Critical reflection

     REFLECTION 

        This part is strangely enough, bitter sweet. I think this was one of my favorite projects I have done in AICE Media Studies. I was able to experience what it's like to create an informational piece form start to finish. I loved working in a pair, because our work was fairly evenly split. Larger groups typically separate the credits in order to increase efficiency. However, Bailey and I would consult each other constantly. In the end, the main critiques we received were regarding the difference in audio between the first couple interviews without a mic, compared to the rest which did have a mic. If I am being honest, we could have easily merged the audio form the first interviews, syncing it with the video, however I didn't have access to the audio clips since they were filmed using Bailey's microphone. Over all, I am very happy with how this piece came out.

    My target audience was people in high school, ages 14 to 18. There is no specific gender that my documentary would necessarily attract because the content has nothing to do with their sex. However, it is likely to attract a number of female musicians up to the age of 25, since Visions of Venus is composed of four girls. I believe that we wrote the documentary in a way which is interesting or at least appealing to many people in our target audience. We stayed central on the the theme of life as a high school musician and the struggles they may face because of it.

        The main reason I had so much fun with this was because it was a topic that is very interest to me. We were always steering towards a topic which is centered around music, so the production came naturally to us. After Bailey suggested featuring Visions of Venus, I thought of this topic because I had personally never seen it realistically represented before. I wanted to capture not only the exciting element to being a teenage musician, but the emotional aspect which is never seen at gigs or on social media. So the balance between school and passion was a great topic for this. I believe that our piece is a good representation of the group of interest, being High Schoolers in bands. Similar to myself, multiple VOV members come from parents who believe "school is put first" above all else. Seeing how this translates to the lives of the members who want to pursue a future in music, compared to those who will pursue alternate careers was very interesting. We chose to represent this by having the members discuss the problems they have with finding a harmony between school and VOV, and discussing plans for the future.

    My target audience was people in high school, ages 14 to 18. There is no specific gender that my documentary would necessarily attract because the content has nothing to do with their sex. However, it is likely to attract a number of female musicians up to the age of 25, since Visions of Venus is composed of four girls. I believe that we wrote the documentary in a way which is interesting or at least appealing to many people in our target audience. We stayed central on the the theme of life as a high school musician and 

    On element which I believe was very important to include in post production was to add some sort of music video-esque montage. I felt as if this stylistic choice was necessary for a documentary that revolves around the lives of musicians. Bailey and I agreed that this would help in creating a brand which comes off as the stereotypical alternative teenage rebellion, but then opens up into a deep dive into the reality of these peoples lives. I included two of these montages, and while I like them and enjoyed trying out audio editing, I am not completely in love with the outcome. I feel as if the shots I used would be significantly improved if the lighting in the area was better. I think the montages are also far too short, and more clips of the band playing all together would have improved the beginning montage. The second however, I enjoy that one more because I utilized picture rather than just videos. I also think this added a sort of aesthetic appeal to the documentary. Another thing I will change, I will try to disperse more b-roll throughout the interviews, and include more videos of the band's actual performances. I think the stylistic choice of including montages, and using questions which required the band members to be honest in their experience's worked well together to establish the sense of closeness with the members, to be shown the true lives of teenage musicians, where their public appearance is secondary to the ordinary adolescent struggles they face. I do regret not getting friendlier with the band members all together before filming, as that would open them up far more and they would have felt even more comfortable in exposing the more raw and emotional struggles of their lifestyle.

Violet storm editing (crying help)

 ONTO EDITING BABY LET'S GO

        My partner and I met up at a local book store on November 26th with our computers in order to start our editing process. I informed her that I thought it would be fun to start the documentary with a montage of the band, and Bailey had the same idea. Bailey is a pianist and has some experience with audio editing, so once she chose a song, she got to work on cutting pieces of the song together so that the intro was much shorter. We chose to do "Helter Skelter" by The Beatles, since the instrumental was free and readily available on the internet, and the intro has a very simple melody with well defined beats that we could use as the transition ques.

        Meanwhile, I spent about an hour and a half watching all of our interviews and trying to determine the time stamps for the most important information that by all means HAD to make it into the Documentary. If I am being honest, this was a hard task because the members of VOV did a great job at answering our questions. Eventually thought I changed route to helping Bailey with the montage, and we were pretty happy with how  it turned out. Bailey chose all of the music and helped me cut down the interviews into smaller videos. Anyways, together we got around the first two minutes of the documentary edited, so now the rest was up to me to do at home.

