3. Genre (Expository)
• Expository documentaries speak directly to the viewer, often
in the form of an authoritative commentary employing
voiceover or titles, proposing a strong argument and point of
view.
• Other Convention such as
• Involved with opinions
• Facts
• Persuasive techniques
• A commentator
• Rhetorical question
• Direct address to the audience (During Interview)
4. Plot
• The plot of a documentary is always determined by the
subjects/topics of the film. In general documentary will divide in 3
different parts.
• Introduction: The beginning of the film which needs to capture the
audience’s attention, to keep the audience watching.
• Obstacles: Similar to disequilibrium, the obstacles is where the main
problems and issues appear.
• Resolution: It is the near end in the documentary, which usually brings
some kind of resolution to the question and conflict established at the
beginning of the film
Our documentary will divide in three stages and talk about how difficult to
get into the creative industry, how to be successful and what reward you
would get in the industry.
5. Realism
• As documentary has been seen as non fiction, so that
everything within the documentary have to be real and cannot
be made up. There are three types of realism which are all
important for documentary.
• Surface Realism- This means that all the detail have to be right,
such as costumes, setting, location and props.
• ‘Inner’ or emotional realism- The audience need to feel that they
can identify with the situation that the characters are in and feel
their emotion.
• Technical and Symbolic codes for realism- Similar to surface
realism, this is about the sound and other technical factors such
as font types which need to be suitable to the setting and the
theme
6. Footage
• Stock footage/ Archive footage is footage that are real which
can be used in other films. Some of the footage may come
from other sources such as library or museum, which is
valuable and contain a lot of rare information of the topics.
Stock footage is beneficial to filmakers, this is because it saves
shooting material, which saves a lot of money and time as
they do not need to refilm again.
• For our production we won’t be using the archive footage this
is because it would be difficult to get the footage relevant to
what we want.
7. Interview
• Interview will take place with expert who knows a lot with the
topics.
• Interview is a very crucial part in a documentary, this is because the
interviewee can give out other information and their own opinion to
the audience, as the target audience of documentaries are
sophisticated so that they would like to look at different sides of
views and think about themselves.
• For our production we will take few different shot of the
interviewees, which gives a variety of angles to the audience, also in
terms of the content we will find some expert who knows a lot
about the creative industry and therefore they can give out some
useful information and personal opinion to the audiences.
9. Costs
• As documentaries are tend to target niche market audiences,
so that unlike mass market film, documentary has only got a
smaller budget as it is produced by independent companies
and therefore the film will not have large budget on
equipment, cast, location and other variable costs.
• As we are having a small production team with the
independent company, so that we haven’t got a large amount
of budget for our film and therefore we will be using limited
equipment's in the filming stage.
11. Length
• Documentaries are tend to be around 5-75 minutes, which features
few characters or interviewees, depends on what theme and topics
the documentaries are. Many of the director and writer of the
documentaries such as Karen Everett thinks that the best length of a
documentary is around 40 minutes, this is because some audience
may feel bored as there aren’t many dramatic storyline and conflict
involve in the documentary.
• However for short film it usually around 10 minutes. There are many
different types of short film such as animation, drama and
documentary. These short will still contain a short version of story or
a topics.
12. Montage
• A montage sequence conveys ideas visually by putting them in
a specific order in a film.
• Narrative montage involve in planning of sequence of shots used
to indicate changes in time and place within a film
• Ideational montage link actions with woods, and is often used in
documentaries
We might be using montage in the film to show the progress and
stages of involving in the creative industry, which can show the
audience the reality in this particular industry and therefore it can
gives feeling and thoughts to the audience about the creative
industry.
13. Sound
• Documentaries often have some music or soundtrack plays in
the background and it is depends on the theme and the topics
of the film. The music will be relevant to the topics and the
type of documentaries. Also there will be diegetic sound or
voiceover in the documentaries especially during interview.
• Soundbridge will also be used so that rather than having a
long take of one camera shot of the interviewee, it can
provide more scenes and materials to show to the audience
We will be using microphones to record the sounds such as the
dialogue of the interviewees and the diegetic sound of the
theatre, which could also create more technical realism to the
audience.
14. Camera
• Documentaries are more likely to use digital camera due to the types of
production company and the budget that they have got for their film. Also
documentary will use different types of camera shot and angle to show
different connotations and representation to the audience.
• Example of the style of the camera shot and angle: there are usually
medium shot or medium close up of the interviewee and look direct
address to the audience during the interview, which breaks the wall
between the interviewee and the audience as the interviewees are talking
‘face to face’ to the audience.
• Example of camera shots and movement: Close Up, Medium Shot, Long
Shot, Tracking, Tilting, Ped etc. There are also some conventions of camera
movement in a documentary such as Hand held connotes more realism,
cinematic which provide more constructed view and mixture during
interview which gives more angle of the interviewees to the audience.
• We will be using few cameras and a variety of camera shot and camera
angle, which might gives out different connotation and representation to
the audience and therefore it can keep the audience engage and carry on
watching the film.
15. Editing
• The footage within the documentary will be using cuts and
quick cuts, this is because it makes the footage seem more
real and create more realism as well as less distracted by the
effect. However, for some documentaries they will use other
editing effects such as fast and slow motions, which will
depends on the topics of the film and what connotation is
given out to the audience.
• We will be using Final Cut Pro in the editing stage of the film
and we will try to add effects to attract the audience. Also we
will be using 1-2 camera in each interview so that we will a lot
of footage and cutaway to edit.
