Primary research: Observation - Finnlea Murphy

The aim of the research is to understand and and evolve our knowledge of the topic for our documentary. I feel that by doing research into this we can know




On a day to day basis you are out and about with other people in social situations. I took this opportunity to observe the different social groups and the clothes they wear. I also observed the different clothes people would wear with different body types.

There are five main female body types that society see females have.

Many people cannot differentiate between these body shapes. I feel that body shape does effect what people wear but, people also obviously have a fashion style that they prefer to wear.

Within our documentary we will be interviewing people about how they feel body confidence effects fashion and the clothes they wear. This will be educational and interesting for the audience.

I decided to do this task to gain knowledge on the type of questions we will be asking our vox pops and experts. I feel it is relevant to do research into the type of documentary we want to create so we know exactly what information what we want to put together and gain.

Diary Entry 2 - Billy Green

Today we brainstormed our initial proposal as a group and have decided that we are going to video record a couple of our group members talking about the proposal. We decided to do this because we feel like it can help give a better understanding to anyone who watches of our proposal as we can further explain our ideas. Not only this, but is also an example of us using different technologies and mediums within our coursework, as we will be using a video camera, microphone and then will eventually upload the video onto Youtube.

Final Documentary idea- Finnlea Murphy

Top 4 Topic Choices - Billy

Top 10 Topic Choices - Maddie Collins

Narrative Structure - Maddie & Finnlea

Narrative is the way the events are put together to be presented to an audience and tells a story through a sequence of actions or events. This includes plot, how the facts are organized, how the story is told, and how the author uses these elements to portray a story. They may be very simple or complex. All media texts have a narrative, whether they are a six hour TV miniseries or a one paragraph newspaper story or a glossy magazine photograph. There are seven different types of narrative structure;

Circular
It has certain plot points repeated and also starts and finishes on the same point.

Linear
It follows a straight line - has a beginning, middle and an end. It is a timeline of events that are all in chronological order.

Open
It has no sense of ending and could go on forever. There are also many story lines and lots of characters. 
E.g Coronation Street.

Closed
The audience is aware that they are watching a complete story therefore having a likely end in mind. Often the audience are invited to make verdicts of the characters.

Non -Linear
It's often used to place audiences in the minds of characters who have unusual ways of thinking or whose ability to process information is impaired.

Single Strand
This usually is a story following one main character.
E.g Spiderman and Batman.

Multi Strand
This is a story from multiple peoples point of view. It can end one story and begin another without confusing the audience. 
E.g Eastenders.

Four our documentary we are thinking of using a circular type of narrative structure. We are using this because in our documentary we are including different topics/plots which are social media, celebrities, friendships, relationships and our narrative will start and end on the same point. It doesn't have a structured beginning, middle and end but has points repeated to help the audience to form an opinion. We feel that the circular narrative structure will keep the target audience entertained. This target audience for our documentary is 16-21 year olds of both genders. This is because we wanted to educate all teenagers at college and university about the dangers of a lack of body confidence and by using a circular narrative this highlights this. 

Theorists - Maddie Collins

Types of Documentary - Matt Burbidge

What is a Documentary? & Conventions - Maddie & Finnlea

A documentary film is one that presents information about actual topics. A documentary has to be factual and the key aim is to record important events and ideas.

Documentaries are known to inform the viewers and convey opinions about the topic involved, they not only do this but educate the audience with facts and figures. They are supposed to present an unbiased view on the said topic but in some cases they do not. An example of this is 'Supersize Me' which is a documentary that conveys a biased opinion against fast food. This will obviously influence the viewer by persuading them to also go against fast food. This all needs to be presented in a entertaining way to keep the audience attention and interest them. 

There are 6 main conventions within documentaries. These are;
Actuality
This is the term for real life events, places and people. Unlike fictional films which use actors, scripted stories and artificial sets, actuality is a record of real events.
Exposition
This is factual information given by interviewees and passes on information to the viewer in order to persuade them.
Voiceover
They offer information and explains opinions to the viewer. These can also sway the viewer by making them think a specific way/opinion.
Interviews
These usually consist of people with authority of the subject. Expert interviews can be used to give factual information or to educate the viewer about a specific topic. Vox pops can be used to find out other people's opinions.
Archive Footage
This type of footage is inserted into the documentary to show historical events and to show certain things that happened in the past that cannot be reconstructed.
Reconstructions
Reconstructions are made up footage by the creator of the documentary to show people the happenings of the real life event that they do not have footage of.

We have researched into this to see which conventions will be included in our documentary and which are most relevant to our idea of body confidence. Through this we have learnt that documentaries include different codes and conventions to get types of information across in different ways. This keeps the documentary entertaining and more interesting for the audience. 

Although these are the main conventions of documentaries, there are some styles which challenge conventions.
An example of this is Direct Cinema; This is a name given to a style of documentary produced in the 1960s as a result of ease and availability of lightweight, portable cameras. This allowed creators of documentaries to follow people in everyday life more easily.
There are many rules of direct cinema that have to be followed such as no interviews, no rehearsals, no narrator, no planned lighting, no transitions and only a small amount of people filming.
Direct cinema has now become 'fly on the wall' where filmmakers follow people around to record their everyday lives. An example of this is a documentary on the Rolling Stones- 'Gimme Shelter' 1970. This is where people followed the Rolling Stones on tour to record real life events and to provide their target audience with entertainment.

This task has helped us learn the detailed structure of documentaries. We've learned the different ways in which we can attract the audience and keep the documentaries interesting. 

Today the audience had a wider choice in ways the can view a documentary, they can use computers, laptops, phones, iPads and simply televisions. There is also specific television channels dedicated to types/genre of documentaries. This will obviously be an easier and faster way for the audience to find a specific documentaries such as; BBC 1 has more nature documentaries including, 'First life with David Attenborough' and Channel Four includes more documentaries about the human body and people's life, i.e. 'Worlds tallest man: Looking for love'.  

These are ways in which we can attract the audience and keep the documentaries interesting. 

Diary Entry 1 - Billy Green

Today I used reflective skills to look back on the brief which we were given for the coursework and write about it. Communication with my group is also easy, everyone knows what they are doing, our communication with our teacher is also easy. Communication is key because it helps us organise ourselves and have a clear vision. I made good progress today as I finished my blog post describing our brief and as a group we hope to make more progress on posts overall.

Brief - Billy

Introduction

Left to right: Maddie Collins, Finnlea Murphy, Matt Burbidge and Billy Green.

We are A2 media students and this is our A2 Documentary Coursework.