Doc: CCR

 Creative Critical Reflection

• How did research inform your product and the way it uses or challenges conventions?
• How does your product engage with audiences?
• How does your product represent social groups/issues?

    The documentary Impact focuses on sparking hope and initiative for positive change in its audience through the use of various technical elements. Honing in on the process of initiating an environmental school project, this documentary highlights the negative effects of plastic pollution and shows a team combating this issue with perseverance.

    When commencing this documentary, researching the central role of a documentary played a vital part in deciding what the documentary would focus. Initial research consisted of class notetaking on the definition of a documentary: "a slice of life". Familiarization with the key aspects of a documentary started the conversation about creating a documentary on environmental awareness. There was a final conversation about creating a documentary on the initiation of the Recycle Beyond the Bag project at Cypress Bay High School by Interact Club, which the initial research helped come to. (Notes on "slice of life" realization to right )

Attaining the topic of the documentary led to researching the genre conventions of a documentary. Class notetaking brought more knowledge in learning about indirect/direct interviews, B-roll, usage of archived footage, etc.. Much of this research is anecdoted in the Doc: Research blog post (https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/1230255472652070084/3199987192783195247) Extra research was done to get more comfortable with the conventions, such as interview styles and steps to conduct one. A repeatedly used source was: https://www.masterclass.com/articles/how-to-conduct-a-documentary-interview-top-interview-techniques-and-tips-for-documentary-films-and-tv 

Choosing which conventions to include and utilize came after researching specific documentary examples and attaining a visual image of how the documentary would look like. Viewing examples of documentaries helped in seeing what conventions to include and which to abandon. The documentary Exit Through The Gift Shop was deemed helpful in showing how documentaries can be sequentially led through the use of interviews. In American Promise indirect and direct interviews show how personal interviews can contribute to a documentary's tone shift, and how B-roll can be integrated to form a story. Lastly, a documentary series on Netflix called Abstract: The Art of Design provides several examples of how staged B-roll can provide authentic exemplification of certain tasks getting done. Viewing examples assured which conventions would be used in Impact. Overall this documentary used the genre's conventions such as indirect and direct interviews, VO of interviews over cutaways of B-roll, staged B-roll, and music. Using traditional conventions in the documentary helped in progressing the story and making content reflective of as much as the truth as possible (with the staged B-roll). Research on what each genre convention does assist in its usage, for example, hand-held shots of B-roll creating realism and VO narration that helped progress the story of the process of the environmental project. This documentary doesn't challenge conventions due to the necessity of focusing on the information given. This film is supported by the understanding of logos given by certain interviewees and is meant to replicate reality in every aspect. If this film became too unconventional or surreal, then the message of environmentalism and plastic pollution would get lost within the piece.

While research was important to making Impact so was establishing a target audience to connect to. Impact's target audience is any person from 12-30 years old, who is interested in the environment and/or making a positive difference in their community. This documentary uses specific technical elements like music, B-roll, and indirect/direct interviews to facilitate connection and engagement to the target audience. Because this is a younger audience, different measures need to be taken to engage if targeting older audiences because of the narrower attention span of 12-30 year-olds. So, including music in the background of longer interview segments is something that not only creates a specific tone but adds something new to what is being watched, which helps engage individuals for longer. For example, when providing silence from a previously long clip with background music, a certain auditory continuity is broken which can reignite the audience's attention (shown in this video clip)

In addition, the addition of varying types of B-rolls worked to engage this audience and to resonate with environmental lovers/ project lovers. The B-roll shown varies from videos of plants and nature landscapes to videos of multiple people contributing to the project. These changing videos over the VO of the interviewees keep audiences engaged and allow for the individuals to actually SEE, not just hear, about the steps being taken to make this environmental project happen:

 

Lastly, indirect and direct interviews played a key part in engaging with audiences. Indirect interviews are utilized to make information more "bite-size" and easy to grasp because using just answers allows for the content to flow nicer and not be as dragged out. This is useful, especially for this younger audience. While most interviewee segments are indirect interviews, a critical interview towards the end is direct on purpose. From the above video clip shown (with the absence of music in one portion), the use of asking this question and inserting it to the documentary was to grasp as much attention as possible on this area of the documentary. As this is the "resolution" or "final thoughts" on the interviewees's views on the global plastic problem and the benefit of this project, there needed to be a big focus and understanding on this part. Also, the idea of vulnerability and emotive responses attracts audiences, especially younger audiences, as they can resonate more deeply with the documentary and become more attentive to the purpose. 

