmakers get into this field and why?
Can anyone make a movie? How important are experience, craft and production quality?
3. Organize students into small groups, according to their concerns. Assign each group to make a list of issues its members need to research before moving forward with their own planned documentary projects. Have at least some of them share those lists with the group, then ask the other class members to provide ideas for dealing with the issues or to expand their classmates' lists further.
Summarize discussion and stress takeaways:
Public affairs essays: Food, Inc.; Critical Condition; Waging a Living; Good Fortune
Personal/Memoirs: the works of Alan Berliner; Bright Leaves; Traces of the Trade: A Story from the Deep North; In the Family; In the Matter of Cha Jung Hee
Narrative history/Biography: Revolution '67; Chisholm '72: Unbought and Unbossed; Wrestling with Angels: Playwright Tony Kushner; The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers; Brother Outsider: The Life of Bayard Rustin; William Kunstler: Disturbing the Universe
Cinema verité: Flag Wars; My Country, My Country; Street Fight; Election Day; Hold Me Tight, Let Me Go; High School
Poetic: Hybrid; The Beaches of Agnès; SALT
Once you have selected the topics and films, explore the related resources — particularly the relevant filmmaker interviews and production journals. Use these to hear and read filmmakers' own stories of why they chose the approaches they did.
2. Ask the group to work together to analyze the implications of the different styles. Below are some options for organizing this discussion:
Organize a discussion (either with the group as a whole or with the class broken into smaller groups) comparing different styles. The comparison should address these general questions: What expectations do filmmakers who work in this mode have for their films? To what kinds of issues does this style lend itself? What are the particular advantages and disadvantages of this approach? You may want to contrast two or more different styles (e.g., public affairs essay and personal/memoir, or poetic and narrative history/biography). You can also develop a chart to use for group discussion; the number of rows will depend on the number of styles you discuss:
| Film Style | Topics/Issues | Pros | Cons |
| Public affairs essay | |||
| Personal/Memoir | |||
| Narrative history/Biography | |||
| Cinema verité | |||
| Poetic |
This discussion should reveal that any style can be used to address any topic, and that each one has advantages and disadvantages in terms of achieving different goals. During the discussion of these advantages and disadvantages, cover the need to identify desirable goals, in order then to determine which style should be used.
Another approach is to select a theme or topic from the POV list of topics on the Discover Films page:
- Adoption
- Arts & Culture
- Criminal Justice
- Economics
- Environment
- Ethnicity
- Family & Society
- Gender
- Health
- History
- Immigration
- International
- LGBT
- Music
- Politics
- Race Relations
- Religion & Spirituality
- War & Peace
- Youth
Break the class into groups, assign each group a different style of documentary, then ask each group to brainstorm a short documentary on its topic as that topic plays itself out in their lives, their town or at a local institution. For instance, if assigned the topic of race relations they might explore race relations at their school. Have the groups compare their material. Show clips from the relevant POV pages to demonstrate how artists have approached the same topic with very different results. For instance, with regard to race relations you could show clips from films with different styles, such as a public affairs essay film (Every Mother's Son), a personal/memoir film (Twelve Disciples of Nelson Mandela), a narrative history/biography film (Brother Outsider: The Life of Bayard Rustin) and a work of cinema vérité (Flag Wars).
3. Summarize discussion/takeaways:
- Social-issue documentary can take on a wide variety of formats and styles.
- Styles can overlap, and filmmakers can be eclectic in their choices.
- Each choice of expression has advantages and disadvantages.
- All choices involve engaging the viewer with a clear point-of-view.
Lesson Four: Production and Producing Challenges
Read about production issues in pages 18 to 22 and pages 125 to 128 of Documentary Film: A Very Short Introduction (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008) by Patricia Aufderheide. For deeper treatment of production issues, read Michael Rabiger's Directing the Documentary.
What is involved in making a documentary film? This segment exposes students to questions documentarians must answer in the process of making a film; it should give students an awareness of the nature and magnitude of the task of making a documentary film. (Note: this unit does not teach filmmaking skills.)
1. Identify the issues you want to address. You can determine these yourself, or the class can work on a list of issues together. Possible issues include:
Filmmakers routinely stress that documentary filmmaking is not a lucrative field, and that they are driven by passion rather than a desire to make a lot of money. How do filmmakers get into this field and why?
Can anyone make a movie? How important are experience, craft and production quality?
- Lourdes Portillo on craft
- Daniel Bernard Roumain on creating a soundtrack
- Natalia Almada on matching the look of different media
- Ellen Kuras on cinematography and sound
- Peter Kinoy on finding the story as an editor
- Anthony Giacchino on avoiding narration
- Louis Alvarez and Andrew Kolker on building trust
- Laura Poitras on working with an unreliable subject
- Yung Chang on finding subjects
- Ido Haar on working with subjects who do not speak his language
- Nicole Opper and Sharese Bullock on building trust
- Filmmakers dealing with safety in Africa for The Reckoning: The Battle for the International Criminal Court and Good Fortune
- Almudena Carracedo and Robert Bahar on Made in L.A.
- Judith Helfand on A Healthy Baby Girl and The Uprising of '34
- Aron Gaudet and Gita Pullapilly on The Way We Get By
3. Organize students into small groups, according to their concerns. Assign each group to make a list of issues its members need to research before moving forward with their own planned documentary projects. Have at least some of them share those lists with the group, then ask the other class members to provide ideas for dealing with the issues or to expand their classmates' lists further.
Summarize discussion and stress takeaways:
- Documentaries are works of art, with elements including narration, soundtrack, editing and cinematography. These concerns are of particular importance to people who make social-issue documentaries, because these films must engage the viewer and inspire commitment.
- Social-issue documentaries can take months, years or even decades to produce.
- Social-issue documentaries are produced out of commitment and passion rather than for profit. Nonprofit and taxpayer support are critical. Public broadcasting is a key resource.
Documentary Journalism
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0BxFRu_SOw
SOTA student Kadisha Phillips' documentary work. Kadisha is currently at the Newhouse School of Journalism at Syracuse University.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0pLp57kD90
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rdQ0i-sRCyg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JgMRlIT6ak4
Documentaries about our society:
http://www.mediaed.org/cgi-bin/commerce.cgi?preadd=action&key=223
SOTA student Kadisha Phillips' documentary work. Kadisha is currently at the Newhouse School of Journalism at Syracuse University.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0pLp57kD90
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rdQ0i-sRCyg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JgMRlIT6ak4
Documentaries about our society:
http://www.mediaed.org/cgi-bin/commerce.cgi?preadd=action&key=223
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