Documentary Critical Reflection

 The goal of my documentary Scrapped was to show what unfinished art projects reveal about their creators, specifically when those creators are young. I think that I succeeded in accomplishing this goal while creating an engaging piece, although there are some areas for improvement.

 When it came to research, it was mainly research through other documentaries as opposed to research of the subject. The subject of unfinished art projects didn't have any facts or history I needed to mention, and I wanted the film to be all about the personal opinions and emotions of the subjects. This is why there are no statistics or facts mentioned in the film, which illustrates the emphasis on personal feelings and attachment. Of the documentaries that I viewed in class, Exit Through the Gift Shop was the biggest inspiration, as I took a lot from it's chaotic and raw aesthetic when it came my editing choices and b-roll. Above is a shot from that film, where the unpolished nature of it's shooting style is noticeable. That film uses a handheld camera and tight close-ups during b-roll to give a sense of rawness, which I replicated in my b-roll, although mine was staged. When filming Scrapped, I chose not use a lighting kit, as I wanted things to look as natural as possible and traditional film lighting would create to much artifice. It's also part of the reason I chose to use alternative rock music. That style of music isn't common in documentaries, but I felt like in both Exit Through the Gift Shop and my film, it's used to illustrate the chaos and freedom of creativity, and in my film specifically, the feelings of anxiety and stress.

 On the subject of the unconventional editing choices, like the colorful filters and big text that appears over people's faces, one reason for their inclusion was to engage the audience at the beginning of the film to get them hooked. When there's this loud music combined with all of this fast and chaotic editing, it excites the viewer and makes draws them into the anxiety fueled world of young artists. One thing that I would criticize about these editing choices, however, is that they can be a little too distracting for some people and lead to them not properly comprehending important information as they're to focused on the music and visuals. I should've either toned it down or had it happen in a place where total comprehension and focus is less vital.

 The entire film is structured using interviews. I alternated between the two interviews so that the documentary would be structured around the progression of topics, going from introductions to detail on the topics of specific projects and why they went unfinished, and then concluding with advice to artists watching the film. I chose this structure because it would be natural and satisfying to follow, progressing like a three act story or a speech. During these interviews I had the subjects look directly into the camera, which I did because it would establish a more intimate and personal connection between the viewer and subject, which makes what they say feel more impactful and makes the overall documentary feel more like a conversation, which enhances the theme of personal and emotional connection to art.

Most of the interviews in the documentary are indirect, but there are some instances of direct interviews, like when Jaden is asked about the role time plays in the creative process and how it leads to projects going unfinished. These moments are mainly in follow-up questions that the interviewee didn't prepare for and therefore didn't rephrase, so to make the film flow better I had to include myself asking the question to create context. I also included moments of direct interviews to create emphasis on certain responses that felt especially poignant. An issue that I noticed looking back on these interviews is how much you can hear me saying "yeah" or some other kind of brief verbal response while someone is talking, especially during Sawyer's interview. I didn't realize that I was doing this when I was filming, but it definitely is an element that feels unprofessional and is distracting to the viewer.

 

 Scrapped is a documentary that primarily represents two social groups, those groups being artists and teenagers. One way that I represented these groups was through the doodle images that appear in multiple places in the film, as they represent both youth and the creative spirit. The haphazard looking design of the doodles represents the energy and anxiousness that many young artists have to get their work out into the world, as well as a sense of youthful nonconformity. These feelings are also illustrated by the editing in the beginning of the film, which is meant to represent the stress and pressure of being a young person and balancing all the aspects of your life, including creativity, and the mere aggressiveness of it is a visualization of teen rebellion. Rebellion is also illustrated through the choice to feature alternative music, although the intensity of the music I used, especially in the beginning, may be too much and distracting for people.

 Representation of teen artists is also shown via the interviews themselves, where the subjects talk about school life and balancing it with creativity. I felt like the experience of scrapping projects because you need to focus on school is mostly universal to teenage creators, so I highlighted it in the film. At the end of the film, the idea of artists being a part of a greater community is illustrated by the subjects giving advice to any artists watching the film about dealing with unfinished projects.

Even though there are some issues with it, I'm very happy with how Scrapped turned out and I believe that it successfully achieved its goal. 

