Documentary Reflection

Documentary Reflection

When Jesse, Wes, and I began brainstorming ideas for our documentary, the first idea we fell in love with was a film on the “shoe game.” It was something that we had each observed in our experiences at Blair, and a topic that we felt was worthy of a documentary. But, unfortunately, another group also thought of it, so we settled on a second idea: Athletics at Blair. In our documentary, we focused on how sports here at Blair used to be a real source of pride, but that in recent years, our teams have fallen on tough times. We analyzed the issue of low school spirit and attendance at games, and interviewed a variety of sources, including the athletic director, basketball coach, and football coach. I learned a lot about the history of Blair sports, but something I want to explore further is what really was the beginning of the demise. Topic selection is very important in this film, because it allows the students to be passionate and engaged. Having such freedom in picking was critical.

One thing I’d never really contemplated prior to making this documentary was just how much b-roll was needed. Our film, when we finished our initial cut, was boring. So, we dug through archival footage and other footage we had taken and inserted it. I didn’t think we were going to be able to use it all when we were getting the b-roll, but having so much of it was extremely useful. The biggest challenge our group faced was the difference in ability in terms of editing. I am not very quick or good at editing, but I had a lot of ideas for our film. The issue was, I couldn’t really put them in place. Luckily, my group members were able to do an excellent job, and were able to put into motion some of my suggestions. I would say we overcame this challenge, because we put together a solid, well-edited film.

If I had a chance to make another documentary, I would probably make sure that I established a clearer plan beforehand. We had a vision for our film, but we didn’t think through a lot of details. This forced us to make some last second fixes during our actual editing time, and limited the depth of our documentary. As a whole, I think you handled the project well. There was never really a panicked feel when making it, and it was actually pretty fun to put together. My only suggestion would be to make the brainstorming a bigger deal. We did solid work in class, but I think that if we had to bring in three ideas as a formative grade, or something like that, it would make us spend more time looking for ideas that we really wanted to pursue.

Heading into this project, I wasn’t so sure how much I would enjoy it. I like documentaries, but they seemed like something that could be a tad boring to actually make. But by finding a topic that I actually cared about, the project transformed from an assignment into something that I was actually somewhat attached to. I wanted to create a good final product, and had more motivation to do so because it was an issue that I wanted to portray well. It gave me a behind-the-scenes look into how documentaries are made, and that was certainly a valuable experience.