    The main social issues represented in this documentary are plastic pollution (explicit) and global health (more implicit). The main topic of discussion of this documentary is the creation of a recycling project to help combat plastic pollution and its effects. Plastic pollution is represented through two different POVs and facets that assist in showing the different scales in which it can be seen: day-to-day encounters with plastic pollution, and how it is created on a global scale. With Boswell and Margarita, examples of how plastic pollution is created on a bigger-scale are explained through interviews of both of them explaining how plastic spreads so easily, and with Margarita showing the different types of plastics that end up in landfills or spreading. On the other hand, the B-roll of plastic in the grass and in school surroundings shows what to many are the unnoticeable homes of plastic pollution. This was represented to give audiences a clear view that even if one doesn't see it, this pollution is all around at all scales. To add on, the other social issue represented was global health. This issue was mainly represented through logos given by Margarita in her interview, where she explained that plastic pollution isn't only an environmental issue, it is a big human health issue that effects everyone. This conversation also bleeds into the health effects this has on poorer communities who are more affected by this issue, alluding to social inequality.

Overall, Impact works towards engaging audiences through visual and auditory elements to inspire them to strive and work towards positive change in caring for the environment and overall health. By showing the initial process of starting a club's own project, this documentary shows how others can do the same.

Doc: Post-production

 Post-Production!!

And finally the day had come... TIME TO EDIT!

This process of editing was one that wasn't as smooth as the other processes like planning, research, or filming, but we managed to pull through...😁

To be frank, the reason this process didn't run as smoothly was because we started it late. Julia and I gave ourselves about 2 days after school to edit, but speaking for my part, I got caught up on homework and wasn't able to start editing until the day it was due (which made things more stressful). Also, one issue we ran into was that all the clips were on my phone (because I transported them from my camera) and I had to send them to her so we could both edit.

EDITING SOFTWARE:

To edit, we decided to use CapCut. We were thinking about using Adobe Premiere but we both are more familiar with CapCut and it would slow our process down immensely if we used Adobe (I would've preferred to use it if I had as much experience as Adobe but I didn't). We did want both of us to edit this to get the job done faster, but this did cause some problems to arise in other areas. In CapCut only one person can edit even if you share the document between 2 people. What we ended up doing was Julia was assigned to edit the first half of the documentary and I edited the second half. I was nervous this could cause some discontinuity in the editing style, so I waited for her to send me what she did, so I could continue editing the rest of what she gave me. This would allow me to see some specific things she did and keep them going.

Throughout the editing process, we focused on several key things that would heavily contribute to the grasping of the doc's purpose and that would help move our doc cohesively. 

TITLE CARD:

When making this doc, Julia and I decided that we would hypothetically want this doc to be part of a doc series (like Abstract: The Art of Design) that would be titled Impact. Our series would have several examples of individuals working towards making an impact, which in our hope would encourage others to do the same. So when making the title card, we put IMPACT and Julia decided to use this bold, ALL CAPS, seriff-like font. I thought it fit so well because I liked that it wasn't extremely aggressive, but that it got one's attention immediately; the black backdrop with the white font contributed to emphasizing and centering attention on this title. This title and way it was composed was meant to instantly start this doc and get your attention and intrigue you.

To transition this title to the first actual shot of the doc, we faded in some environmental noise at the end of this title card portion to assist in a smooth transition.

