jdmoviemaker
Well-known member
what is the best format for shooting and editing a documentary any tips or tricks to shooting one? :cheesy:
documentary shooting
- Thread starter jdmoviemaker
- Start date
Depends on what you want to do. If you're doing a lot of operating and interviewing, a shoulder-mounted camera is good for that, or for quick action too. We used a Canon XL1S on our last doco and it was quite good as we were filming karate training.
Tips etc:
* Get as much tape as you can. People who are keen to do the doco will talk for ages.
* Make sure everyone gets a copy and give the organiser a letter & small gift
* Test all sound equipment before the shoot, ideally play back the test in the edit suite
* Prepare some set questions initially, but be prepared to abandon them if the interviewer says something amazing
* Make sure that you the interviewer are not nervous! More often than not the interviewee is all too happy to be filmed, but an inconfident interviewer will only make them appear stupid - ask a silly question, get a silly answer...
* Editing a doco is like building a jigsaw. What are we building here? Educational video? A sports doco? Then figure out the themes. We did a karate doco and we explored the themes like this: history of Kyokushin, the rise to black belt, beyond black belt, 7th dan: the (im)possible dream, the politics of self-defence
Hope your shoot goes well
Allen Green
Active member
RC has some great advice. What it comes down to is what camera are you comfortable with. Unless you are doing something for a specific vendor, Discovery, History channel or HD-Net you can shoot on whatever camera format you want. Just be comfortable with it you will shoot a LOT of tape.
I would also watch a ton of docs. each director has a style, if you watch a bunch of docs you can see the differences.
One bit of advice I would give ALWAYS listen to the camera audio return. I say that because I just left a friend who is trying to edit a thing he shot and his sound guy (his friend who was inexperenced) didn't monitor audio off the camera and the result is everything is over modulated.
good luck
I would also watch a ton of docs. each director has a style, if you watch a bunch of docs you can see the differences.
One bit of advice I would give ALWAYS listen to the camera audio return. I say that because I just left a friend who is trying to edit a thing he shot and his sound guy (his friend who was inexperenced) didn't monitor audio off the camera and the result is everything is over modulated.
good luck
jdmoviemaker
Well-known member
one more question , IS THERE A FASTER WAY TO CAPTURE VIDEO OVER TO MY COMPUTER? , BECAUSE WHEN YOU FILM A DOCUMENTARY IT TAKES FOREVER TO CAPTURE VIDEO OVER!!! :furious3:
Jeff Anderson
Custom Title!
real time is as good as your going to get from DV/HDV as far as I know. 80 tapes = 80 hours of fun! I find it a good time to take notes (with timecode)and make a rough outline of how things are going to flow.
scorsesefan
Veteran
avoid the Panasonic anamorphic adapter - you will have a very hard time focusing on the fly. shoot 4:3 or letterboxed like "Iraq in Fragments".