        We also officially named out documentary! We definitely wanted it to revolved around something with the color purple. Visions of Venus's brand is defined by this color, and I had done research on the significance of this color tot he rock industry. Bailey wanted to name it Purple Rain after the Prince song, or Purple hue, which are really sick names, but I felt it should be something that represents how Visions of Venus has "taken the world by storm." So there it was, we named it Violet Storm

              One major problem which I discussed here earlier is my lack of b-roll. Since I had no access to Caileigh and Morgan before the performance at the restaurant, I had no b-roll of them. So, we were very VERY limited on b-roll. Essentially the only shots we could use were: Homecoming, the Gig, photographs I took in Ari's room, and a video I took of Ari with her friends at school. But... oh well.. whoops.. womp womp... With a very closely approaching deadline, there was nothing we could do. 

        So, I made use of what I had. I was able to use clips from other interviews as B-roll. We specifically recorded some questions on Day 1 as a two shot with Cameron and Ari so that we could capture their relationship. This proved to be a good idea because they hugged at one point, which I used as b-roll while Cameron talking about the band's relationship with one another.

    Okay...so here is where we really messed up. I stayed up late the night of the deadline to finish fixing up some of the editing, and I realized I didn't have the microphone recorded audio clips from Day 2 of filming since we did all of that on Bailey's computer. The rest however, I was able to sync the visuals with the audio recorded with Dani's mini microphone with a surprising amount of ease.

Here is the finished product: VIOLET STORM

Violet Storm Documentary Production

Day 1: Homecoming

    Soon after getting in contact with Visions of Venus, Bailey and I realized that they would be performing at homecoming that same weekend. So, we recorded videos of the band at the school dance. We did our best with these shots; we didn't want to interrupt the band or disturb the crowd by getting too close with our phones and we tried to keep as as still as possible while the audience was jumping all around us.

Day 2: Interviews at Ari's

        I planned to meet up with my partner, Cameron and Ari at Ari's house on the 15th of November. I brought my camera and tripod, as well as copies of our outline and questions for both interviewers and the band members, and Bailey brought a microphone and computer to record audio. We rotated between two shots of both Cameron and Ari, to them individually.  

 

We filmed Cameron from her right side and Ari from her left, because it would add more visual appeal once the interviews are included back to back.

While Bailey talked more with Cameron and Ari, I took several photographs of Ari's music room. Her dad had build her a beautiful room and how could I not document it and use it as b-roll??I also made sure to "discretely" record some over the shoulder and two shots of the two girls talking, because it shows how close they are in person.

Day 3: The Gig + interview

        So I finally met Caileigh and Morgan!! YAY!! They were so sweet. I asked a few of my friends to come to the resturant that VOV would be performing at, since Bailey was not able to go this day, and it would be hard to film by myself. The band performed 12 songs total (set list below).

        I got some great shots this night. However, the only dilemma I experienced was finding the right angle. There was a large portion of the crowd gathered in chair in front of the stage, so I was unable film in areas that would block the audience's view of the band. Therefore, I was very limited in where I was able to record.

        After the performance, I found Cameron who introduced me to the two members I had not met yet, and asked if we could do some interviews. One of the friends I brought with me is Daniela, we'll call her Dani, who owns a small microphone that connect to your cell phone. (image below) Since Bailey wasn't here, I didn't have her microphone. Strangely enough, this cheap little microphone picked up great audio quality. I ended up having to connect it to my phone and start a voice recording on the voice memo app, and then recording video as usual on my camera.

        The interviews went very smoothly, Caileigh was far more willing and comfortable answering questions than Morgan, the youngest of the group, but I was able to get the content I needed. I also asked Cameron about how she feels after the gig, since VOV made a huge step that night. They performed their original song for the first time!

  That just about wraps up the filming of my documentary, so I went home and uploaded all my footage and updated Bailey on the night.

Planning - Documentary

 Finding a topic

    So for this project, we were told to create a 7 minute documentary on the topic of our choice. I decided to work with my friend Bailey, who I've worked with last year in AS. We got together and started planning our documentary. Bailey suggested we do something centered around an all girls band named Visions of Venus (VOV), whose members go to our school. She wanted to focus on how this band deals with misogyny, however I noted that this is a massive topic, that can't be condensed down to seven minutes without  poorly representing the situation, and frankly, since Visions of Venus is a small local band, they don't have experience with misogyny in the music industry. Once my teacher walked by and asked about our topic, we told her this and she had the same sentiments. So, back to the drawing board.

    I suggested we do something surrounding architecture since my mother is an architect, so we would have easy access to models and plans for b-roll. But, both Bailey and I didn't feel connected to this at all, and we wanted to produce a documentary on something we would enjoy. So, we stuck to the music track, and that's when I came up with a pretty good topic. We decided to focus on how Visions of Venus deals with maintaining/creating their band, while still being high school students. Our teacher loved the idea so how all we had to was get in contact with the band members. 