 Structure:

As seen in the clip below, Julia and I really wanted to use my interview especially to be the "path" for all the B-roll we would include. We took heavy inspiration from the documentary "Exit Through The Gift Shop" in how they would mention something in the interview and then show it through B-roll. Through this, a lot of  VO of the interviewee commentary over cutaways were used (B-roll as cutaways). Here below is one example to how we fused the interview portion to the B-roll:

 

 Online videos:

When making this doc, we really wanted to include an array types of different environmental shots. We did get to take a handful, but shot like drone shots or shots of the beach, etc.. aren't something we were able to do because of the locations and equipment. So, during the editing process, we searched for some copyright-free B-roll shots that would add more context to what was being said. One that Julia found was a drone shot of a landfill with heavy amounts of plastic. This specific shot would heighten the effect of what the interviewee was saying because it would show the real-life effect of plastic pollution:

MUSIC:

Music was an important aspect of this piece in helping set the tone and engage the audience. When editing, we had to think about where to place the music and what type of music to include. In the half portion that Julia edited, she introduced our first type of music as soon as I started speaking about the process. I really liked this idea because, before this, it was Margarita's interview where she discussed plastic and even showed us examples of plastic. I think that including the music in Margarita's interview portion would've slightly distracted the audience and maybe even minimized the importance of what was being said (it just wasn't necessary). The type of music wasn't distracting but was complementary, and it felt very "expedition, we are going on a journey" which goes with the idea that I am walking you through a process in my interview segment. 

In my half of the doc, I continued this music with my portion of the interviews and when explaining the process of initiation for the Recycle Beyond the Bag project. Towards the end of my interview and when the "resolution" of the doc was approaching, I decided to fade this music out and leave there to be no music on one specific question Julia (interviewer) had asked me. Previously when filming we decided that we wanted this one question to be somewhere at the end, as a final say on how I felt about the project. I really wanted this to be the place of shift in tone of more hopeful and inspiring (and slightly sentimental pathos to appeal to the audience). So, the silence of the interviewer asking me that question offered as a transition showing "hey this is different to what you have been seeing!" and gave the next music bigger attention. The next type of music I used was "inspirational, reflective" type music that when paired with segments of the other's interviews, gave a strong, purposeful message that we wanted for the ending:

Credits:

For the credits, I thought it would be really cool to include one "environmental shot we took" so it ended off with a vibrant, natural image. I remembered that we took this video of a dandelion flower from the Cypress Bay back area. I thought this was a perfect symbol to end our documentary with; not only does a dandelion represent hope, healing, and resilience, but when blowing a dandelion you send 50-120 seeds into the air. This symbolizes to me that this was our wish to the world, for people to see this doc and feel impacted to contribute to this project or make any positive impact, so by making this doc hopefully we allow for this idea to be planted and to be a catalyst for the birth of change in other's lives. 

I knew I wanted the lettering to be scrolling down, but for the font, I also knew I wanted something more delicate but noticeable because of the way we ended the doc off. So, I decided to use this still seriff, but not as bolded white lettering:

OVERVIEW:

OveralI definitely think this process could've run smoother if Julia and I started this process beforehand. Also, I do wish that maybe we would've chosen one person to edit instead of both of us because it would've made the transferring of content process much easier. I do think that the actual editing of the content went well, but the whole process leading up to it could've been handled more considerably. I will definitely take this lesson with me in the future!

Doc: Production

 Production!

We finally made it to the FILMING! This process of filming was a tedious but fulfilling one that taught me about myself and contributed to our documentary. 

So..... for this process of filming we had various different days and people that filming separately to get this footage finalized. 

INITIAL FILMING:

The first filming we did was actually accidental. It was during our planning time when we were going to go to Mr.Boswell's class to ask him to be interviewed and we saw pieces of plastic on the ground. I remember me and Julia looking at each other and going THIS IS PERFECT, because it was a real-life, in real-time example of plastic being all around us even if we aren't consciously aware of it. We didn't have our equipment with us yet, but we used "cinematic mode" recording on our phones and it worked well!! We also got some B-roll clips of trash cans and nature scenery that we would have just in case we needed more b-roll (OVERSHOT!!)

