Our task was to create a 3-minute documentary related to Greenwich. After we were put into groups we had to select our roles; I was editor, Dominic was producer, Yashna was director, Conor was director of photography and Beth was on sound. We then discussed researching ideas, so we each prepared for our first production meeting by researching current documentaries and coming in with a concept for our production. A documentary I had found that I liked was about the secrets of body language [1]. I found the idea of showing how body language is used to be very interesting, so I thought it would be a good idea to apply theories from the documentary to the people of Greenwich.
The documentary idea that Dominic had brought was about gymnastics. Dominic had found a documentary telling the story of a gymnastics coach and his background, why he runs the group, and about his students [2]. The whole documentary had been filmed on GoPro’s which we all really liked the idea of. Out of all the ideas brought to the first meeting we decided that the gymnastics documentary idea was the best one, so we began making our pitch for the next seminar session. For our pitch we each created one slide of a power point and spoke about how we would use our role to produce our best documentary. As an editor I spoke about using a bright colour scale to create an upbeat atmosphere, using a mixture of slow and normal speed shots, alike what was used in the gymnastics documentary. I said I would work with the director of photography to get the perfect types of shots so that they can be edited nicely together for smooth transitions. Conor as director of photography said he would be using a GoPro for some shots, because we had liked the idea of filming on GoPro’s from our research.
Before the pitch, Dominic had already got into contact with multiple, local gymnastic groups, asking for permission to create a documentary about them, however the first group to reply said that they would be unable to facilitate us and recommended we ask other groups. About a week after our pitch, all of the organisations had either denied our request or had not replied, so we sought help from our lecturers as our plan for the gymnastics documentary had failed. One of the lecturers recommended us a gymnastics group outside of Greenwich who are often looking for advertisement, which we could give them with this documentary. So we then had permission to film outside of Greenwich and Dominic got into contact with the new group. We had to send them a couple of emails because they were not replying and we were getting tight on time, so after a week of them not replying we had to have another meeting to discuss our new plan.
In this meeting we discussed ideas that could replace the failed gymnastics one. Firstly, we went back to our original ideas from our research and one option was my idea for the documentary on body language. Another one that Conor had come up with was on the Maritime Museum. He thought we could look into how the museum is run, and, for example, look into their takings over a day, month or year. Another idea related to the museum was about Dominic’s Grandfather, and his links to the history. So we emailed the Maritime Museum asking if we were able to film anything like what we wanted there, Dominic also spoke to his Grandfather about the topic, however both tasks were unsuccessful and we were back to the drawing board with our idea again.
Our final idea was to make a documentary about buskers. This idea came about when Dominic found a busker in Greenwich and asked him if he would be interested in making a documentary, and got his contact details. We spoke to the man on several occasions, trying to sort out when he was playing so we could go and film, but we were struggling to arrange something as he was very vague with the dates and times he plays. After a week we decided we were unable to complete the documentary within Greenwich or with this busker, so we researched about busking in central London and where we were most likely to find someone playing, we had quickly found a website called Busk In London [3], which told us about the 'Busker's code', which is basically the laws that buskers must follow. It showed us a very large number of places that buskers could play around London. We used this to search for the best place for us to travel to to film. We found that Camden is a popular place for busking, so we decided that it would be a good place to go to create our documentary. After this we researched documentaries on busking and we found one that we liked, and used it as inspiration for our new idea [4]. On Friday the 2nd of December our group travelled to Camden to film, with the intent of filming multiple different buskers.
The documentary idea that Dominic had brought was about gymnastics. Dominic had found a documentary telling the story of a gymnastics coach and his background, why he runs the group, and about his students [2]. The whole documentary had been filmed on GoPro’s which we all really liked the idea of. Out of all the ideas brought to the first meeting we decided that the gymnastics documentary idea was the best one, so we began making our pitch for the next seminar session. For our pitch we each created one slide of a power point and spoke about how we would use our role to produce our best documentary. As an editor I spoke about using a bright colour scale to create an upbeat atmosphere, using a mixture of slow and normal speed shots, alike what was used in the gymnastics documentary. I said I would work with the director of photography to get the perfect types of shots so that they can be edited nicely together for smooth transitions. Conor as director of photography said he would be using a GoPro for some shots, because we had liked the idea of filming on GoPro’s from our research.
Before the pitch, Dominic had already got into contact with multiple, local gymnastic groups, asking for permission to create a documentary about them, however the first group to reply said that they would be unable to facilitate us and recommended we ask other groups. About a week after our pitch, all of the organisations had either denied our request or had not replied, so we sought help from our lecturers as our plan for the gymnastics documentary had failed. One of the lecturers recommended us a gymnastics group outside of Greenwich who are often looking for advertisement, which we could give them with this documentary. So we then had permission to film outside of Greenwich and Dominic got into contact with the new group. We had to send them a couple of emails because they were not replying and we were getting tight on time, so after a week of them not replying we had to have another meeting to discuss our new plan.
In this meeting we discussed ideas that could replace the failed gymnastics one. Firstly, we went back to our original ideas from our research and one option was my idea for the documentary on body language. Another one that Conor had come up with was on the Maritime Museum. He thought we could look into how the museum is run, and, for example, look into their takings over a day, month or year. Another idea related to the museum was about Dominic’s Grandfather, and his links to the history. So we emailed the Maritime Museum asking if we were able to film anything like what we wanted there, Dominic also spoke to his Grandfather about the topic, however both tasks were unsuccessful and we were back to the drawing board with our idea again.
Our final idea was to make a documentary about buskers. This idea came about when Dominic found a busker in Greenwich and asked him if he would be interested in making a documentary, and got his contact details. We spoke to the man on several occasions, trying to sort out when he was playing so we could go and film, but we were struggling to arrange something as he was very vague with the dates and times he plays. After a week we decided we were unable to complete the documentary within Greenwich or with this busker, so we researched about busking in central London and where we were most likely to find someone playing, we had quickly found a website called Busk In London [3], which told us about the 'Busker's code', which is basically the laws that buskers must follow. It showed us a very large number of places that buskers could play around London. We used this to search for the best place for us to travel to to film. We found that Camden is a popular place for busking, so we decided that it would be a good place to go to create our documentary. After this we researched documentaries on busking and we found one that we liked, and used it as inspiration for our new idea [4]. On Friday the 2nd of December our group travelled to Camden to film, with the intent of filming multiple different buskers.
1. Psychology Tomorrow (2015) The body language documentary. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RmSQm9_o-c (Accessed: 8 December 2016).
2. GoPro (2016) GoPro: ‘Two roads’ - gymnastics with coach Liang chow (Ep. 7). Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fy9NeUTUuXE (Accessed: 8 December 2016).
3. London Busking map (no date) Available at: http://buskinlondon.com/map (Accessed: 10 December 2016).
4. Busker Stories (2016) Tash Sultana - Busker stories episode 1 (street music) documentary webseries. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2BSetAUL20 (Accessed: 8 December 2016).
2. GoPro (2016) GoPro: ‘Two roads’ - gymnastics with coach Liang chow (Ep. 7). Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fy9NeUTUuXE (Accessed: 8 December 2016).
3. London Busking map (no date) Available at: http://buskinlondon.com/map (Accessed: 10 December 2016).
4. Busker Stories (2016) Tash Sultana - Busker stories episode 1 (street music) documentary webseries. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2BSetAUL20 (Accessed: 8 December 2016).
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