As I stated on my last blog post, Lauren and I will be initiating our filming process this week while hopefully concluding it next week. We made the decision to split filming into two weeks considering Abby and Riley, our subjects for the film episode, will only be available starting March 4th to record both interviews and b-roll. Therefore, for now, we will focus our efforts on Sai, Josh, and Constanza, our subjects for the podcast and yearbook episodes. Below is a cutely decorated film schedule created by Lauren, who among other things happens to be a master at all things Canva.
In addition, a necessary step we had to take in preparation for filming was the formation of interview questions for all our subjects. Here is what Lauren and I came up with for each:
As may be seen, the same formatting and types of questions are used for all interviews, regardless of which media text is in discussion, with an introduction, a production set, and a reflection. However, we felt it was crucial that we personalize each set to the subject in question in order to yield the highest quality responses possible. For example, while Sai and Josh will be asked what their future goals for the podcast are due to possibilities of longevity, Constanza will be questioned regarding how she will apply her yearbook skills in her later professional life, provided her time at "The Storm" will be over one day. Furthermore, not all subjects will be asked the same amount of questions primarily due to relevancy factors. For instance, although Abby, Riley, Josh, and Sai will all be asked what their goals are for their projects, Constanza will not be asked the same given the end goal of a yearbook creation is implied.
I am both nervous and excited to emphasize that the first day of filming is tomorrow!
After reviewing our teacher's sample schedule for the portfolio project, Lauren and I decided that in order to ensure we remain on track and work diligently throughout the duration of the project we would need to formulate a new schedule. In our new outline, as demonstrated below, we dove into great detail on the jobs we would complete each week as opposed to stating large, overall topics, such as "film documentary excerpt." Consequently, we hope we will not get lost in the production process, unsure of how to proceed with one of the components due to an overwhelming amount of duties. In addition, we concluded that specifying the different blog posts we could write each week would be a great manner of securing that we do not run out of ideas and/or grow increasingly vague with our postings each week due to lack of variety or inspiration within our tasks.
Here is our updated and final schedule (promise):
Week 2/19-2/25:
Blog posts:
-introduce the project & new schedule reflecting the project
-research episodic documentary
-outline project
Week 2/26-3/3:
Begin filming documentary with Josh and Sai (podcast)
As outlined in our schedule, this week, Lauren and I will be dedicating our time to planning and researching for the production of our portfolio documentary project, which we expect to officially commence next week. Prior to doing so, however, Lauren and I concluded that conducting research in an attempt to gain greater familiarity with the narrative structures and technical elements of episodic documentaries would be essential.
On one of my previous blog posts, I described the inspiration Lauren and I drew from the Netflix series Abstract: The art of design, an episodic documentary accompanying different jobs in art through the lens of professionals in each of its episodes. For example, my personal favorite episode follows costume designer Ruth E. Carter in her career background and creative processes. Abstract's structure is the main source of inspiration for mine and Lauren's upcoming extract; our idea to follow different media creation process, all in different modes, is perfectly reassured and substantially supported by the Netflix series. By modeling our own sequence after the innovative ideas and production choices made in Abstract, I believe Lauren and I will be able to construct a truly wonderful project. For now, as I have only seen a couple, I will continue my research journey by viewing more episodes of the piece in order to gain even greater familiarity with the transition between and structure within each.
On the other hand, regarding individual episode structures, I turned to YouTube for guidance. Below is a short yet meaningful video I encountered explaining the importance of a story structure within documentaries as well as film in general.
Although explaining seemingly obvious principles, I believe this source does a wonderful job of dictating the importance of a clear and coherent sequence, a principle not always obvious in documentary filmmaking, as well as how to achieve such a goal. For instance, while working on our previous documentary project, Shifting Success, Lauren and I struggled greatly in deciding how to format the stories of our subjects Joey and Fernanda, concerned that their journeys would not be intelligible to audiences regardless of the fact that the obvious answer would be to organize a beginning, a middle, and an end for both individuals. However, due to Knoblock's words, a major concern of mine has been eased and I now feel increasingly confident that our story will naturally develop its own chronological and coherent sequence, with a beginning, middle, and end followed organically and smoothly in the absence of overthinking and confusion.
