Documentary Hidden Kingdoms - Secrets Forests

-

BBC Program 

Narrator - Stephen Fry 
Producer - Verity White 
Series Producer - Mark Brownlow 
Executive Producer -Michael Gunton

When I started watching the documentary I was fascinated with the whole design of it. The colours, the technique and the sound design. 

It opened with an overview of all the animals it was going to talk about (with VO giving a quick description) and CRYSTAL CLEAR images, which made me speechless.There technique was done so that they could show the audience what its like to live in that world. How small animals feel against big animals, therefore they had to get down low to capture all this. 


The tree plays a key role in the documentary, as its used to change topic. it is done with a tracking shot and light coming through all the leaves. 








Colours: warm/brown (dark colours) 

Sound Design: each sound of every animals is amplified through effects but also the sound effects such as eating, falling, chewing etc 

We never actually see the presenter, he's there in VO only. The way it's done is they follow the animals around and Stephen Fry explains what is happening but also gives information about each animal in that. 

Music: dramatic music which goes with the actions of of the animals = dramatises it, makes it realistic 

Introduces another animals by linking the, 

Target audience: everyone 

Something which I found different and unique was that towards the end of the documentary they showed the camera crew filming, and the difficulties they had to face. I was shocked as to the amount of equipment they were using. The reason behind doing this is for ethical reasons. They wanted to show that it was set up but also at the same time that it adds to the realism of the documentary (as we see the crew waiting for hours for something to happen)


Things that inspired me:
  1. The QUALITY! It was amazing. In our documentary I would like to get clear images/shots of the butterflies and show there beautiful colours. 
  2. One thing I still want, is a presenter. At times I got bored, so I still feel that having a presenter will keep the audience interested 
  3. I liked the introduction bit; where they quickly spoke about what they will show before starting. That is something I will take into consideration.
  4. Even though I liked the sound design in this documentary, I do not want it in mine. I don't think it would suit it. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Now or Never (2011) - A short film about family relationships

-
Image
Vivandy Productions  Director: Vivandy and F.C Rabbath  Written and Produced: F.C. Rabbath Synopsis: Its about 3 generations of women; the grandmother, mother and daughter. The same story is being repeated between grandmother and mother as well as mother and daughter. Each mother is trying to reconnect with her daughter; both being unsuccessful. What intrigued me:  Showing the mother getting prepared (I'm planning on doing something like that for my video)  portrayal of family drifting (arguing about being too busy for each other)  when she opens the bathroom cupboard when she's young and closes it when she's old (i like the technique it uses to show time passing)  having the same conversation with her daughter as she did with her mother  the way we are shown that there is an issue (phone call from doctor)  VO flashback to the same line she said her mother 'You're being selfish' = realisation the ending:
Read more

Evaluation

-
Writing the final versions of the script was fun, exciting but also a long process. Having a clear idea of what directions my episodes where going I wrote skeleton drafts to begin with and worked like that. With each new draft,  added new jokes, stories lines. With guidance from Simon and his suggestions for certain characters I did make a few changes to some story lines and slightly changed my characters personality. In the first few drafts of each episode Hara was becoming somewhat annoying and lacked a lot of humour. Therefore I decided to make her into a bit of a spiritual person who gives herself a pep talk in each episode but also one of those people who believes in positive thinking and constantly carries a positive thinking book with her, sage and incense.  Kotchy, didn't have much of a story, if you got rid of him you wouldn't even notice. Therefore I made him so that each time his family does something humiliating he captures it on camera or Sebastian does and he
Read more

Documentary - Storyville Episode: Blackfish

-
Image
StoryVille Episode Director: Gabriela Cowperthwaite Producer: Gabriela Cowperthwaite Writers: Gabriela Cowperthwaite, Eli B. Despres and Tim Zimmerman Synopsis: It concerns Tilikum, an orca held by Sea World and the controversy over captive killer whales Even though I analysed this documentary for my script I wanted to analyse it for my research as well.  When watching it, it starts off with Voice over and archive footage of what happened (v.o is the telephone call to emergency).  It then goes on (which I though was smart) and shows and advertisement for Sea World = shows glory, happiness, once in a life time opportunity.  Another thing which I enjoyed was the fact that all the people that were interviewed for the documentary were ex-trainers for Sea World. The technique it then uses is a montage of the trainers saying where they come from (all over the US) A lot of archive footage was used especially when showing the incident or the shows from the whales. 
Read more