Some clips we got were:

Later that day, I got on Zoom with Mr. Boswell because I needed to discuss and establish some final ideas about the project. I then realized that getting a screen recording of him and me working on details about the project would be useful B-roll, so I asked him respectfully if that would be a possibility and he was up to it!

(Here is part of the hour-long Zoom meeting):

 B-ROLL FILMING:

Throughout this whole process, the Interact Club members had been filming themselves getting certain tasks done that were helping start up the project. With this filming Julia and I didn't have any part in the actual technicality of filming it because they were filming it themselves, but for some parts, I also filmed myself getting certain tasks done with my phone (some examples):

Emma filmed the cardboard boxes she bought where we collect plastic

Sarah filmed herself at Home Depot buying some of these boxes

I filmed my printer printing out the posters we made to publicize the project

The only B-roll filming where Julia and I filmed had planned to film it with the camera and tripod was filming ourselves hanging up the posters around school and us building/playing around with some of the cardboard boxes:

Final Filming:

This part of the filming was the more intricate and complex one. Because this was something that was newer to us (filming interviews) we made sure to refer back to our notes taken in class to remember to prioritize certain things:

- We wanted to have one person asking the questions right next to the camera (to where the interviewee could look at) and one person at the camera filming, attentive to adapting the shot at any second.

- We tried to have everything set up before the interviewee arrived. We did accomplish this with one of the interviewees but not the second one, because we didn't set a specific location to meet inside the school so we had to find them and then set up.

- We made sure to listen. This was the most important part of filming the interviews for me because it allowed for me to hear their response and see if they gave us the necessary info, and if they didn't I would add one extra question for additional commentary.

- Also to BRING OUR QUESTIONS!

Here are part of the interviews:

Mr. Boswell ^

Margarita (Rotarian) ^

OVERVIEW:

This filming process was long and tedious, Julia and I having to organize filming our own things and also getting Interact members to film theirs, but in the end it worked out! Some things looking back now I would change would be filming our own B-roll earlier, and trying to schedule the interviews to not be two days before the project was due. Doing this would've given us more time in post-production.In addition, I do think we should've made the location more clear for interviewing Margarita so we could have everything set up and ready to go to film. 

Doc: Research 2 & Planning

 

Research and Commencing Planning

After deciding what the documentary was going to document, it was imperative we start doing research on our chosen topic, and initiate planning in several areas. We first chose to focus on the planning aspect of the initial process, following helpful guidelines that we had taken in our notes:    

APPROACH TO STORY:

Going back and forth, Julia and I had several conversations discussing how we wanted to structure and develop our message and story throughout the documentary. We really wanted our message to go along with the approach to the story and for it all to make sense for the viewer watching it. Our goal for this doc was to show the process of students implementing a new environmental project to their school, and for this to motivate individuals to make an impact. So, the approach that would be most cohesive and complementary to our purpose was to create a chronological structure for the doc, to use the interviewees and B-roll as a way to sequentially progress the doc. A sequential structure allowed for us to explain and show the journey of how the environmental project got created. Because I was actually starting this project in real-time with the making of the doc, this approach to telling the story allowed for us to film as I was working on the doc (which would be the B-roll we needed). 

We also wanted to approach this as unbiased as possible, so I looked at this article that showed how Robin Hauser (award-winning documentarian) approaches eradicating as much unconscious bias as possible and we used her collaboration tactics.

https://www.premiumbeat.com/blog/documentary-editing-avoiding-unconscious-bias/

DOC OUTLINE:

- Next we worked on creating a shot list of the documentary that would help us decide what interviewees to reach out to, what interview questions to make, and what equipment we would need. Here is our original shot-list outline:

After having the shot-list done, we knew what interviewees we needed to reach out to, so that's what we did! We reached out to Mr.Boswell (Interact club's sponsor) and Margarita (an environmental head at Rotary Club of Weston who introduced the environmental project to me). For Mr. Boswell's interview it was easy to set a date and time to record because he said we could go one day to his class and interview him. But with Margarita, it took a bit longer to schedule with her because she had been going back and forth to Miami and was very busy. Thankfully, towards the end of our timeline she reached out and told me that she was already going to be at Cypress Bay and that we could interview her there. We didn't want to push anything on any of our itnerviewees and we were going to make sure we had everything set up by the time we were meeting with them.  We also ended up using me as one of the subjects because I am one of the environmental project's leaders and I know that I would be able to chronologically explain our process (because I was involved in it!). All of these interviewees served for what information we wanted to be included in the doc. 

