The document discusses a student's documentary project exploring the Meninism movement. It summarizes: 1) The student was asked to create the opening of a documentary, a magazine listing, and radio trailer on a chosen topic. They decided to explore Meninism, a movement that began as a joke response to feminism on social media. 2) To guide their documentary style, the student researched Bill Nichols' documentary modes and chose to use expository and participatory styles. Their documentary included interviews, vox pops from students, statistics with images/text, and background footage related to the topics discussed. 3) The student studied conventions from similar documentaries to incorporate, such as anonymous interviews

1. Abi Semple

2. Our products…
For our A2 Media Studies
coursework we were asked to
create the opening five minutes
of a documentary on our
choice of topic, as well as a
double page spread for a
listings magazine, and a radio
trailer, both promoting our
documentary.

3. What is Meninism…
After much planning we decided to make our
documentary exploring Meninism. Meninism
is a movement which began on social media
and was a response to Feminism. It began as a
joke, but as support grew, it became
increasingly popular and now the Meninist
movement have their own website
http://meninist.co/ , merchandise, and
everyday the movement is growing in
numbers. Through our documentary we
wanted to explore what exactly Meninism was
and how it officially came about. All three of
us are interested in Feminism and knew it
would interest us to make a documentary on
this subject and therefore, thought we could
research and plan this to the best of our
ability.

4. Bill Nichols’ Theory…
We began by researching into Bill Nichols’ theories of Documentary
Modes (2001): (http://www.slideshare.net/mag_anna/doc-modes-pp)
Nichols created six different documentary styles, of which documentaries
tend to be. After researching what these different styles were, we decided
to choose an Expository mode, as well as using aspects of the Participatory
mode, for our documentary. We therefore tried to keep consistent to this
mode.

5. Modes…
 From the Participatory mode, we
used conventions such as voxpops
and formal interviews. We did this
by filming two professional
interviews and then many voxpop
clips.
 From the Expository mode, we
used a voice over all the way
through who addressed the
audience, as well as editing visual
footage and statistics of what is
being said over the top of
interviews and the voice over.

6. Camera Angles
 In terms of camera angles we followed
typical conventions by setting up our
interviews using the rule of thirds. We
placed the subject on the left hand
side, so that they were aesthetically
pleasing to the audience, which is a
convention of documentaries. We also
used medium close up shots for all of
our interviews and medium close up
and medium shots for our voxpops, so
that we were able to see them clearly
but the audience could have a
connection with them. Therefore, we
again, followed a convention of
documentaries.

7. Camera Angles
 We also used conventions of
documentaries by using different
shot types, for example, we used a
pan shot to show the setting of the
Sixth Form College, so that the
audience know the exact place
where they the interview is being
shot. For most of our interviews
and voxpops we use straight on
shots, so that all focus is on what
they are saying, and no attention is
drawn from this.

8. Professional Interviews
 A key connotation of documentaries are professional
interviews. In our documentary we filmed two interviews;
one with a student development officer and one with a
group of students at the Sixth Form College.
 For our interviews, we used on screen text titles of the
interviewee’s name and role, and so followed the
conventions of typical documentaries.

9. Julie’s Interview…
 We wanted to make sure that the mise en scene was appropriate and
so for the professional interviews we created settings that were
appropriate for who we were interviewing.
 For Julie’s interview, we placed her in an office setting, as she works
in student development. We also used a laptop, books and papers to
suggest she is working in a school environment. On the wall there is
a Feminist poster, therefore suggesting that she supports equality
herself, and so we refer back to the topic of the documentary
throughout.

10. Meninist’s Interview…
 Along side the professional interviews, we challenged typical conventions of
documentaries by including an anonymous interviewee. We are not able to see
his face and so couldn't see where he was looking, (and so strays from a typical
interview where they look at the interviewer). This feature is different from
many other typical documentaries, and was taken from another documentary
we saw during research (mentioned later in this PowerPoint).
 We also made sure the setting was appropriate, by using an Apple Mac
computer with the Meninist website on the screen. We also have footage of him
scrolling through the site, and so links with his interest in the movement of
Meninism. Background footage of the topic being spoken about is use in many
documentaries and helps demonstrate what is being said.

11. Voxpops
 This is also a typical convention of
documentaries, as voxpops give
opinions from members of the public,
in our case, students, who would be a
similar age to our target audience, and
so would relate. We took our voxpop
interviews in the canteen, which
showed a busy atmosphere, and this
diegetic sound made it very realistic
and so makes the voxpops even more
life-like. The interviewees all looked at
the interviewer rather than the
camera, which is a typical feature of
interviews in documentaries, and we
have also used this in our professional
interviews.

12. Statistics
 Many documentaries speak of statistics in their footage, so that there is
quantitative and qualitative evidence to back up points of view, and to interest
the audience. This is often backed up with on screen images, animation, or
text. For our documentary, we used our own statistics from primary research we
had done, and used text and symbolic images to give visual information. We
also blurred out and muted the screen behind the statistics, where footage was
still being shown. This is often used in documentaries so that full focus is on
the statistics, however, the environment of the college is still present. The way
in which the students are in the footage, suggests that the statistics are what
they think, and as they are blurred, making them anonymous, suggests that
this is the view that any young person can hold, and so relates to the audience.

