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Perhaps you want to create a YouTube video of your cat riding a vacuum robot. Maybe you want to make an insightful feature-length film that will tug at the hearts of your viewers. Both are examples of a documentary, and that鈥檚 the beauty of documentary films: your options are limitless. But if you want more people than your mom to watch what you make, it's important to know the tricks of the trade.
Here are my top 5 tips to creating a compelling documentary film:
5. Don鈥檛 be so stuffy.
A documentary shouldn鈥檛 feel like medicine. Loosen up, smile a little, and give me a belly laugh. If you鈥檙e too serious for the full length of your story, you鈥檙e not reaching the full spectrum of the human experience.听 It鈥檚 true that it would be disrespectful to crack jokes during heavy moments, of course.听 Still, even a grave story has room to make you smile.听 Humor allows us to reset as tension builds. Nobody will ever stop watching a story that makes them laugh.
4. Use the right camera for the job.听
Decide which is the best before the first frame and you鈥檒l be sure to get the best results.
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I鈥檝e had the opportunity to work on television specials that cost millions and independent features that only had a few thousand bucks.听 What I love about today鈥檚 cameras is that it鈥檚 easier than ever before to shoot like the pros without spending like the pros.
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Right now, I鈥檓 loving two economical cameras.听 The and the are both extremely small, bringing HD cameras to the palm of your hand.听 The GoPro is true 1080, extremely versatile, waterproof, and tough enough for even the heartiest adventurer.听 The 5D is also small and has a sensor the size of a walrus鈥攎eaning that you can shoot incredible HD video.听 They鈥檙e both also less intimidating than traditional sholder-mounts.听 It鈥檚 been my experience that when you put a big camera in someone鈥檚 face that you鈥檙e less likely to get a genuine experience.听 There鈥檚 something non-threatening about a little camera.听 The only drawback is that both cameras sacrifice sound quality.听 Think about a third camera that can connect professional audio attachments or record sound separately.
3. The best producers/shooters are created in the edit suite.听
Learn your editing software and compose your story.
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Editing is a lot of work.听 Even if you dread pouring over hours of your footage and dealing with the hassle of choosing the best codec thingamajig for the job鈥攍earn to edit!听 When you ingest footage you understand better how the camera works, how much data it captures, the frame size and aspect ratio, how many frames it鈥檚 recording in a second, and the scan type.
2. Know the scope of your project.听
Begin to formulate the story you want to tell early on鈥攈ow long it will be, where it will be seen, and the overall goal of the film.
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Before you begin shooting all willy-nilly, define your final product.听 Is it a one-hour TV documentary, a feature doc, a short, a webasode?听 Is it a one-off or a series?听 These answers dictate the amount of content you should aim for and the tone of your film.听 And this ultimately comes down to knowing your audience.
Once you鈥檝e got the footage loaded and begin to make edits you鈥檒l start to look for sequences.听 By watching what you shot, you鈥檒l better understand how to shoot a story.听 Often times I鈥檝e heard editors cursing that they need a cutaway shot or a consistent storyline to put the message into context.听 It鈥檚 embarrassing when you鈥檙e in the room listening to the editor complain, and you were the one running the show.听 Believe me, it鈥檚 a lot easier to capture a story in the field than trying to generate it in post.
1. Document the world as it is.听
Create a work that helps people understand their shared experiences by being genuine. 鈥ㄢ∕uch of TV documentary is not truthful. I鈥檓 not talking about Jersey Shore, because I wouldn鈥檛 give it the time of day鈥攑eople know when their being fed BS.听 Tell your stories without the hyperbole.
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In my last film, , we ended up shooting a scene in downtown Juneau five times to put the climate in perspective (or something like that) and the shot we chose in edit was the one in which we were interrupted by a tourist looking for the post office.听 At the time, it was frustrating, but our editor loved it the most. It鈥檚 honest, and all of a sudden, people care.
is a former National Geographic Television Associate Producer and is currently scouting his third independent feature in India. Watch an outtake from above.