Evaluation

Research:

To begin my research I explored how a documentary is made by looking into their conventions and modes. This research was really important to my whole project because documentary film maker is completely different to the fictional content I've filmed previously. Before starting this project I hadn't watched many documentary's and after researching them it made me realise the importance of diversifying the media I regularly consume. Also in my research I found that conducting a practise interview contributed to my final product. In previous projects I had been struggling with the way my product looked whether the lighting wasn't great or it was slightly out of focus. This problem also occurred in my practise interview after this I decided to take extra care in setting up my camera.

Additionally I wrote a research essay in which I dissected two very different documentary's trying to understand how the film maker manipulated my thoughts and emotions. Personally I found this activity extremely helpful as it makes me dig deeper and then apply this to my own work. For example I found the lingering cuts in the documentary Whitney: Can I Be Me to stir real emotion so I decided to leave them in my documentary when Sadie is talking about her pregnancy.

Idea:

My initial idea was based around pregnancy and parenthood however I took me a while to find an angle that was interesting. The proposal I made helped me to think through my idea more thoroughly for example I hadn't considered a potential audience and the actual purpose of my documentary. However I ended up changing my initial idea on how I would start and end the documentary this was because of scheduling issues. Also once I added my voice over with the photos from different decades it appeared weird. However with the footage I captured the introduction seemed personal and perfectly introduced the three women. 

Planning:

I regret not starting a production schedule sooner because of my home situation it's very difficult to travel and I didn't consider this enough. By making my production schedule sooner I would have considered filming sooner which would have relieved some stress from editing. Although I put off filming until I was at my production stage I already knew who I wanted to interview so it would have really benefited me to think a head and a schedule would have really helped. In future I will consider planning my whole project because it will really help me think of my work as a whole and hopefully relieve some stress from me.

My planning for my interviews were well thought out I wrote a series of questions for each interview and also considered what cut away footage I would be able to get at each location. This really helped me because I can be forgetful and I didn't have time for re-shoots I will definitely continue this planning for my future projects.

Production:

Overall my filming went very well all my interviewees were very easy to work with and even gave their own suggestions on things I could film. I felt as if my quality of filming has vastly improved since my last project because I spent time setting up my camera to fix problems I had previously made. When I began to edit I found it quite difficult because there was no set format, for previous projects I've had story boards to help me organise my work. I considered making a visual audio script however this seemed to confuse me more so I decided to just review clips to see how I could make a narrative with them. This method as unorganised as it was worked well with me as I felt that I would have missed crucial parts of an interview if I had planned it before hand. However this only worked because I was making a documentary and I will only use this method when making a documentary.

After I considered my documentary finished I decided to get feedback from my tutor because I felt in the past I didn't want feedback because I knew the mistakes I had made. However I wanted to know about finer detail making it just seem tidier and more put together. I was able to listen to his advice and apply it to my final product, which I think is a big improvement from my last projects, where I didn't particularly want feedback therefore didn't apply it to my work.

Conclusion:

Overall I was very happy with my final product and can see my improvement from my last project in all my stages of my work. I hope to continue to improve with my next project and will be considering better planning to help relieve stress. Also I will continue to take time setting up my equipment to ensure my footage looks and sounds professional.