What are three key suggestions that this video brings up? Why are each of these so important? How could you use them in future productions?
Three key suggestions was that you should be mindful when choosing your interview space, 3-point lighting, and testing your audio and video before you begin the interview.
What are three tips that you think are the most important from this video? Why?
The most important tips I gathered from this video was to ask open ended questions, prepare your questions but don't give them out to the interviewee beforehand, and don't talk unless you are going to appear on camera. You should ask open ended questions to give your interviewee room to answer more in depth versus a yes or no answer you would receive a more fleshed out answer. You should prep your questions but not give them out to your interviewee because when you have your questions prepped it helps keep you organized but you shouldn't give them out because if they see the questions before then they'll have time to prep their answers and the interview will feel robotic and inauthentic.
What is the difference between A and B roll? Why is B-roll needed?
A-Roll is the main narrative driver footage, it is the video or the audio that is telling the story. B-Roll is the footage that supports the A-Roll and the narrative it is trying to tell through more interesting visuals. B-Roll is needed to make your project more interesting, break up A-Roll, and to help hide imperfections in the A-Roll footage. If you are just watching straight A-Roll footage it can get boring so having B-Roll to break up the footage helps make your project more interesting. It can help hide imperfections in A-Roll if you need to cut audio from the A-Roll footage but want it to look smooth you just cut to B-Roll with it to help hide the change.
What are 2 things that the filmmaker did that are controversial? Why were they? Do you think the film was "authentic" after reading this article? Why are why not? Why is this film so famous?
What was controversial about this was that there was an interruption in the filming, there is a missing piece of a scene where you don't see the seal getting pulled up to the surface bringing up the question on if this was authentic or not, another thing was the filmmaker not wanting to show a shot with a gun to keep the purity of "man against nature" which again takes away from the authenticity of the film. I think this film was authentic in what they were showing, however there were definitely parts they dramatized for the sake of entertainment and film. I think this film is so famous though for what it achieved in the time it was made.
Imagine you are talking to a person who has never before seen or even heard of a documentary film. How would you describe it? What are some essential elements of a documentary film? What distinguishes a documentary film from a narrative (Hollywood) film or a broadcast news story?
A documentary film is a piece of non-fiction media that follows a specific subject and has an unspoken driving question that the filmmakers want to answer by the end of the film. Essential elements for a documentary would be b-roll footage of the main elements of your subject of the film, a driving question that must be answered by the end of the film, and narration or interviews. What distinguishes a documentary from a narrative film is that it is not scripted in the same way that a narrative film is, you are working live with non-actors for the most part and possibly asking them questions and you have to be prepared for any answer they give and any situation that happens.
Reflect on your performance in your music video group. Look back at your pitch. What was your role in the project? What went according to plan? What didn't? How could you improve future productions?
My role in this project was the role of the Director, I would say I handled my job well, there was a lot of high stress situations I was under and I was able to deal with them without taking it out on my cast and crew and everything was able to go smoothly and we were able to work around the issues. Everything was able to go according to plan for the most part, we had all our locations set, our costumes, our main cast, and all our props. The major things that went wrong was that the day we needed our dancers all of them no called no showed and I was FURIOUS but I couldn't show that and I had to think of quick solutions using some of the actors we already had on set step in and some friends come in last minute to do it, it was very stressful but we got it done. We could improve this in the future by getting more reliable people and making them sign contracts to prevent no showing without consequences.
Revisit your earlier blog posts about sound. What are 3 things you learned during this unit? What did you learn about them? Explain in detail. What are two things that you still feel you need to learn more about? Why? What was one thing that you found the most interesting? Why?
Three things I learned during the sound for screen unit was the importance of sound design, how to equalize and adjust levels in adobe audition, and how to record proper sound onset. For sound design I learned how important it was because it's essential in the end to make your edit fully fleshed out and whole and not hollow, it provides the depth you need. For equalization and adjusting levels in audition thats important because in case audio gets messed up on set and theres unwanted noises or issues you can adjust those in post to get the cleanest audio possible. As for recording the best audio on set we learned how to boom properly and all the positions and how to hold it directly at the mouth because you would need to get the clearest audio and those mics need to be pointed directly at the subject from which the audio is coming from, as for lavaliers you would lav them correctly but still boom them just in case the lavs fail on you during the shoot you would have a back up, you should always make sure to record room tone which is 15-30 secs of pure silence recorded of everyone on set on the room to gather how everything sounds. I didn't mention this but what I found most interesting wad foley, this is because I find it so fascinating how they can make such obscure sounds with everyday objects.
