This document provides guidance for documentary pre-production including brainstorming ideas, researching the story, choosing equipment, making a budget, and writing a production plan. It emphasizes determining the documentary goal first to focus pre-production, using various sources for brainstorming ideas, and considering whether the topic is relevant, original, committable, and financially feasible. The document also covers obtaining location releases, and choosing different shot types like establishing shots, close-ups, and over-the-shoulder shots to visually tell the story.

1. THE SHUT UP AND SHOOT
DOCUMENTARY GUIDE
Form Research
“Shut up and shoot.” – Anthony Q. Artis

2. Basic steps of Documentary pre-
production
• 1. Brainstorm ideas and develop goal(s)
• 2. Research story
• 3. Choose interview subject
• 4. Choose equipment package
• 5. Make budget
• 6. Write production plan
• 7. Hire crew

3. Introductions are important!
• - Carefully plan out what you will do and
double-checking your equipment will help to
ensure that you get it right first time.
• By doing this we will potentially boost are
confidence, particularly when it comes to
shooting are documentary. If we complete
proper preparation we will prevent a poor
performance.

4. Documentary Goal
• “Determine the goal of your documentary first in order to
focus your preproduction in the right direction.”
• What's the focus? Why are you making this project? What story do you
want to tell? What topic will be explored? What information do you
convey to your viewers? What aspects of your topic are most compelling?
Are there new angles to explore on your topic?
• We want to focus on cyber bullying as we believe strongly the this serious
topic should be made aware by more and more people. We are interested
in researching past experiences, also we are looking forward to learning
more about conventions of a documentary and fascinated by how they are
put together. We want to educate our audience, whilst shocking them
with some of the severe things we have seen through parts of our topic
research.

5. Brainstorming Your Idea
• Use the:
• Internet
• Personal contacts
• Organizations
• Books
• Magazines
• Newspapers
• Google/yahoo

6. R-O-C-K-Y
• Think R-O-C-K-Y before you shoot:
• Relevance – will anyone care, is timing right? – yes this topic is an ongoing issue
that people will respond to.
• Originality – How will yours differ? – with the help of our outside angency, the
NSPCC, and by interviewing certain people to differ our research.
• Commitment – How long/hard will this shoot be, can we commit? – if we are
organised and stay ahead of our schedule we will hopefully create a strong
product.
• Kash – can we afford it? - Luckily for us, our school provides the resources such as
camera equipment and technology such as APPLE MACS for us to access.
• Your access – can you gain entry? - Realistically we have a clear opening to create
an interesting informative documentary.

7. LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION
• Location Release, also called “Location agreement”.
• This can be done by:
• Person, by fax, by email or standard mail.
• It should be at the top of your list BEFORE you shoot.
• *Name of location owner
• *Location address
• *Filmmakers, title of project, and production company
• *Dates and times needed
• *Permission and costs to use location
• *Damage or legal claims
• *Signatures of location owner, and filmmaker.

8. The visual language of DOCS
• The term “coverage” refers to the variety of shorts you use to visually tell your
story.
• Possible shots:
• 1. Establishing shot – open a scene to let the audience where we are at.
• 2. Wide Shots – a shot that will cover all action, a ‘safety’ shot.
• 3. Medium Shots – good for our interviews, basically framed from the waist up.
• 4. Close Ups:
• * Medium Close Up – Framed from the shoulders up.
• * Close Up – Framed from the neck up.
• * Extreme Close Up – Framed tight on facial features.
• 5. 1- shot & 2- shot:
• Both good for interviews, generally for one or two people, ideal for covering the
interaction between to people such as us and the interviewee.
• 6. Over the shoulder – this will help the audience determine the positioning and
eyeline of the people on screen.