Another great concern of mine surrounded the encompassing of so many different subjects and their roles in the processes of the media projects. While in Abstract each episode follows one primary professional, with merely a few collaborators commentating on smaller aspects of the job, the media texts Lauren and I plan on following each require a large group of producers, all of relatively equal importance. Consequently, we felt confusion on how to introduce all the subjects while also avoiding overwhelming viewers with information. However, amidst attempting to decipher this issue, I recalled another Netflix episodic documentary I recently viewed which did a wonderful job of introducing a multitude of separate subjects in a coherent and distinct manner: American Nightmare.
American Nightmare discusses the kidnapping and sexual assault case of primary subject Denise Huskins and her journey to being believed. However, as the 3 episode documentary progresses, different subjects are introduced based off sequential order of how they came into contact with the case, including both police officers and other victims, all of which were highlighted as distinctly crucial and important in their contribution to the mystery solving. Drawing from this narrative structure, I believe that commencing each of our episodes with the "main" production director, such as the Editor in Chief for the yearbook episode, while introducing the other jobs and subjects as the media text production process chronologically reaches their role. This way, we may avoid introducing too many subjects in the beginning of an episode and confusing viewers on where or when they come into play.
Now, after conducting this research (which I had a lot of fun doing, considering I mainly watched interesting videos/pieces) I feel confident that Lauren and I are prepared to both film and edit our documentary extract effectively.
After a week-long, stressful discussion, Lauren and I have officially come to a consensus regarding which idea we will be producing for our documentary excerpt!
Considering both our intense passions for media creation and admiration of the large variation of media texts available to society, we concluded that producing the third option, mentioned in one of my previous blog posts, is the best choice for us. Ideally, we plan on creating a 3 episode documentary series in which each episode details different production processes for all modes of media text: auditory, visual, and physical, represented through a podcast, a short film, and a yearbook.
In the podcast episode, the one we will actually be producing for the 5-minute excerpt, Lauren and I will follow our friends Sai and Josh in the creation of their podcast "Contact Crunchers," in which they discuss sports analytical matters. On the other hand, for our social media-represented episodes, we will follow our classmates Riley and Abby in their production of a short film and the editor-in-chief of our school yearbook "The Storm," Constanza, in her duties and interactions with other members.
For now, Lauren and I plan on each episode being approximately 25-30 minutes long. However, we both agreed that we must conduct more research in order to be fully prepared for our own production process, which officially begins next week. Personally, I am thrilled to be able to call watching documentaries "research," and cannot wait to commence that journey as well.
P.S.: I hope my Taylor-Swift-themed blog titles are amusing :)
Before officially commencing our portfolio project production, Lauren and I concluded that formulating a schedule would be essential to the rest of our process to ensure that we have a set, functioning plan which will maximize our performance level for each aspect of the assignment. Below is the schedule we concluded would work best for us.
Considering the large scope of the documentary facet of the project, we concluded that devoting a majority of our time to the excerpt would be absolutely necessary, thus a total of 4 weeks are dedicated to planning, filming, and editing the documentary. Specifically on the week of 3/11-3/17, our Media Studies teacher has a planned a research assignment on the print component, hence our research for the magazine spread commencing on that week following the conclusion of the editing journey. In addition, we decided that devoting at least a week and a half to working on the social media component of the project would be best to ensure we represent the entire breadth of our episodic documentary in an effective and technically pleasing manner. Lastly, the full week dedicated to the critical reflection is crucial for both Lauren and I provided the size and weight of the essay.
Now, with a functioning plan in order, we are increasingly thrilled to embark on this journey!
