How long should it take to film a documentary?

T

theprestige

Active member
Hello all,

So I started the pre preproduction for a documentary I was keen to shoot last autumn (personal project) and it involved a particular company giving me access to it's building and content, which they were very happy to do. Life happened and I went cold fish from the project and got on with other stuff.

At the time, all I had was a Nikon D3200 (lolz) but now have upgraded to the A7S II and have some decent separate audio equipment and lenses. I now feel like I can do the doc justice and present it in a way that's appropriate to the content. It's a documentary on an old cinema, btw.

I'm just at a stage where i'm sick of thinking about it and talking about it and now I just want to film it. I've got 2 weeks before **** kicks in and I have other work to do. The doc will only be about 15-25 mins. Will this be enough time to get what i need?
 
No one can sensibly answer this question without reading your treatment. I've shot half-hour documentaries in a couple of days, and others have been shot over a year. You may as well ask, how long is a piece of string?

My advice; just get on with it.
 
Thank you both. I think i'll just do it. You are right, just get on with it, nothing stopping me at this point. Two weeks should be enough to get exactly what I need
 
I've shot some 15-minute mini-docs in the morning and had them on the air the same night, and then again, I have an ongoing project I've been developing on and off (mostly off) where my first notes date from 1980. In short, there is no answer to your question. Go at the pace that is right for you, your budget, your equipment, the help you have available, and the nature of your subject.

- Greg
 
Well it depends on a number of things. Whats the documentary about? What type of documentary? Will you have to fly or travel one place to another? How many DP's will be shooting the documentary? Questions like that will determine how long it will take.
 
I regularly shoot 23-minute travel/lifestyle episodes in 3 days (plus one scheduled extra day in case of weather delays/pick-ups). One seg per day, and this is for pretty high energy stuff - average shot length of the final program is about 3 seconds - so it's certainly not all talking heads.

It will depend on so many things though, so it is hard to give a definitive answer. Program style, archival content, shot complexity (crane shots can take forever to set up & nail!) will all vastly effect your shoot:edit ratio as well as how long each shot takes to acquire.

My advice though would be to shoot all your interviews asap. Then you can go home, transcribe them, and put together your shot list of cut-aways. That way any b-roll you might not have though of at first will become far more obvious (ie if someone talks about anything in an interview, you'll need to get a few cut-aways of it).
 
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