A documentary may change between the writing of the script to the final edit, especially since scripts for character-driven films, such as ours, are usually only summaries which outline the story that aims to be told (Curran Bernard, 2010:155). According to Rabiger (2014:341) 'the object is seldom to develop a script, but to explore everything relevant so that one is fully prepared', since things can often happen when filming a documentary by chance, and this can change the direction of the story.
Pre-Production:
Most of the scriptwriting happened in pre-production, and was based on the research we conducted on roller derby and skateboarding as sports, as well as when we met and spoke to our contributors and did location recces.
Therefore, I already had some ideas before beginning the first draft, which I broke down into the following categories before I began writing:
'-main ideas,
-logical progression,
-visualisation,
-opening,
-rhythm and pace,
-climax' (Rosenthal and Eckhardt, 2016:87)
These points changed a lot as I drafted the script more and more, but it meant it could refer back to and make changes to this document throughout the process.
When I began my first draft I thought about looking for 'a
natural or, one might say, obvious and commonsense structure, one dictated by
the material itself’ (Rosenthal and Eckhardt, 2016:78). Even though this made it easier to structure my ideas, I wasn't sure how to write the sequences along with the interviews. Therefore, I broke everything down according to shots, rather than according to ideas and sequences:
I also tried to predict what the contributors would say in their interviews which was difficult, and I found that writing a script like this meant that I could not communicate my ideas as clearly as I wanted to.
For the second draft, I found an example in Writing, Directing, and Producing Documentary Films and Digital Videos which helped show me how to break my ideas down into sequences and audio, which I later was able to add abbreviations and titles to such as "sequence". I found this was much easier to write and also much easier for people to read and understand:
Re-drafting helped me to clarify what I wanted to put into the script, especially in the sequences since 'visuals serve a story; they are not the story' (Curran Bernard, 2011:47). Therefore, to refine the sequences I thought about the following questions:
‘What
is the point I want to make in this sequence?
What
can I show to make that point?
What
are my characters or participants doing?
How
will sound —whether music, dialogue, effects, or commentary— help make the
sequence more effective?’ (Rosenthal and Eckhardt, 2016:90)
For example, for the first montage sequence with the female skateboarder, Kayleigh, my answers would be:
-Point wanted to make: To show there is a female skateboarder, even though skateboarding is considered a 'masculine' sport and is male dominated, she has just as much skill as the males do
-What can be shown to make point: Kayleigh doing tricks, showing her skills, a female skateboarder approaching a skatepark full of male skateboarders
-What characters are doing: Kayleigh approaches skate ramp/park, does some tricks
-How sound can be used effectively: Music can be used to empower, commentary from Kayleigh can help to introduce her to the audience
I didn't do this for every sequence, but I still thought about the questions as I was working out what to cut and what to keep while drafting.
During the third draft, I worked on making sure everything linked and the transition between skateboarding to roller derby would be clear to the audience, since if there are no links between the material, 'your essay and ideas for the film can fall flat or the film can fail to
reach its full potential' (Rosenthal and Eckhardt, 2016:95). Therefore, when writing the second half of the script I made sure I wrote in the sequence which would provide the transition, as well as structure the interview so the answers could link to one another, more like a natural conversation than a staged interview:
Originally, since I wrote the script in two halves they ended up seeming like two separate short documentaries, with different titles but similar trains, train being defined by Curran Bernard (2011:48) as being 'the single thread, the plot, that drives your film forward, from the beginning to the end.' For that reason, I thought about the film's train in order to solve the problem and bring the two halves together more effectively.
Since, it is also said that, ‘Where
you begin your film is a critical decision, because it sets your train in
motion and draws the audience into your story and its themes’ (Curran Bernard, 2011:56), I focused on changing the opening montage to show both sports together, before leading into skateboarding and coming back to roller derby later:
I think that this will work better since it shows both the similarities and contrasts between the two sports to the audience straight away, as well as establishing that the theme is women in sport and the gender stereotypes which can affect them.