13. Background footage
 It is usual for documentaries to show
background footage of settings or clips of
the topic being discussed. Therefore,
when anything is discussed, we use
background footage of what is being said,
to demonstrate it. Therefore, through
editing, we were able to use audio footage
of the voice over and interviews and then
place visual footage over the top. This
made it more interesting and enjoyable to
watch, as well as being able to get
information across easier. Footage
included social media sites, internet sites,
searches on google and YouTube videos.

14. Voice Over
 We decided to use a voice over for our
documentary as this was what the target audience
said they would prefer, rather than any other
presenting methods. We felt we challenged
typical conventions, by using a female voice over,
when in many documentaries, males are used.
We made sure that the voice over was confident
and energetic, as well as using rhetorical
questions to involve the audience, e.g. ‘What is
Meninism? Have people even heard of it?’,
therefore throughout the documentary, the voice
over goes on a mission to find out about this new
movement, and so puts herself in the same place
as the audience. Therefore, the audience would
warm to her, as well as her being of a similar age
group. This is often used in documentary’s to
create a voice over that people can relate to.

15. After the break
 Many documentaries also show what will happen after
the break or ‘Next time’, and so we chose to show this
in our own. We used a pan shot to show the area of
Birmingham that we would be visiting, as well as
showing clips of voxpops that we’d taken, while the
voice over was talking over the top of what was yet to
come.

16. Similar documentaries…
 We looked at similar documentaries and created a
PowerPoint on the blog on this:
 http://www.slideshare.net/freyadowns/documentary-
research-55161032
 We also did research later in the project on other
documentaries, e.g. two by Reggie Yates.
 Using these, we were able to pick out conventions that
we could use in our own documentary.

17. We are Legion: The story of the
Hacktivists
 We decided to look at this documentary as
it’s topic is similar to ours, in which it
began on the internet and social media. In
this documentary, there were often
references to the ‘Hacktivists’ and when
one of them appeared in footage, they
wore a mask to keep their identity secret.
We therefore developed this idea and
decided to use it in our own documentary,
when the Meninist was on screen, we kept
his face shadowed and so it was impossible
to work out his true identity. We did this
through clothing, lighting and editing to
get an anonymous effect, similar to the ‘We
are Legion…’ documentary, and found it
worked effectively.

18. Bronies
 In ‘Bronies’, those that are part of the
community are often criticised, similar to
that of Meninists, as both are very
controversial and there are many different
opinions towards them. In the
documentary, the ‘Bronies’ are given a lot
of time to talk and share their opinion, and
therefore we thought that this would work
well in our documentary. Therefore, we
gave the Meninist a say and footage of him
was shown for a significant amount of
time. This was so we made it clear that we
were unbiased towards them, and the
audience could make their own decision
based on all of the information.

19. Reggie Yates
We looked at two documentaries by
Reggie Yates: ‘Men at War’ and ‘Gay
under Attack’. We decided to look at
these because their topics were related
to ours in terms of social issues.
Therefore, we thought it would be
beneficial for us to look at conventions
of these. From ‘Gay under attack’, we
liked the idea of a young presenter being
able to empathise with people who he
was interviewing and talking to,
therefore, we decided to use a young
person for our voice over, as this could
relate to the target audience.

20. Double Page Spread
 We looked at conventions of ‘The Radio Times’ before we
began planning our double page spread:
http://www.authorstream.com/Presentation/freyadowns-
2736050-radio-times/
 We then found that there were typical conventions which
they had in common. These included the masthead of an
article, page numbers and credits to the author and
photographer, as well as screen-grabbed images from the
show and large images and columned texts.
 We also found that ‘The Radio Times’ uses an ‘align left’
type structure, and uses the colour red throughout.
 The main image was also staged and took up a significant
amount of the page.

21. Double Page Spread
We attempted to make our double page spread as similar to what ‘The Radio Times’
usually publish as we could.

22. Double Page Spread
 We used a big, bold masthead which took up a
significant amount of the page and therefore
 Also, we used the colour red for all of ‘The Radio
Times’ features, e.g. ‘The Radio Times exclusive’
box. This was also effective as our main colour for
our project is red, and so meant that the whole
double page spread could relate to this colour and
therefore links with our topic and documentary.
 We aligned our article to the left and wrote in
columns, as well as using a drop capital which is
present in most documentaries.
 We used screen-grabbed images from interviews to
show what would be included in the documentary.
 Our main image took up most of the right hand
side of the spread, and was professionally took in
the photography studio, and edited on the Mac
computer.
 We used page numbers and credits to try to make it
as realistic as possible.

23. Radio Trailer
 We looked at typical conventions of radio trailers from previous Media
Student’s work at the Sixth Form College:
http://prezi.com/b8zys8lkv1fe/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy&rc
=ex0share
 We realised that the main conventions of a radio trailer are that they are 30-40
seconds long, have ambient background music, a voice over which leads the
trailer and gives all of the information, and the date, time and channel the
documentary is being shown on so that the audience know when to watch it.
This is often heard at the end.
 They also use voice clips from the documentaries.

24. Radio Trailer
 For our documentary, we challenged the typical
conventions as our documentary is around 45 seconds
long, however, felt we needed these few extra seconds
to further promote the documentary and so kept it
longer.
 We also used clips from the documentary, e.g. from
interviews and voxpops. We used the same music and
voice over from the documentary to keep it consistent.
 We told the audience all the airing information at the
end of the trailer.

25. In Conclusion…
 Overall, we have mostly followed and developed on
conventions of documentaries, double page spread
and radio trailers.
 In some instances, we have challenged documentaries,
but this was for the benefit of the products and
allowed them to be more creative and unique.