As Lauren and I prepare to commence the documentary portfolio project I described on my last blog post, we have brainstormed a multitude of ideas regarding accessible topics we may cover in the final extract. Although we have yet to make a decision, listed below is a set of our final contenders, described in no particular order.
1) The Circuit
"The Circuit" is the name of our school newspaper, a group I, as a journalism enthusiast, have always envied as I was never able to register myself. Together, Lauren and I theorized that, modeled after the Netflix documentary Abstract: The Art of Design, which in each episode details different jobs relating to the arts, we could follow The Circuit's production process, specifying each task in different episodes. For example, while one episode might accompany the Editor in Chief and Managing Editors (top positions in The Circuit), another could follow specified writer roles, such as the sports or news editors.
2) Student Hobbies
As our second option, we concluded that following students in their hobbies after school could be an interesting and thought-provoking piece revealing the variety in young adult interests and personalities. In our plans, we outlined that each episode could demonstrate a separate student describing their passion and illustrating the processes and steps they take to revel in their past-times. For instance, Lauren and I brainstormed inviting our friend Chiara, a singer, for one episode and our other classmates, Sai and Josh, who host a sports podcast in their free time, for another. Below is an article I researched while attempting to discover a purpose for and connection with this idea:
As I am sure may be obvious due to the fact that we are in the second level of a Media Studies course, Lauren and I are deeply fascinated by media text production in many forms, one clearly being documentaries. In an interesting turn of events, Lauren texted me with a wonderful idea, although at the moment extremely experimental and theoretical. For now, we discussed surrounding our extract on the production process of a documentary piece, possibly of another group within our class. Regarding other episodes, we concluded that different production operations, such as film, podcasts, and writing, may each be highlighted separately. Of course, this idea requires additional development; however, we are truly interested in discovering whether or not this plan may be plausible.
As I move into the second semester, I hope this blog will accompany me through my last major journey. Similarly to the processes detailed in my last series of posts, in the next few weeks, I will be constructing a long-term project for my AICE Media Studies A Level Portfolio, all of which will be described here!
Last year, I detailed on Lights Camera Blog the process I took in creating my AS level portfolio project, which was comprised of a 2 minute film opening I titled Dread, the one major component required for the AS exam. In contrast to AS, A level tasks students with a plethora of production components for each undertaking, including one major and two minor assignments. Although possibly overwhelming, I feel that my background in Media Studies this year thus far, such as my experience with our most recent four-component film distribution project, has perfectly quipped me to tackle such a large mission in an effective and well-thought out manner.
Above are the four task options offered for students to work on through the duration of the portfolio project. Understanding the longevity and intensity of the assignment, I instantaneously realized my hope to work with another individual, thus enter Lauren. On my previous blog posts, it may be seen that Lauren and I worked together on our documentary project as well. Honestly, if we were allowed, we likely would collaborate on every assignment possible. As best friends since 8th grade, Lauren and I have vast experiences with working with one another and therefore understand how to navigate each other's interests and ideas which, unlike what our outside personas may demonstrate, are all extremely similar. Consequently, almost as if an unspoken decision, Lauren and I immediately began discussing our plans.
Given our difficult but nonetheless enjoyable experience with the documentary project, the two of us, upon reviewing all the options, quickly decided we would be completing option 3, the documentary packet. Although for Lauren, an avid viewer and enthusiast of documentaries, the major extract task may have been the compelling factor, I, while still deeply attracted to the idea of creating another documentary, was primarily enticed by the magazine spread component. As an aspiring journalism major (with a focus in writing) I viewed option 3 as the perfect opportunity to gain familiarity with my potential future career and to explore my journalistic passions in a more in depth and creatively open manner, hence our combined final decision.
In complete sincerity, while a little petrified, I am excited to embark on one last journey during my high school experience, and I cannot wait to document the entire process right here on Lights, Camera, Blog!
