Target audience interviews

Brainstorm Of Content

Below is a brainstorm of ideas that we thought we could incorporate into our documentary on fashion and how it has changed and evolved over time:

Initial Idea

The idea that we finally decided to base our documentary around was fashion. We thought that this would provide a large gateway as to how we could go about presenting fashion and getting a message across to the audience. It would also be possible to gather experts on this topic and everybody has their own opinion on what fashion is and how they iterpret it. Fashion does mean something to everybody whether they are highly interested in it or not and everyone has an opinion, so choosing the topic of fashion would interest many people and explore deeper into where it first began. We decided that the particular element of fashion that we would like to focus on would be the history of fashion and how different trends and styles have evolved and changed over time. We thought that this would be an interesting element to choose as it would be of interest to many people and would allow us to collect some interesting information.

Brainstorm of ideas

Below is our 3 preliminary ideas and our cirlced chosen idea for our documentary:

Spider diagram of our initial ideas:

Our first 10 ideas and our three preliminary ideas:

Typical Codes and Conventions of Documentaries

• A voiceover - a voice over is a typical aspect of a documentary, narrating what is being seen on the screen and also offering the audience a voice of 'expert knowledge' on the subject
• Cutaways of footage of the events or objects that the documentary is based around
• Interviews with experts - a typical ascpect of a documentary, used to give some authority to the opinion that the documentary is trying to prove and to back up their argument.
• Text - the use of words on the screen is commonly seen on documentaries, whether to introduce an interviewee, or dates of events etc are a cheap way of conveying information to the audience
• Mise - en - scene - visual coding is often used when interviewees are on the screen, for example if a doctor was being interviewed, the interview would typically be filmed in the doctors surgery surrounded with all the eqiupment, and with the doctor wearing the typical white lab coat or shirt and suit pants, and wearing a stethescope etc
• Sound- non diegetic sounds are often used to marry together whats being said by the voiceover and interviewees etc and what can be seen on the screen, and can also be used to create a meaning and often try and project a certain opinion on to the audience
• Positioning of interviewees on the screen - Interviews with different people are often editited together to create a narrative cohert, and the interviewees typically do not look at the camera but at the interviewer. The questions asked are also typically edited off so the interviewees answer is what is heard, graphics are also used across the bottom of the screen to introduce the interviewee. The head of the interviewee is typically positioned off centre positioned to the right or left, following the rule of thirds.
  

Six Documentaries

My Family's Crazy Gap Year

Type Of Documentary:
This was an investigative documentary folowing a family as they decide to take a gap year to a foriegn exotic country.

Themes:
Themes of the documentary were; gap years, relationships within the family and strains on each other,adventures and also other countries and cultures.

Narrative Structure:
The documentary had a linear narrative as it was narrated all the way through

Camerawork:
Camera shots that I noticed were; point of view shots, talking head shots, close ups, over head shots, close ups, and mostly handheld camera work as because after the family had left england it was up to them to film for themselves.

Sound:
There was non-diegetic action style music when a dangerous situation arose eg the family realised that they had eaten a poisonous type of fish and became very ill, music is also used with the voice over to provoke emotion from the viewer, eg when the family get emotional. Emotional music is also sometimes used at times like this eg with violins etc.

Editing:
A voice over is used.


Archive Material:
Impressive shots of the places/countries where they were staying were shown throughout their time there. There was also an animated map of the world at the beggining, showing where they will travel.