CVTV Documentary Making Process

 When one thinks of the vast extents of video media available around the world, the genre of documentary is one that  comes to mind within the top three categories of films. For that reason, many beginning filmmakers attempt to dive into the genre. However, more goes into the documentary making process than one may think. When it comes down to the fundamentals of a good documentary, the main components that must be done well are the concept, interview process, and sound design.

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The first and most important element that makes or breaks a documentary is the concept. What is the documentary about? Who is the audience? What aspects of the subject matter will you put under a magnifying glass? Generally speaking, a concept that is generally interesting will work better, however interesting stories can be found or created if the filmmaker is skilled or creative enough. Furthermore, it is important to have an idea of what genre of documentary you would like to create your documentary as. Will it be focused on purely information? Will it be more focused on guiding an audience on the flow of thoughts and feelings of a person or people? Will the filmmaker be involved in both the making process and documentary themself as a part of the film? All of these add to the style of your documentary.

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    Another important aspect is one that is iconic to the documentary genre: interviews. There is a lot more than goes into interviews in a documentary than meets the eye. Who are you interviewing? What are you going to ask them? How can you get them to feel comfortable enough to talk normally? Another important thing is the setup of the area that you are interviewing in. Keeping the mic out of frame and the lighting are very important. Specifically with lighting, it is common to use a three light set up that covers the angles of directly in front of the subject, above and behind the subject, and the last to the side of the subject that the first light does not cover.

Lastly, it is extremely important to handle sound design well. With sound, it is important to have a good use of music and also generally good quality. With quality of sound, what is needed is good equipment,

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a lack of outside sound sources, and also the hiding of sound devices for professionalism. Good equipment will vary between projects, but the latter two can be controlled. Clever techniques are possible with both. With hiding outside sound sources, common practices are turning off things that add to white noise (like A/C or fridges), putting away objects that make noise when people move (like keys), and putting soft objects on the floor to keep from having footsteps or other creaks being heard. With music, it's important to know when and when not to have music as the first decision. When using music (or not), it's all about having it add to and influence the tone of what's occurring in the documentary.

    

    In the end, it's most important to have an interesting concept and a killer plan. Afterwards, during the process it's important to have good sound quality recorded and great interviews (with great lighting) to use as footage for the editing process. At the end of the process, the sound design needs to be clearly organized and have a well timed and chosen music track in the background. Through all of it, being creative and clever with your documentary is the most important.