Image taken from VOV Instagram

Getting in contact with VOV

        I went to Visions of Venus' Instagram's, where they have a link to contact them in their bios, so I sent them an email explaining the purpose of Bailey and I's documentary and asking if they were interested in being a part of our documentary. In case they declined our proposal, I have a friend who is in a band and would have been willing to participate.  

VOV Instagram

VOV link tree

                                                                              

    

    Bailey and I also realized that VOV would be performing at our school dance a few days later, so we decided to get footage of them there, since we were both going. Several days later, I finally got a text from Cameron, the bassist for the band. She texted me saying the members were definitely interested in taking part in our documentary.  Below are the texts I received from Cameron.

 

    Our first dilemma appeared when Cameron told me that only two members, her and the singer Ari, actually go to our school. This means the drummer and guitarist, Caileigh and Morgan, are far less accessible to film as they both live 45 minutes away. So, I asked Cameron if Morgan would be okay with Bailey and I going to her house , since that is where they rehearse, to get shots of their musical process, their interactions, and their interactions with one another. However, she let me know that her house is very far away, and she doesn't think Morgan's family was comfortable with us being there since they don't know us. Therefore, I planned with Bailey to go to VOV's gig at Carolina Ale house on November 22nd, where we'd be able to get interviews with the remaining to members. I also planned a day to meet up at Ari's house to get her and Cameron's interviews done.

Research and Planning

    I found it interesting that VOV's color scheme revolved around the color purple. So I decided to research the use of purple within the music industry. Unlike other local bands, they have a sole defining color, which was very well chosen stylistically. Parasomnia is another example of a local band which formed earlier this year. However, they have no set color scheme, their IG and dressing suggests a basic “rock” look (reds, blacks). VOV on the other hand, has had purple since day one. They are easily recognized by their signature shade of purple, and the members often correlate their wardrobes to incorporate purple, while allowing their own style and personalities shine through. 

    This choice of color is also well selected because it is deeply rooted in rock music culture. The color was popularized in the industry in the 60s because it was a blend of the primary colors, and because it was very ambiguous in relation to music. It was later used by highly successful artists such as Prince and Deep Purple. It is also a color associated with femininity, which works well for VOV being an all-girl band. Source

    This was one of the main reasons I agreed to focus our documentary on this band. After looking in-depth at their Instagram, I realized how well done their marketing is, especially for such a small local band of high schoolers. Aside from this use of this purple theme, they have excellent photographs, and they create video content following trends ideal for their target audience.

    In the meantime, Bailey and I created an outline for how the documentary will be be structured, as well as a list of questions that we will ask the girls when we meet up with them (see below).

Outline     Interview questions

Documentaries research

 We viewed and studied several full length documentaries in class

    I have to admit, before October, I had watched very few full length documentary. I had always thought the idea of a documentary boring, because I didn't see the point in watching two hours worth of animals hunting, or how an athlete made that one life changing shot. Which is why I initially was not excited to start the documentary unit. My teacher gave us a lecture on documentary conventions, which was what first peaked my interest. She explained the different types of documentaries, and I realized I had watched several in the past and loved them. I had watched several crime documentaries, such as one in 2017 about the case of JonBenet Ramsey, as well as a sociological documentary in 2021 on Zimbardo's Stanford Prison Experiment.

 

The Case Of
(2016)

The Stanford Prison Experiment
(2015)

AMERICAN PROMISE (2013)

    The first full length documentary was American Promise (2014). It was directed by Joe Brewster and Michele Stephenson, and followed the life of two boys living in New York city for 13 years, up until they enter University. The documentary starts with the story of two boys as they go apply to the prestigious Dalton academy. Because the film was shot for so long, the directors hired three professional verite editors to assist in cutting the 800 hours of footage down to around 2 hours. 

And these editors, as well as the cinematographers, did an excellent job, in my opinion, because the editing within the film is very clean and concise. The documentary was filmed in a way which created a sense of realism, as we were often reminded that the subjects lives were being filmed. One such moment was when there was a fight at Sean's school, and footage suddenly became very shaky, this was because the cinematographer was struggling to get out of the way of the people fighting. Sean then grins and turns to the camera man and says "Welcome Banneker!" Another example was one instance where Idris forgot to inform his mother about his History quiz and she begins to panic over it not being in her calendar. In the moment of stress, she completely forgets that the cinematographer is in the room, and he stays out of her direct line of sign in order to capture the true effect of the argument between mother and son. These moments create an sense of realism because it feels as if the audience is in the room with the subjects, however we do not interact with the subjects. Therefore, we have the "fly on wall" effect, which in some instances actually adds an uncomfortable feel. Some moments it almost feels too personal, as if we aren't meant to be watching this on television.