Documentary Production (Part 2)

  Editing the documentary took two days. Day one, November 13th, was all about making a line edit, which is an edit that just contains the interview without any b-roll. This part was harder than I thought it would be. I had to intercut Jaden and Sawyer's interview together and make it coherent, like it's a continuous speech being given by both voices. I tried my best to alternate between the two subjects, but in some places I had to show two responses by one person back to back, as it just flowed better. This is also where I did the color correction of the interview clips. Jaden's raw footage looked fine, I didn't really need to do much. Sawyer, on the other hand, had some lighting in their house that didn't look the best on camera. The main correction I made to it was giving it a white balance, which made it match more with Jaden's footage and improved it noticeably.

Before

After

 The next day was the day the project was due, meaning I had to add all of the b-roll and the music and the "special enhancements" (don't worry, we'll get there) in one day. I began with the b-roll, adding in clips to mask cuts in the interview, act as transitions, and prevent the audience from getting bored staring at talking heads for too long. I realized that I had undershot the amount of b-roll I had needed, but the bright side to this was that it gave me an excuse to implement something that would really make the documentary stand out.

 That idea was doodles. I went into Microsoft Paint and made little sketches based on the unfinished stories. I added to the DIY, Exit Through the Gift Shop inspired aesthetic I was going for, and like I said earlier made the film more visually unique and interesting. It also illustrated the idea of young artists trying to get their work out there, and I used the doodle aesthetic for the end credits as well. All things considered, I'm proud of my artistic accomplishments.

 Once that was done, I added the music. I already gathered a number of stock tracks (pictured on the right) a few days ago when I had free time in class, so now it was just about adding them in. I didn't use every song that I downloaded, but I overprepared enough so that I had something that fit each moment in the film. The first song that I used was this alternative rock one. I wanted to feature alternative and punk music in the film because it would represent the chaotic feeling of being an artists, having all of these ideas screaming at you in your head and struggling to get them out, all while having to balance your life as an artist with other responsibilities. Naturally, by using that kind of music I had to lower the volume on it significantly so it wouldn't overpower the subject's voices.

 Finally, I had a functional documentary, but there was still a piece missing. A secret sauce, if you will. You see, as I edited the film, I knew something was missing. I wanted this film to capture the chaos of being young and being and artist, as well as the aggression and frustration that both leads to and comes from leaving things unfinished. In it's current state, I felt like it wasn't going far enough to do that. On a more petty level, I also wanted to eliminate every possibility of the audience being bored, especially during the beginning.

My solution to both of these problems was simple: go crazy. For the first minute of the film, as well as in a few other moments, I employed some pretty unexpected and nontraditional editing tricks (like colorful filters and a repeated split screen effect I call "bug eye view"), and that combined with the thrashing alt rock that plays during that section really works to give off that off-kilter, anxious energy that's just shy of causing most people a headache.

 And with those finishing touches done, I exported the film, submitted it to my teacher, and took a deep breath. I had finished "Scrapped", my first documentary.

Documentary Production (Part 1)

   Right before the weekend where I was scheduled to film, I ran into a problem. Two of my four subjects had conflicts and wouldn't be able to participate, meaning I was down to two. Then after that, I learned that of those two, one of them was out of town on a family trip (one they didn't know about until now) and wouldn't be returning until after the weekend, meaning I was now down to one. With the availability of my interviewees out of my control, I set off on Monday, November 11th (a day off from school) to make the best of what I could get. I figured that I would make myself my own second subject, knowing that the structure of the film wouldn't feel the same if there was only one.

 That one subject was Jaden, a fellow student filmmaker. Jaden has been my best friend for years and I knew that if there was anyone I could rely on, it was him. I arrived at his place in the afternoon and we set up the interview in his bedroom. He had a shelf containing his desktop and a display of Funko Pop bobbleheads and Lego characters, which I thought would be an interesting background. I told him not to clean some of the clutter on it because it would make it look more natural, plus there was a box from our theater program that was labeled "Write the Story" that I thought should be visible because it fit the film's subject. The equipment I was using was rented from a place called Becon, which lends filming equipment to students in South Florida for student films and news stories. I got a camera, a lens, a mic, a pair of headphones, and a tripod, which were the bare essentials I needed for the documentary.