Here are the interview questions we came up with:

 This is our finalized version, but it took us some and error to create questions that we knew would allow our doc to flow (for it not to seem like we were just throwing information at you) and to create questions with differentiating purposes that would ultimately come together to move the to our purpose.  

EQUIPMENT:

Our necessary equipment wasn't elaborate. We realized we only really needed a...

CAMERA:

Sony ZV E10

TRIPOD:

VOICE MEMO: 

As audio while recording

OUTLINE B-ROLL/REACH OUT:

The final step to planning was finalizing what B-roll we needed and reaching out to specific individuals. Because we wanted to show the process of initiation of an environmental project, we had to get staged B-roll of certain steps being taken for the project. So, throughout the process  of planning, I had to reach to specific Interact Club group members and ask them to prepare to film themselves doing certain tasks like making digital posters, hanging them up, talking to teachers, etc. For example one Interact officer had to plan to go to Home Depot to film herself buying bix cardboard boxes.

Research:

Now for additional research, Julia and I wanted to become more familiar with the topic that we were discussing: plastic and its effects on our health and the environment. I was already somewhat familiarized because I had gotten this project handed a couple days before we started the documentary, but still I wanted to know much more. So, we researched different things like....

PLASTIC IMMEDIATE/LONG TERM IMPACTS TO HUMANS:

Source for research information: https://www.un.org/africarenewal/magazine/may-2023/understanding-plastic-pollution-and-its-impact-lives

- We found that only 46% of plastic is landfilled, and even if it is, plastic still takes up to 1,000 years to break down. The fact that single-use plastic is used in so many ways means that us humans could be digesting about 5 grams of plastic every week, leading to possible reproductive, growth, and cognitive issues. But plastic isn't just a problem for humans, it affects the animals that we are surrounded by. From animals washing up on shore dead to consuming a lot of plastic to simply having plastic contest oceans, this is a real issue. 

By us knowing this knowledge, it strengthened our need to make this documentary and also allowed us to narrate the documentary with assurity that we were telling the story we wanted to tell.

OVERVIEW:

Overall, I am very pleased with how this process went. I think that Julia and I worked well and efficiently in reaching out to certain people and getting confirmation on whether or not we could have an interview with them. I do think if I had to go back and change anything, it would be to make one extra shot-list outline that wasn't our rough draft so that we could have it when editing to look back on. The one we had was good, but to me having the visual-drawn out pictures of the shots makes it easier to distinguish each shot, which helps when filming and editing. But overall this process went smoothly!

Doc: Research

Research

 When commencing the process of making the short op-doc, I began with research. Gathering research on the different types of documentaries and the conventions of a documentary was significant in the primary research in deciding what documentary I wanted to make (worked on this on my own first).

  But first, I had to find answer "WHAT IS A DOCUMENTARY?"

• Documentaries are a "slice of life"
• focus on a niche part of life or existance
• A film embedded in attempted realism

Going into this I didn't really know what a documentary looked like, I had some sense of the stereotypical dramatic documentary you see every once in a while, but I didn't know the ins and outs regarding what makes a documentary a documentary. So, the lesson we learned in class involving documentary genre conventions was extremely helpful...

1) Documentary Genre Conventions:

- Hand Held camera shots utilized (realism)

- Incorporate interviews (close-up shots of shoulders and above, right/left third)

- narrative format

- B-roll

- Archived footage within research

- Specific editing (cross-cutting, parallel editing, use non-dietic sound like voiceover and music, etc.)