From this script, I was then able to come up with a plan for directing the documentary.
Production:
Although our documentary had an outline from the script, since we aimed it to have an observational style a lot of what happened during filming was unscripted. Therefore, I wrote the script as a summary, making crib notes whilst directing of things to capture if they did happen.
Because of this, according to Rabiger (2015:92-3), our film related more to what he calls 'The Observer role' rather than 'The Storyteller', and is about:
'Creating a hypothesis.
Seeking and interpreting significant events and evidence.
Noting the patterns, cycles, and structure in actuality.
Learning the clues to individual behavior that substantiate temperament, intention, and action.’
Respecting the integrity of “what is.”
Waiting for actuality to yield its intrinsic meanings.'
Therefore, whilst I took the script to the locations during production, I didn't attempt to stick to it rigidly. Instead I used it as a guide to help generate possible interview questions and sequences, and then used what the contributors said in their interviews as an outline for what the sequences should focus on, changing plans as we filmed. What I did find during production was that the script had helped to establish a theme of empowering women to take up sport and the importance of this, since this was discussed by most of our contributors.
Therefore, whilst I took the script to the locations during production, I didn't attempt to stick to it rigidly. Instead I used it as a guide to help generate possible interview questions and sequences, and then used what the contributors said in their interviews as an outline for what the sequences should focus on, changing plans as we filmed. What I did find during production was that the script had helped to establish a theme of empowering women to take up sport and the importance of this, since this was discussed by most of our contributors.
Post-Production:
As stated by Rabiger (2015:343), 'a documentary is a mosaic that comes together during editing, not the realization of a script.' Because of this, the script has to be edited throughout production so that it reflects the changes the film goes through. Therefore, each time something is cut from the film, or it is re-structured, a new editing script will be written (Rosenthal and Eckhardt, 2016:16).
In regards to structure, because most of the material comes together in the edit it is suggested that the narrative move 'from the simple to the complex, from the specific to the general, from the familiar to the unfamiliar, from problem to solution, or from cause to effect. The important thing is the suggestion or illusion of inevitability, of natural movement’ (Rosenthal and Eckhardt, 2016:90-91). This is because the audience may not know anything about the topic covered, which is why it is important as the director or editor to watch the cuts as if for the first time.
To ensure this was the case with our film, the editing script was drafted several times, first starting with the sync when the sync pull was cut together:
The time codes in brackets were important to include since they showed the editor where the part to cut was, but also the shot the narration came from because we got coverage in the interviews by shooting from different angles.
We then re-structured this using post-it notes to make it flow together with a more natural progression, as well as intertwining all three contributors so that the film felt more like one film, as before it had felt like two:
For the rough cut, we then began to add sequences after further re-structuring using a paper edit put together from the transcripts:
To speed up the process of cutting sequences together, whilst we watched the footage back I took notes and logged what each clip contained so that the footage was familiar and could easily be returned to:
If our documentary had been planned more throughly and wasn't observational, another way to do this would be to write the times when certain actions occur in the B-roll footage, writing a short description of this, and then logging which scene it should appear in (Rosenthal and Eckhardt, 2016:212). I based my own system on this but instead just included the clip number and a brief description of what it showed since this was what we needed.
After some more restructuring using a paper edit, I then wrote out the final script:
I didn't include time codes in the end, because we found that when the videos were cut into Premiere Pro the timecodes were different than the ones we had worked out when we were watching the clips in Quick Time Player. Therefore, they weren't really helping the editor and at this point we didn't have time to work them out again.
References:
Curran Bernard, S. (2011) Documentary Storytelling : Making Stronger and More Dramatic Nonfiction Films. (3rd ed.) Oxon: Focal Press
Rabiger, M. (2015) Directing the Documentary. (6th ed.) Oxon: Focal Press
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