Skip to main content

Investigation 10/6: How To Film An Interview

Prior to beginning work on my documentary, I feel that one of the aspects that I should learn more about, in order to help with the process, would be the filming of an interview. The interview portion of a documentary should be engaging so that it gets the audience to listen to what the interviewees are saying. However, the interview usually is not the main focus of the documentary and should not be presented as such.

Lighting An Interview

PictureWhen lighting a setting for an interview, the most common setup uses three different lights known as three point lighting. Three point lighting makes use of a key light, fill light, and back light. The key light is intended to be the brightest source of light within the scene, pointing at a 45 degree angle on the subject. The fill light's purpose is to fill in the less lit portions of the scene. The fill light is meant to be not be as bright as the key light as to not over brighten the image. Lastly, the back light works to light the background, creating depth within the image between the background and the subject.
Link To Picture

Making An Interview Look Interesting

Creating an interesting visual look for your interview helps to engross the audience with what is being said. Looking for a guide as to how to accomplish this, I came across this created video by the YouTube user "Indy Mogul". While the video goes in depth showing the entire process of setting up and interview, I took away a few specific details. The first being that the filmmaker should choose an interesting location for the interview to take place. The surroundings should create give depth to the interview and should try to relate to the topic of the interview. Next, the placement of the camera should work to highlight the subject. Putting the subject in the center of the frame creates a bland look. By adjusting the camera's positioning, the subject can be elevated and moved to the side of the frame in order to strengthen the presence of the subject. Also, the video included how the filmmaker should avoid close-ups as they make the scene feel "too dramatic". The last main detail I took away from the video was work with the person being interviewed. In order to get the best results, the interviewer should work to not engage too much within the conversation, letting the interviewee speak their mind.

Work Log

  • Monday 9/30: Working to wrap up script 
  • Tuesday 10/1: Continued to wrap up script
  • Wednesday 10/2: Script in "finished" state and began storyboard
  • Thursday 10/3: Minor script adjustments and continued storyboard
  • Friday 10/4: Continued storyboard and worked to communicate with actors for documentary

Labels

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Investigation 3/1: The Tools Of Camera Stability

One of the most important aspects of cinematography that goes commonly unnoticed is having the camera steady. Even a slight amount of movement within a shot can pull the audience away from the film, so it is important to attempt to have shots. There are multiple different ways that you can use to stabilize your camera, some of which are more effective than others. Tripod Using a tripod is the easiest way to stabilize the camera while filming. By having three points of contact with the ground, a tripod keeps the camera extremely stable. The camera would likely only move due to very large movements on the ground or strong winds. The one downside to using a tripod is that it has to remain stationary. If the required shot involves moving around, a tripod can likely not be used. Overall, the tripod is the easiest, simplest, and cheapest way to keep your camera steady. (Image Source) Shoulder Rig A shoulder mount is one way to keep the camera stable while also being able to mov...
Post a Comment
Read more

End of MP 1 Blog Post

After now reaching the end of the first marking period of the 2019-2020 school year, I am able to reflect back upon the work that I have completed so far. Intention Definition & Exploration Of Ideas Having no prior experience in any particular area of film, I set out to choose a topic to focus on that would allow me to help narrow down my focus. The area I chose to focus on was documentary and mockumentary styled film making. I made this choice with the intention to be able to explore both formal and less formal ideas while also not relying on having to create an entire original idea by myself. The topic of my film (The Game) was chosen because of my familiarity and pre-existing personal opinions about it. Planning Planning an entire production entirely by myself was a change of pace in comparison to how I worked in previous years. I began the planning process by typing out all of my thoughts in order to help establish what I am trying to do. Once I developed an idea for th...
Post a Comment
Read more

Investigation 12/20: Digital Aging/De-Aging

Over the past couple years the technique of Digital Aging/De-Aging has begun to show up in a growing number of films and TV shows. From making an actor look younger like they used to, aging an actor up to what they might look like, and even bringing actors back from the dead, digital aging and de-aging has changed a lot about how actors can look. With the technology only now reaching a usable form, filmmakers, studios, and actors now face the question of it's use in filmmaking today. Why Digital Age/De-Age? Using digital aging and de-aging of actors can lead to multiple different filmmaking techniques that wouldn't be as possible without it. One example of this is that by digitally aging and de-aging actors the filmmaker is given more freedom as to how much of a characters life they want to portray. While different actors could take the main actors place to show aging, digital aging and de-aging can permit a single actor to look whatever age the script desires. This also create...
Post a Comment
Read more