Once our group was established, I was appointed as director of photography for the project. This then gave me a conceptual awareness of my task from start to finish. I was able to consider the documentary’s artistic style through my role and through liaising with most of the group – mainly the producer, director and camera operator.
Before we could start our documentary, we had to research into how documentaries work which I done by watching several different documentaries such as ‘The Cove’ which opened my eyes to the different styles documentaries use. Researching photojournalists was also helpful as being director of photography, it gave me the opportunity to see how others work – allowing me to acquire ideas and even adapt them into my own work. Researching the history of documentaries and photojournalism allowed me to not only see how filmmakers and photojournalists worked, such as Bill Eppridge and John Grierson, but also the direction in which documenting through visual media is heading.
Researching the technical side of the production process helped me not only in my role, but also it enabled me to understand clearly how the sound works. I have previously documented where I have visited since 2010 with family, but I have never understood the technical side of photography. Through researching it I have gained a clear understanding of the manual modes of the Canon 650D. I have never put this into practice until the day in which we filmed our documentary, and it was a huge learning curve. However I did take the camera into a low-lit pub beforehand and tested the manual settings but this didn’t prove to be resourceful. Trying to balance between the aperture, shutter speed and ISO proved difficult and there are images that show how I was learning as some were underexposed and some grainy. I feel that, as we were there from 10am until 10pm, I had the whole day to find my bearings with the settings I had researched. It wasn’t until the post-production stages where I had blown them up in RAW on Photoshop, that I could truly identify where I had gone wrong.
When individually researching documentary ideas, I found it a particular challenge to find a subject area that provided us previously unexposed information that would be of interest. I searched through several news websites and utilised their search facilities in order to find interesting stories – for example I searched for the word “shocking” to find articles of a shocking nature. I searched on a local and national scale whilst thinking pragmatically about how viable the location of particular stories were to us. I felt this way of finding stories was good in terms of finding articles that are affecting people currently – which in turn provides us with fresh information as we worked. Trying to find a subject that has potential to meet the six qualities of documentary proved the biggest task as without meeting most of those qualities, our documentary would have been dull for any viewer. I found potential in two subject areas; closing care homes and scrap metal thieves. However, these were little benefit to the group’s ideas as they have been done before.
Once we reached a group decision on Competitive Food Eating, we found other than the show Man V. Food, there were small concentrations of food competitions all over the UK. Finding an interesting fanatic would prove difficult so the idea was scrapped. In its place was all about the Brony fandom. Once the idea was set in stone we all researched extensively to become ‘experts’ on the subject and have extensive knowledge when filming and connecting with our primaries. Through creating social networking accounts, such as Instagram, our production company has been able to directly contact our primaries and find them easier. The fact that the Brony community was initially based online, once we started posting online looking for primaries such as Brony Facebook pages and websites, the response was very rapid. We were invited to the Season 4 Premiere of My Little Pony in London through reaching out on social networking sites.
Once we had the event inline early on in the semester, we were able to plan well for the day of filming. We thought about the questions to ask and came up with a basic outline, which we would then expand on during the day, considering our primary’s response. I researched into the location – finding out the setting of the location beforehand worked well as we were able to know what to expect. By arriving early we were able to think about where our interviews will take place. Due to the aesthetics being inside the noisy pub, we decided to interview outside as sound levels would be better and due to its location in the heart of London, there was still an atmosphere that would be identified by the audience. My role as DoP was put into practice as I took many still shots throughout the day. The fact that the event was organised in a western themed pub, as DoP, I was able to assess what would look good in shots – for example there were horses heads along the bar, horses on the wall and barrels and horse saddle barstools around the pub. The general décor of the pub was mostly dark wood. I tried to get these elements of the setting into my images through the background as I captured different scenarios with different individuals within the foreground.
Release forms were a huge part of my role on the day, as taking the images of different people consisted of getting them to sign the forms prior to taking them. I’m happy that I got as many as possible early on in the day – however as so many people were in and out it was hard to make sure everybody had signed them. The fact that the organisers put posters about our presence and we handed our own leaflets around helped inform anybody who didn’t want to participate. As a group we kept forms organised with a folder, which helped, but I feel associating a release form with the individual who signed it could be a task as they became muddled.
With one SD card, it was ejected early and formatted as we rushed to hand the camera back in – this meant we lost many images, one of which I was most proud of. This has made me learn to be less agitated and more prepared in postproduction stages as deadlines approach.
As a group we’ve worked really well in achieving what we set out to do, and have had many learning curves from start to finish. I feel there is always room for improvement, as I reflect on what I have done and broaden my knowledge. Through the project I wish I had taken the camera out more than what I did as I would have produced much better images when I needed to. However I was happy with what I had captured. I am also very pleased that I can take away new technical knowledge and put it into practice during future projects. I am pleased with my time management for the website as I started uploading content considerably before the deadline – but I feel I still could have started sooner.