During this unit, I think what worked best was that I got to work with Jess and Aurelija. This is mainly because all three of us get along well, but also we were able to collaborate effectively, and also efficiently, since we split the work and helped and supported each other. I believe this helped the film overall because although we all gave our individual input, as a whole it is much more original than it would have been if only one of us had worked on it since we each came up with ideas which evolved throughout the process.
The pitch also went well because of this since Jess and I split the presentation in two and worked together to make sure the visuals backed up what we were saying and that the idea was conveyed correctly, covering all the relevant information we needed to.
In terms of coming up with the idea, I think what worked is that I picked a topic I personally was interested in but not too close to, obsession with image, and then was able to naturally progress with this to get to how women's obsession with sport is helping to change gender stereotypes. I really liked how relevant this was and also how it was something the three of us could all relate to being young women ourselves.
It also therefore fit with the BBC Three audience, as being an online platform, their audience is mostly young people. By researching and watching some of their documentaries, I found that we were able to craft our idea to also fit the brand, especially since the idea was appropriate for the channel, and even similar to one of their short documentaries I watched, Zoe the Lady Linebacker. One of their longer documentaries I watched Generation Screwed? also inspired us to use a split screen, which helped link the sports we covered together in the opening sequence, helping it to feel more like one film, instead of two.
Even though we didn't know much at first, through research we were able to learn a lot about each sport in very little time, and also cover both aspects of the issue, skateboarding being a typically male dominated sport, and roller derby being a female dominated sport.
However, what I found didn't work was that I didn't meet all of the contributors before filming, and I think that if I had the interviews could have turned out better since more research could have been done, and we could have then dug deeper into why these sports are these womens' obsessions and found out exactly how important they are to them. This didn't happen mainly because we didn't have time, but I did find that because I hadn't met some of the contributors they were much more spontaneous when we got to talking for the interviews.
This was my favourite part about the unit, getting to meet the contributors and find out about them and their sports, as I didn't know much at all about skateboarding or roller derby before this project, and had not really given much thought to how important it is for women to break gender stereotypes and be able to take up these sports. I found that the contributors were easy to talk to, and that we also ended up talking a lot off camera between takes, and then filming what we had discussed because it was so interesting. For example, I hadn't planned to ask one of the skateboarders, Kayleigh, about injuries, since we hadn't thought it would help show her obsession. However, after chatting between takes and finding out she is never injured bad enough not to skate, we realised this does show her obsession, so it ended up in the final film.
The interview being so spontaneous was mainly due to how it was able to be conducted like a conversation with the question areas on index cards in front of me, but not always being stuck to, since I tried to change things as the conversation naturally progressed. I feel like the interview workshop helped us to learn this, since then we stuck to the questions a lot because we didn't have cards but instead just read them so it was less spontaneous.
Therefore, I also learnt a lot about the serendipitous nature of documentary as when filming actuality anything can happen. At first, I found this really hard because I usually prefer to be prepared and have a plan to follow. However, what this taught me is that although it is good to have a plan, it is also good to be able to be flexible in order to adapt to what is happening. On the first day of filming this took a while to get used to, but by the second day I felt more comfortable changing my plans to fit the situation, partly because I had learned to observe and listen better. Overall, I also realised we had got more coverage than I had thought.
The reading I did helped me to prepare for some of this unpredictability though, since this was a big point raised by Michael Rabiger, and also by many of the other authors. Because I read these books, I learnt how to make crib notes, write a documentary script, as well as how to structure the narrative of the film, which was also helped by watching Red Ape:Saving the Orangutan, since this helped me to understand how acts can be broken up in a non-fictional story. Nevertheless, one of the most valuable things I learnt was that a documentary is a mosaic which normally comes together in the editing stage.
However, I don't think the narrative of our film worked even though we restructured it so many times by learning how to make transcripts, several paper edits, and a sync pull. Again, I think we ran out of time, mainly because we left almost all of the structuring until post-production because we hadn't met some of the contributors until production. Therefore, more planning probably would have also helped with this. Because of the structural problems ideas in the documentary didn't really link together as well as they could have, but this could have been solved perhaps if I had known earlier about what the train of the documentary was, and if we had established this for our film earlier, because then we would have had a much clearer aim.
I think the style of our documentary worked well though, especially because we worked this out so early on and also researched into it. I really enjoyed researching filmmaker Lauren Greenfield, because she used a lot of techniques in her documentaries which inspired ours, such as the characters leading the audience into their world, giving our documentary the more personal feel we had aimed to achieve.
Watching Dare to Dream: The Story of the U.S. Women's Soccer Team also helped with this because of how the interviews were anecdotal, enabling the women to tell their own stories. It also helped me to understand early on in the production process the importance sport can have for some women, and how it can impact them positively as they bond with teammates and establish communities. This was helpful because we found it was one of the reasons why women become obsessed with sports.
What I could have developed was watching more documentaries, since I don't really ever watch them, as I prefer fiction. I found there wasn't as big a difference between fiction and documentary as I had first thought since it is still telling a character's story, the character is just a real person, and the story is their real life.
Because of this, I would have liked to look into ethics more, as I looked into them a little bit when writing about Lauren Greenfield's film The Queen of Versailles, but had also planned to write a blog post on them. I had also planned to write posts about scripted reality, sequences and actuality, and the history of the observational style, but didn't get time to as I had a week off ill, yet this could have helped me watch more documentaries and therefore learn more techniques to convey our idea.
I didn't find that organisation was a problem during this production though, because we had a production book, which kept all of our paperwork together so we could refer to it when needed. Also, I was able to carry around the index cards in a separate folder with me, so I didn't lose any of the question cards, or overhead diagrams I made which made it easier to change my plans because I could refer to them at all times. The only issue with paperwork was that because there was so much else going on, I kept forgetting to update the script fully, so would often write out only the sync and then have to go back after making several other edits to work out the sequences. If I had kept this updated, I think the sequences could have had a clearer beginning, middle, and end, but because of the script and also the paper edits, we were able to cut out a lot of the sync we didn't need quickly.
In general, I did enjoy this unit because it was fun working in a team with Jess and Aurelija, as well as meeting and learning about the contributors and their sports. However, I do prefer the more controlled, constructed nature of fiction, because I enjoy watching actors bring fictional characters to life, and find it can be more creative to direct since more intricate plans can be drawn up in advance. The spontaneity of filming actuality was interesting though as we never knew what would happen next so it felt as if the possibilities for the final product of the film were endless, which helped my directing since I learnt to be more flexible and calm when things change quickly. My scriptwriting also improved, since I had to keep up with each different cut of the film in post-production, but I would like to learn more about writing scripts for documentaries.
I do think it would have been better if we had more time, as well as done more planning and I had watched more documentaries since this could have helped us to convey our idea better. Personally, I am happy with the final film even though there are things I would like to change, but I think the idea is interesting and something I would like to learn more about.
Therefore, overall, I learnt a lot about documentary this unit considering I knew almost nothing before, and, although I would rather make a drama, would make one again if there was ever opportunity to.
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