What Makes A Documentary Authentic?

A documentary film purports to present factual information about the world outside the film. A nonfiction film about real events and people, often avoiding traditional narrative structures. Documentary [is] the creative treatment of actuality.

What makes a documentary reliable?

A great documentary has the quality of fiction — it evokes something larger than the particular story or characters at hand, and lingers in our memory.

What are 5 elements of a good documentary?

Elements of a Documentary Film

• Subjects. The subject is what your documentary is about.
• Purpose. The purpose is what the filmmaker is trying to say about the subjects of their film.
• Form. The form is the formative process of the film.
• Production method and technique.
• Audience experience.

What makes a documentary true?

The essential claim that traditional documentary films make is that there’s unmediated truth here because this was not scripted – because the materials are “found in nature” – thus, the text built out of them is truthful as well. That truth claim is still at the center of most documentary work.

What are the 6 conventions of a documentary?

Documentary Conventions

• Archival Footage and Photographs. Archival materials include old photographs, newsreel footage, and even shots from fiction films.
• Talking Heads. Talking heads are people interviewed to explain or comment on the text’s subject.
• Jiggly Camera.
• Voiceover Narration.
• Re-enactments.
• Real People.

What are the characteristics of a documentary?

Characteristics documentaries have in common that are distinct from other film types (especially from the fiction film) can be thought of in terms of: 1)subjects; 2) purposes, points of view, or approaches; 3) forms; 4) production methods and techniques: and 5) the sorts of’ experiences they offer audiences.

What are the four elements of a documentary?

The Four Elements You Need to Capture When Shooting a Documentary

• 1 – The Interview (SOT = Sound On Tape) It’s not literally Sound On Tape anymore, it’s just Sound On Something Which Oftentimes Is a Camera, but you get the gist.
• 2 – Narrator’s Voice Over.
• 3 – B-Roll.
• 4 – Natural Sound Break.

How do you structure a documentary?

Ken Burns’s 7 Tips for Structuring a Documentary

1. Embrace the laws of storytelling.
2. Keep rearranging structure until it works.
3. Hook your audience immediately.
4. Introduce large stories through small details.
5. Use chronology as a compass.
6. Boil the pot.
7. Send them home safe.

What should a documentary contain?

It is a genre of movie making that uses video & film scenes, photographs and/or sound of real people and real events which when edited together creates a particular story, viewpoint, message or experience.

How do you create a documentary?

Key Steps to Making Documentaries:

1. Tell a story you care about. Start with a subject that excites you.
2. Research. Learn everything you can about your documentary subject.
3. Make a Plan. Create an outline.
4. Create a Shot List.
5. Start Shooting.
6. Write a Script.
7. Begin Editing.
8. Check Legal and Copyright Issues.

Does a documentary have to be factual?

Documentary filmmakers have a responsibility to be truthful to their vision of the world without intentionally misrepresenting a topic.

What makes a documentary different?

However, documentary filmmakers do not create events or characters; they only attempt to recreate the reality. Therefore, documentaries have no actors, sets, or made-up locations. They are filmed in real locations with real actors. Compared to feature films, documentaries are made with a low budget.

What makes a documentary and fiction different?

The clearest distinction between the two is their relationship with the reality; “a fiction film presents a story that is not based on reality, or at least not in the form it is represented; a documentary, however, tells something about the reality of our world – shows us the real world” (Bakker, 2002).

What are codes in a documentary?

What are codes? Codes are systems of signs, which create meaning. Codes can be divided into two categories – technical and symbolic. Technical codes are all the ways in which equipment is used to tell the story in a media text, for example the camera work in a film.

What is reflective documentary?

What Is Reflexive Documentary? The reflexive documentary mode focuses on the relationship between the filmmaker and the audience, pushing viewers to reflect on their perceptions and re-analyze their notions of truth.

What is documentary realism?

Documentary realism is the sense of seeing no imitation, not a reliable imitation. (An imitation can be very reliable. You may believe God made it. Even then you will see an imitation, not X itself.)

How do you critique a documentary?

1. Step 1 Give details of the documentary.
2. Step 2 Explain the purpose of the documentary.
3. Step 3 State your prior knowledge of the subject.
4. Step 4 Summarise the documentary.
5. Step 5 Talk about the sound effects, camera work, interviews and special effects.
6. Step 6 Give personal comments and recommendation.

How do you name a documentary?

When choosing your title, choose words that are memorable, unique and catchy, not generic and vague. For example, the words “disease” and “health” are vague. “Generation Rx” is catchy. Once you choose a title that clicks with you, check the internet and make sure no one else is using it.

What are the main elements of a film?

There are five elements of film which is narrative, cinematography, sound, mise-en-scene, and editing. These five elements help determine the film and a way to judge a film.

What is documentary example?

An example of something documentary is evidence that proves someone’s alibi during the time of a murder; documentary evidence. A documentary is defined as a film or television program that is educational and tells a true story. An example of a documentary is the An Inconvenient Truth, a movie about global warming.

What is the narrative of a documentary?

The structure of a narrative documentary is very similar to that of a feature story. Narrative documentaries also include a protagonist, a conflict, and a resolution. But documentaries, by the nature of their length and time of production, also demonstrate another significant element: change over time.