 Jaden's interview went smoothly. We began with a practice run so he could get a feel for how he wanted to answer the questions before we filmed the real thing. He talked about his writing process, an unfinished scrip called "Bury Harry", responded to some follow-ups I asked to get more detail on certain things, and before we knew it we were done. The next step was to film b-roll. I got some shots of Jaden working on his computer at various angles and some other ones of the posters and props littered around the room. Those computer shots were annoying, as no matter what I did to adjust the settings on the camera and the computer, the text on the computer wouldn't appear properly visible. It wasn't a big deal as it wasn't necessary for the audience to be able to read it, but it still bothered me because I wanted them to see that Jaden has written screenplays. Once that was over, I packed everything up and went back home.

 I needed to return the Becon equipment tomorrow, meaning that now was the time to film myself. I did in my bedroom, which was barren compared to Jaden's, and responded the questions that I had written. I focused on this video diary project I had began but never committed to and eventually abandoned, and I intended to use footage from that as b-roll. I'll be honest with you, it was late at night when I filmed this, I was tired, I wanted to sleep, and I knew that I looked and sounded like a mess and I dreaded having to edit it. It was all I could do without my other subjects, though, so I filmed my sleep deprived self and accepted whatever result that would yield. Now as much as I would love to show you the disaster that was the footage, I deleted it all. Why? Well, the next morning, a miracle happened.

 Sawyer (the person who was out of town) texted me to say that they got back home that night and could be filmed afterschool. I quickly texted the guy in charge of Becon and got him to let me extend me rent on the equipment, and when school was over I headed to Sawyer's house to conduct my second interview. Interviewing Sawyer was basically the same as interviewing Jaden, I asked the same questions but asked different follow-ups. Sawyer's responses were a lot more in depth and and felt a lot more personal that Jaden's more technical responses, which isn't to say anything bad about him, it's just to highlight how different people have different ways of expressing ideas. I liked this contrast, as it would make my documentary have more variety. Once we were out of questions, I got some b-roll, a lot of it being of Sawyer's digital drawings. Finally I was done and headed home, knowing that I now had two quality interviews, and didn't have to use the terrible one of myself. I felt confident, and all that was left to do was edit and export.

Documentary Planning

  From the beginning I wanted my documentary to stand out. When it came time to pick a subject, I realized that given the time frame of two weeks, I had to pick interviewees who were people I already knew and lived close by. I wanted to be efficient, I didn't want to waste time and energy making phone calls to people I've never met who may or may not be willing to be filmed or available when I needed them to be. My best bet was to center it around people from my summer theater program, as they're basically my inner circle who I feature in a lot of my projects, and they all have something interesting to talk about. Working backwards from there, I now needed to decide what these people would be interviewed about. 

 One of my first ideas was to make it about fans of obscure and independent music, which could've been interesting, but I knew there was something else I could think of that was more... I guess the one word I can think of is special. I thought about the demographics I was working with. I would be interviewing people who do theater, and a lot of them also work in other artistic mediums. That got me thinking about making it about those artistic pursuits, but that subject has been done numerous times and I knew that if I did, I would be one of multiple in the class. I needed a unique angle. 

 And then it came to me. So many documentaries are about young artists, focusing on the joys they take from their work. As a young artist myself, I know that joys don't come alone, they come alongside frustrations, especially when it comes to struggling to finish a passion project. That's what my documentary would be about: unfinished artistic projects.

 Now that I had my subject, I reached out through a group chat to get people who were interested. I got four people, which seemed like a good amount of interviewees, and I sent them a document for them to give a brief description of what they would be talking about, as I wanted each person to have a specific unfinished project that their interview would focus on. I also asked them to list their availability to be filmed so I could make a schedule

 While I waited on everyone to respond, I worked on making a shot list. My idea was to film at the house of each subject, and have them show of their work to the camera. I had only been to one of these people's houses before, so I didn't know what would be there to film. When I made my shot list, I listed a lot of generic things that would fit the theme of unfinished art projects, like shots of people typing on computers and sketching in notebooks, with the knowledge that once I got there I would film that in addition to b-roll I would come up with on the fly based on what I saw. This production would require a lot of staged b-roll, but I didn't want it to look staged. I planned to shoot using a handheld camera to make the footage seem more natural.

 Now it was time to make the questions. This part was pretty simple. I knew that I wanted to focus on what unfinished projects reveal about their creators and the personal reasons they go unfinished, so I made a series of questions that focused on that. After getting feedback on them from my teacher, I reworded them to be more conversational sounding (i.e. changing "what is" to "can you tell me about"), as that would lead to me getting better responses. I put these questions in the shared document with the subjects so they could read them and prepare ahead of time, and I made them aware that I intended to ask follow-ups.

