Documentary week 1
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This document provides an overview of the course "HNC Unit 61: Moving Image Documentary Production". The 15-credit course runs from October to December and aims to develop an understanding of documentary filmmaking and provide skills to produce broadcast-quality documentaries. Key topics covered include the history and development of documentary film, from early actualities to modern approaches, as well as pre-production, production, and post-production processes. Assignments include an essay, pre-production presentation, and individual documentary film with evaluation. The course aims to prepare students to understand documentary formats and produce documentaries to a broadcast standard.
Documentary week 1
- 1. HNC Unit 61: Moving Image Documentary Production
- 2. Lesson Objectives • To understand the course requirements and assignments • To begin to understand the development of the moving image documentary format
- 3. Course schedule & aims • Credit value: 15 • Dates: W/C 2nd Oct – last day of term 19th Dec • Course runs through half term (W/C 23rd Oct) Aim • The aim of this unit is to develop your understanding of the moving image documentary format and provide you with the skills needed to produce documentaries to broadcast standard.
- 4. Learning outcomes • On successful completion of this unit a learner will: 1 Understand the development of the moving image documentary format 2 Be able to complete pre-production for moving image documentary proposals 3 Be able to produce moving image documentaries 4 Be able to review own moving image documentary production work.
- 6. Course Content The beginnings of factual filmmaking Lumiere Bros, John Grierson, Robert Flaherty Documentary theory and approaches 1920s & 30s Soviet Cinema and Vertov. Leni Reifenstahl and the Third Reich British Free Cinema The rise of Documentary at the cinema Nick Broomfield, Michael Moore Documentary from pre-production to broadcast Developing a pitch; Narrative approach and visual techniques; Research skills, interviewing and scripting Current & future Documentary practice Emerging and merging platforms -Transmedia
- 7. Assignments Assignment 1 Hand out date: 16/10/17 1000 word illustrated essay on a documentary format relevant to your proposed project Hand in date: 03/11/17 Assignment 2 Hand out date: 9/10/17 Presentation of your pre-production materials for your individual Documentary film Hand in date: 8/11/17 Assignment 3 & 4 Hand out date: 9/10/17 Individual Documentary film 1000 word written evaluation Hand in date: 15/12/17
- 8. The development of Documentary Film
- 9. The problem with Documentary 'The contradictory or paradoxical thing is that in a documentary the real things depicted are liable to lose their reality by being photographed and presented in that documentary way, and there's no poetry in that. In poetry, something else happens. Hard to say what it is. Presence let's say, soul or spirit, an empathy with whatever it is that's dwelt upon, feeling for it - to the point of identification.' - Margaret Tait
- 10. ‘Many of my documentaries are feature films in disguise’ Werner Herzog
- 11. The Photographic Truth • Since the very earliest photography there has been a sense that an image can reveal the truth of the world. • Photographic images as soon as they could be reproduced were thought to be able to say more about what was actual than words ever could.
- 12. The First Photograph and the Daguerrotype • Daguerre took the first ever photo of a person in 1839 when, while taking a daguerreotype of a Paris street, a pedestrian stopped for a shoe shine, long enough to be captured by the long exposure (several minutes).
- 13. Louis Daguerre
- 14. Edison kinetoscope films 1894 -1896
- 15. Lumiere Bros - Actualities • The Lumiere Bros patented a dual camera and projector in 1895. • They were the first to present projected, moving photographic pictures to a paying audience in the same year • At first, films were very short, sometimes only a few minutes. They were shown at fairgrounds, music halls or anywhere a screen could be set up and a room darkened. • Subjects included views of foreign lands, short comedies and events considered newsworthy. The films were accompanied by lecturers, music and a lot of audience participation - although they did not have synchronized dialogue they were not 'silent' as they are sometimes described.
- 16. The Lumiere Brothers' - First films (1895)
- 17. International development. • By the end of 1896 the Lumiere’s cinematographie was being used across Europe, Russia and India. In the next two years its use had spread across the world. • The reason for this was financial at the time film was cheap to make and increasingly popular as audiences would watch films more than once.
- 18. Boleslaw Matuszewski • A polish writer and filmmaker identified the concept of a Documentary film as early as 1898 • Wrote two of the earliest texts on cinema Une nouvelle source de l’histoire & La photographie animee • They both considered the historical and documentary value of film • He also proposed the creation of the Film Archive to collect & preserve film
- 19. Robert Flaherty & John Grierson Moana (1926) Dir Robert Flaherty
- 20. ‘from the raw’ • The Scottish filmmaker and writer John Grierson is often associated with the word documentary due to his review of Robert Flaherty’s film Moana • Grierson suggested that the principles of documentary, to observe life, was a new art form in itself and that the original actor and scene were better guides than their fiction counterparts to interpreting the modern world • He spoke of taking materials ‘from the raw’ as they were more real (and therefore better) than if it were acted • He saw it as a ‘creative treatment of actuality’
- 21. Dziga Vertov ‘Life as it is’ • Vertov was an important early documentary film and newsreel director and theorist • His style and theories are highly influential to this day • Vertov began as an editor on newsreel footage after the Bolshevik revolution of 1917 • He worked with his wife a fellow editor to produce Man with a Movie Camera • Kino-Pravda (Film truth) series of films • He wanted to capture fragments of actuality that when edited together create a deeper truth that cannot be seen with the naked eye
- 22. Kino Pravda • He focused on everyay experiences, eschewing bourgois concerns • Locations included bars, markets and schools Kino Pravda 1
- 23. Man with a Movie Camera Perhaps his most famous work is Man with a Movie Camera An experimental documentary from 1929 It presents images of life in the Soviet cities of Kiev, Kharkov, Moscow and Odessa It shows ordinary citizens from dawn to dusk at work and play What cinematic techniques do you find featured in the sequence? Criticized upon release it is now thought of as one of the greatest and most influential documentaries of all time.
- 24. Task: Short Doc edit • Complete your edit of your short documentary from the previous week • Once completed export your file adding your name and put it on the media store
- 25. TASK: DEFINING DOCUMENTARY • First research and then write your own definition of Documentary. • Write two paragraphs about what Documentary means for you. • Write up a short evaluation of your short doc task (maximum 500 words) Describe 1. Your pre-production process 2. Production process 3. Post-production process The techniques and equipment you used(Vox pops, direct to camera, B roll footage lighting, microphone, locati