Alex Burgess Film Reflective Journal

Here is me and my groups ideas and deciding what each of us would want to do. For this each of us focused on a particular topic on what we were interested in making as a documentary. We then went through some pros and cons of each of our ideas, which helped us reach a justified conclusion on which one would work the best.

 

This is the group agreement me and my team made for our documentary. This involves some planning and information from each of are roles, which gives us a clear guideline on what we need to achieve throughout each stage of the production process.

This allows us to have a clear guideline on what we need to do in each of are roles. As my role as cinematographer, it is my job to ensure the shots I am filming are good quality and to refilm any shots that aren’t. I will also consider the different shot types, movement and angles when filming to create meaning and signify contrast within our documentary.

 

As a group we all decided that we would out on location, including Cobo Bay, Grandes Rocques, the Cows Horn and cliff paths and in town. We were originally going to film in school because the weather forecast was for rain, however, the weather turned out nice so we decided to film outside. This suited our plan better as being outside helped us to convey the contrast of being our in the natural world versus being consumed on your phone by social media.

This is are production meeting agenda which helped us stay organised when filming.

We had agreed in advance on a few places on where we were going to film which helped us stay organised. We also had a wide range of shot types we were going to use for all the landscapes when filming.

We decided we wanted to film with the shoulder mount which we were borrowing from our teacher. However, this made us lose some time on particular shots because we had to collect the shoulder mount from another location. We resloved this by filming more shots near the location where we were going to collect the shoulder mount. However, becuase of our lack of planning around the collection of the shoulder mount, we could not take as many shots in the places where we had planned to film, which was disappointing. For the next shoot we will work more collaboratively and plan better which equipment we should bring, like the tripod, drone, and shoulder mount. We will also plan better with each other what we should use and who takes what and allocate task between ourselves.

While shooting some of the group were late as the location was quite far from where they live. This resulted in less filming time. In my job as cinematographer I would resolve this by filming more shots by myself. I would also plan better with my group on the location to make sure that everyone can turn up on time. This means that we would have more time to film.

We decided to use a drone while filming. This involved us going to someone’s house to pick it up. However, that person changed the time of the pick it up. This resulted in more time being lost. We then found that the drone was low on charge which meant that it ran out of battery fast. For our next shoot we will resolve this by making a clear plan with the owner of the drone regarding the pick up time and requesting that the drone is fully charged.

Our mode of transport was the bus which also resulted in less filming time, as we didn’t have a plan on which times we would take the bus. A way we can resolve this is for are next shoot we be more organised and schedule with each other when to get the bus so we have more time for filming.

As my role as cinematographer, I thought about the framing, lighting, movement, and composition.

• For the movement I decided to use pans/tilts shots to fully capture the scenery and to provide context for my film so that the place where it was set was seen as an important part. For this I used a tripod and the pan handle to create successful movement.
• For the framing I made sure to impliment the three main shot types, mid shots, long shots and close shots. These shots help to change the emphasis of the subject of the film, with close shots being more personal and intense and long shots putting the subject into the context of the environment and making them less significant within the setting.
• For lighting I used places I thought would signify high key lighting with the sun to represent the contrast with people being on their phones and consumed by media.
• For composition I implimented ways in which the scenery and the actors appear in respect to each other within the frame its self.

 

 

For this task I had to make a short expository documentary that was roughly a minute long and I had to base it on something I’m familiar with.

DRAFT SCRIPT:

So much work to do… Such a big exam tomorrow…. It’s 1:43, I have to get some sleep. I am so tired, I am just going to snooze for a few more minutes…. OH MY GOD! NO! It can’t be! My exam started at 9… Oh no! The school has called. This cannot be happening! I have done so much work! How can this happen? Quick grab everything they might still let me in! RUN RUN RUN I’ve got to get to the bus. I hope I remembered my calculator… NOOOOO!!

PROCESS:

For this I had thought of a few ideas and wrote down a few I thought would work well. Once I thought of my idea I then created a storyboard on some of the particular shots and techniques on what I will use. For example zoom in shot and a pan shot. Once I made this I then used it as a guideline when creating my expository documentary. For the filming I used my phone, which unfortunately made it have a bit of movement in the film when recording. Once I recorded all my videos I then uploaded them to WeVideo where I will be editing my documentary. I made sure to have all the videos in chronological order and to edit it down so it fits within the time frame. I then voiced out my script and edited so it fits well within the video I made. I also made sure I added the sound to my short clip over the voice memo, as this made it more realistic.

Signified bellow is my Expository documentary:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Meaning of a performative documentary:

A performative documentary is a genre of documentary filmmaking that emphasizes the personal involvement, subjective experiences, and creative expression of the filmmaker as an integral part of the documentary narrative.

Key concepts within a performative documentary:

• Filmmaker as subject – presence of the filmmaker as an essential subject in the film
• Narrative subjectivity – prioritize subjective storytelling, allowing the filmmaker’s personal viewpoint and emotions to the shape of the narrative.
• Autobiographical elements – filmmaker shares personal memories, experiences, or reflections.

To allow me to understand a performative documentary I watched a documentary called “Supersize Me” which is about an experiment, where the producer of the film Morgan Spurlock eats McDonald’s for 30 days straight, aiming to investigate the impact of a fast food diet on his physical and mental well-being.