Category Archives: Storytelling (Factual)

Keep Fighting – Cancer Documentary

Storytelling (Factual)

Contextualizing Statement 

This story is important to me as I know Yvonne very well, we worked together at Northern Hygiene laboratories, and it was devastating for everyone when we learned she was suffering from bowel cancer. When she announced to people that it was terminal I knew I needed to tell her story, I contacted her directly and inquired if she would be comfortable with me doing a short documentary on her, and she loved the idea. I informed her that I would be asking some hard hitting questions and I wanted to ask her daughters some questions and she was accepting of it all. 

Ethically I knew not to ask the girls any inappropriate questions that would be upsetting or confusing for them, them both being very young and going through a lot with their mother. I kept the questions on the positive side; “whats your favorite thing about your mum?”, “what do you like to do with you mum?”, and got good responses from the eldest Tia. 

I had major issues with the sound on the footage, I believe the mic was faulty, I made sure when I booked out the equipment to get a final sound tutorial one on one with a technician to make sure 100 percent I knew what to do. I wrote all the steps down, and took pictures of the wires and setting, I then mimicked this on the shoot but the sound was still faulty, much too quiet and grainy. I tried to fix this in post but there was only too much I could do before it sounded robotic and unnatural. 

My target audience age was quite general from 10 onward, because cancer can affect anyone, and then all the people around them, regardless of age. I wanted people to feel apart of Yvonne’s world for a second, to get a sense of what it is like.  

I chose a video format because I thought the audience would feel the impact of the story more if they saw the victim to the horrible affliction, and her daughters, I feel the tone wouldn’t as effectively been shown through text or audio alone. 

 

Word Count: 358

 

 

The 5 Year Old Pirate

Storytelling (Factual), , , ,

Contextualizing Statement

For my first documentary video, I wanted to create something heartfelt. To achieve this I thought about stories that were personal to me. My nephews are incredibly important to my life, so shortly after the brief was given, my sister told me about Thomas’ eye condition and that he would have to wear an eye patch, I needed to tell his story. This was the perfect story for me to start the module with because it was close to me personally, I had the resources and the motivation to try incredibly hard for my family.

The biggest issue I encountered was the camera exposure, I can admit that I am learning with the camera, and learning from mistakes. I filmed my indoor interviews, and then without adjusting the ISO or aperture, I took the camera outside for the beach shots. This proved a big mistake as the shots were too bright and over exposed, I could not redeem them in post and could not afford to travel home again to recapture shots. I used the shots as they were, and used more footage from my other locations to cover it. However I take it all as a learning curve, and in my next two projects I took more care in the camera settings when shooting.

I chose video as the media to showcase this project as I felt the visual aid of seeing the afflicted child playing and laughing would tug at the heart strings of audiences, and buy more attention. Then on a personal level I wanted this footage of my family for us all to enjoy as a family together. I knew not to ask Thomas any negative questions about the eye patch in case it upset him or put him off using it entirely, that would not have been ethical of me.

I targeted the older demographic, the parents. I filmed it more from the mothers perspective than the child’s, and captured how the situation effected her, hopefully other parents with children with issues will take comfort knowing they are not alone and there are things that can be done to help. 

 

Word count 355