 After making the questions, the final step was to make the outline for the film. This was pretty much the order of how I would present the information. I decided that I would rather structure the documentary based on ideas rather than the individual subjects. I would begin with an introduction to the artists, which would naturally progress to a general discussion of unfinished projects and then to their personal and emotional significance. I thought that the best way to end it would be with advice to artists, as they would be a target audience member of the film and I liked the idea of ending things on a hopeful note. I felt like it would make it more meaningful. 

 

Documentary Viewings and Research

 The first big production project we had this year to create a documentary. Obviously, to do that we had to watch some documentaries to learn what one should look like. One of the big take-aways was that documentaries can come in various forms, and while there are conventions of the genre, there are no written rules as to how it should look or feel.

Take the first feature documentary we viewed in class, American Promise from 2013. This film showcases the lives of two black boys living in New York City and attending the prestigious Dalton Prep School. It highlights the stress put on students in high pressure school environments and the experience of growing up black in New York. A very interesting aspect of this film is how it is filmed by the parents of one of the boys, and thus the entire thing can be seen as a really long home movie. Describing it like that may be an exaggeration, but there is something very raw about the handheld footage from average cameras that makes the movie feel more real and immersive. The interviews were mostly conducted at impromptu moments and it had a strong honesty to it, with people saying things on camera that others may not because it may paint them in a bad light. Watching it, I knew that for my documentary I wanted that sense of rawness. I wanted to show something real, and something that people may not often think about or want to show.

The second film we saw was Exit Through the Gift Shop from 2010. I'm gonna get it out of the way and say that this was my favorite of the documentaries we saw, and it might be one of my new all time favorite movies. Exit Through the Gift Shop takes on an odd structure, being a documentary made by the street artist Banksy about videographer Thierry Guetta, showcasing the footage he shot of other street artists and Banksy himself and discussing the relationships he formed with them. Around halfway through, the film shifts focus to Guetta's attempts at becoming a street artists himself, the instillation he created, and the controversy that sparked from it. What I love about this film is the style of it, using handheld camera movements, jump cuts, b-roll edited into hard hitting montages, and a soundtrack of punk and electronic music to represent the boldness and aggression of the street art community while being always exciting to look at and listen to. I also love the choices of b-roll regarding Thierry Guetta and the interviews of him, which let him be himself and show his eccentricities, making him one of the most interesting people you could learn about. Like American Promise, Exit Through the Gift Shop is raw, but it's also stylish. I immediately decided that my documentary would be inspired by this film, both in having a strong aesthetic and identity and showcasing interesting subjects and letting them give insight into who they are.

After viewing these two film, we moved to episodic documentaries. In class, we watched a 2019 episode of the Netflix series Abstract: The Art of Design. The episode we watched was about costume designer Ruth Carter, discussing her career, her background, and what her work represents. This series uses a lot of staged b-roll to represent what the voice over is discussing, which is something that would become very important to my documentary once I decided what it would be about (more on that in a future post). Overall, while I found the episode well made, it didn't stick with me or impact me the way the other documentaries did. It felt artificial on a visual level, it's crisp cinematography and bright colors look nice but only served to take me out of the realism and make me think only of this as a staged production. If I was to have staged b-roll, I didn't want it to look staged.

The last documentaries we watched were two opinion documentaries (op-docs) from the New York Times. We had the choice of which two we saw, and the ones I chose were Modern Goose and Roach's Lullaby. Looking back on them, they both had similar subjects, both relating to the relationship between animals and humans. The way that they each portrayed this idea, however, was very different. Modern Goose has no dialogue, and shows the life of geese in a city through a verité style, simply filming them partaking in aspects of their life like searching for food and swimming in the lake. Roach's Lullaby uses interviews to discuss how New Yorkers in the 70s deal with roaches, and has a far more gritty look and feel than the sleekness of Modern Goose. Despite my love of 70s grime, I would I say that I preferred Modern Goose mainly because of how it tells a compelling story with no dialogue, and the beautiful way it humanizes nature. Watching these back to back, it solidified the truth that documentaries can look and feel like anything.

Been a While

 I'M BACK! Yes, you heard that right, I have returned to this blog, this time to document my journey through AICE Media Studies A Level. This time the blog is gonna be bigger, it's gonna be better, and it's gonna show all the amazing things I'll do in this high level course. Get ready and strap in, because from this point on it's full speed ahead with no turning back.