- These were some of the main examples I found and they were a good introduction to understanding how documentaries differ from other types of films. These conventions also reinforced that a documentary is all about honing in on realism as much as possible in areas like production and post-production.  Notes down below!

2). Research on variations of documentaries:

- This research was also done in class and was significant to deciding what specific subgenre of documentary to do. This was something that helped me narrow down what I wanted to portray and what topic I wanted to revolve the documentary around.

The subgenres I was mostly looking at include:

- biographical (based on a person or event)

-sociological examination 

-nature (which hones in on animals, plants, etc.)

Seeing that documentaries didn't all have to be on "the reenactment of the Cold War" and could be something I was genuinely interested in (like animals and society) motivated me to keep researching. 

-PROBLEM AND SOLUTION TIME-

So, after doing all this specific part of the research I realized that it was going to be very hard for me to get this done by myself. I had to remind myself that I only had two weeks to do this documentary. After doing the research and learning about the editing process for a documentary and seeing what components were needed, like interviews (which I was very new at) I realized that I needed a partner. So, thankfully my friend Julia at the time needed someone to partner with, so we began doing this project together!😊 Here we decided to do a documentary showing the process of creating an environmental project in one's community. We chose this because frankly we were running out of time and needed to start planning, but also this was a club project I was doing simultaneously (with Interact Club at Cypress Bay and with Rotary Club of Weston) with the doc so we thought it would be perfect. The environmental project was one where we would need to collect 1,000 lbs of used but clean plastic to create a school bench ("Recycle Beyond the Bag").

3). Documentary Examples

Now with a partner, Julia and I were interested in watching real examples of documentaries so we could see the conventions tangibly and get inspiration.

Two of the main documentaries we were inspired by we watched during class:

American Promise:

- Things that inspired our final outcome:

Use of constant, personal interviews

Having the producers as interviewees (the concept of that relationship and how that could affect bias is what we worked on)

Exit Through the Gift Shop:

- Things that inspired final outcome:

Using interviews to structure the docu

Sequential order of the "storyline", how there was a sequential order of events

In addition, the NY Times Op-Doc called Modern Goose is one that personally impacted me and showed me that creating a whole "slice of life" in one 5 mn documentary doesn't mean all the information has to be squished. Providing context is important, but also leaving room for air and flow for the documentary is also necessary for the viewers (this helped me when deciding the specific questions I wanted to ask)

RESOLUTION & OVERVIEW:

After acquiring all this information Julia and I were able to have a vivid picture of what we wanted our documentary to consist of. Moving forward, I would've definitely started with a partner from the very beginning, due to the time length. But overall, I am happy with how I handled the initiation of the research process! 😊

TRANSITION!

Back To Business....

It feels so exciting and nostalgic to be back on blogger.com. IM BACK BABAYYYY, we are back to blogging and I can't wait to see where this takes me. 

Hey! It's still Sofia, but I'm a new Sofia. I am in AICE MEDIA A level now 😉😉

Let's see where this unfolding and new journey takes us.

Project Overview

Overview!

 Well we did it! We finished the film opening part of the AICE test. I never thought I would get here but here I am, alittle tired and empty but we made it 😄

This project taught me a lot of things, things not only having to do with the class but also things that involve myself.

This project first off was a great introduction on how to plan out and manage a “on your own timeline” project. I never had a project this significant that I had to plan out and agenda all by myself, so this first experience was one that was really useful in teaching me what to do and what not to do (procrastinate!).

In addition, this project was so much fun and showed me how much I really like filming and editing and directing actors on set. Even though the parents were a bit unprofessional sometimes, being in that atmosphere with the filming equipment and things I had never used like a boom stick is one that I will never forget.

Also, this project taught me so much about the hard work and all the different parts that go into one film. From intricately picking out the right costume design to every individual prop that the camera sees, a film maker has to be so detailed and meticulous about what they include and what they don’t, for their intended message or purpose.

Overall, this project served me in so many ways and I am so grateful I had the opportunity to create this introduction.