    One thing I thought was interesting as well, was the use of both direct interviews and indirect interviews. The directors used direct interviews were used a lot with the children at young ages, because it is easier for a child to directly answer the question, rather than to have to restate questions into their answers. 

    Overall, I loved this documentary. As a high school senior, I related to many of the experiences the two boys were going through regarding college application and acceptances. The piece was very telling of the hardships of minority children, the consequences of putting stress on young children, and the inexplicable situations that are thrown at us in life. It brought me chills, laughter, and tears. We were taken on a journey to experience two people's childhoods, we were witness to tragedy, love, loss, and guilt. The directors created a piece which is very telling of the human experience, it demonstrates just how much we go through as people, and just how much we are able to overcome. 

EXIT THROUGH THE GIFT SHOP (2010)

    Another full length documentary that I enjoyed was Banksy's Exit Through the Gift Shop (2010). The point of this documentary was to capture the risky and thrilling world of street art from the perspective of the artist. The majority of the footage was taken by French cinematographer, Thierry Guetta. 

The beginning of the documentary follows Guetta, as he gets inspired to create a video. He gets in touch with several big name street artists, and begins to immerse himself into this underground world.

     The documentary started with a montage of several different street artists creating their art in a series of different locations, one riskier than the other. The montage contributes to the style, setting off the tone of the documentary as having a grunge aesthetic, with a very fun feel. I tried to use this in my own documentary as well. As you will see later, I used this montage to start my documentary with a similar grunge feel. I think the most interesting thing about this documentary, is the fact that it was not made by Thierry Guetta, despite it being mainly filmed by him. It is revealed within the documentary that once Guetta attempted to build it, it was unorganized and poorly edited. So, Banksy ends up collecting all of the footage and creating it himself. The use of background music was excellently chosen. Banksy uses sorrow music to set the tone as Guetta's childhood story is told, as well as slow zoom ins, keeping the audiences attention stuck on the man's words. On the other hand, playful modern music is used when showing the footage of Guetta immersing himself into the illegal activities the street artists take part in.

Episodic Documentary

    I watched two episodic documentaries from Netflix's Abstract series. The series is intended to spotlight different people form a variety of artistic fields. The first one I watched was focused on Ruth Carter, the famous costume designer who worked on major productions such as Black Panther (2019). 

The documentary's b-roll was beautifully chose, showing her organizing, planning, an creating the details on her costumes. The film makers used close ups of her pieces used in many of her old films as well, showing the change and progressed of intricacy of her costumes over time as she grew as an artist. 

    

    The second episode was of Es Devin, set designer. The nature of her job is to create interesting an visually unique sets for artists to perform on. Therefore, the editing and transitions of her episode reflected this craft of building the world around her. One specific transition that I believed to be excellently created, was the instance when Devin cuts a slit through the backdrop, peaks her head through, ad places herself onto a Ferris wheel below.

This transition was a great choice as it showcases Devlin's style well, and it was used right after she explained her use of cuts or sips in many of her digital works.

    I love the concept of episodic documentaries and I think they are an excellent style to gain views for major companies such as Netflix. Since the documentary is split into a series of episodes, all with the same purpose but different focuses, the audience is kept engaged an they are able to pick and choose which documentaries they would like to watch.

Op Docs

    Op docs are short documentaries that follow a variety of styles and unrelated plots, submitted to the New York Times by pretty much anyone who would like to submit. My favorite op doc that I watched was named Oasis by Justine Martine (2023).  The documentary follows two twin brothers who have begin to grow apart as they grow older, as one begins to focus on conforming to his friends. However, they cherish their summer, feeling as close as they did when they were just little boys.

    There are two different tones throughout the video for the summer break section contrasts from the other. The summer break sequence contains well lit scenes, all of which are in areas with a lot of nature. The greenery of the scenes, the activities that they brothers take part in, as well as the fact that the sound is all nature oriented and original audio, all help to create a sense of realism. They all emanate childhood, giving the viewers a look into how it was that the two boys strengthened their relationship over the vacation time. it reminded them of how they were when they were younger, without their friends there to distract them.

    The scenes in the skatepark show how the twins’ lives are, outside of summer. The camera is usually focused on Ralph, and often shows Remi in the corner of the screen. By focusing the camera on Ralph, we understand his sense of loneliness as he watches his brother with his friends. Dialogue is included where Ralph attempts to get his brother’s attention by offering him his hat, however Ralph accepts the gift and makes a dismissive gesture. With the combination of the solo shots of Remi watching his brother, and the lack of duologue between the two here compared to the summer, we understand how Remi feels as a handicapped individual with a neurotypical brother. 

WE'RE BACK PEOPLE WELCOME TO A LEVEL

This is just a transition post into my new content for the 2023-2024 school year. I'm a senior now in AICE Media A level, let's get excited. 

Here are some celebratory grandmas!