Stages Of Documentary making - Part1

image courtesy: www.kvibe.com

A documentary film is basically a non-fiction film which is made to document a particular subject, event, occasion, culture, nature, people, etc. Major part of documentaries are made with a vision of documenting the subject for the future and as a part of recent relevance of the topic. The documentary films discuss General topics as well as news/current affair topics of general interest.

There are mainly two types of documentaries; (1) Films commissioned by Television channels or funding agencies and (2) Independent films not made for telecast. Though there are a number of channels doing documentaries on various subjects; there are some channels like Gyan Darshan,BBC,DW TV,Russia Today,Al-Jazeera  who are specialized in doing it professionally. But the fact is that more than 60% of the documentaries made are not for TV channels, i.e. it is done by Individuals. For example Adoor’s profile on Kalamandalam Gopi is a best example for Profile type documentary done Individually. We even have lots of Individual documentary makers like Anand Patwadhan, K P Jayasankar, Anjali Monteiro, Mike Pandey, etc. Other funding agencies may include various Trusts, Organizations, Corporates, etc.

In Indian news Channels; the length of a documentary is about 25 minutes. But considering the International channels; their documentaries are more like 45 minutes or even one hour of length. And independent documentaries have no specific rule about the length; it is decided according to the subject and relevance.

And the three main stages in actual documentary making are :

1.      1)  Pre-production

2.      2)  Production

3.      3)  Post-Production. 

Pre-Production

The pre-production phase of a project is where all the planning takes place before the camera rolls. As the name suggests, it is the period in which we prepare the shoot. We search for actors, crew members, outline the script, schedule the scenes, make storyboards, find locations and so on. Pre-production is EVERYTHING. A good planning makes a good shoot. Anything and everything about a video production's logistics are coordinated from scratch based on the script, and everything must be in place before the principle photography begins.

The main steps in pre-production stage is as follows:

Identification of subject: Based on the availability of stuffs; different ideas for a documentary is identified. Then we pool the ideas together to have a clear cut view of the matter. The clubbed ideas are reevaluated according to the availability of time and possibilities of shooting.

Assigning of work: The whole production process is assigned to a crew. And they will be responsible for the making of the film. There are three ways in which Documentary film works are assigned in a channel:

·         The members or the staffs in the channel does the work with their own equipment.

·         Invite a film maker from outside and asking him to do a film with the crew and facilities of the channel.

·         Outsource a full team and assign them to do the work.

Material Collection and Research: The materials for setting up the contents are collected. This may include collection of written materials, visuals (individual or government initiative documentaries) and the main process of actually going to the place and talking directly to the concerned people.

Preparation of One-Line: It is the presentation of the idea/contents about the documentary in a single paragraph (it may have maximum up to one page in length). It explains the concept in a nutshell and how the subject matter is visually presented to the audience. Thus the visual script and idea of subject is presented.

Draft scripting: A draft script is made according to the finalized idea about the subject topic and with the materials collected through research. This gives the rough idea of how the actual script would look like. This step also gives importance to Location spotting according to the need of the subject.

Budgeting: This is an important step where the budget is set up for the whole production of the documentary. It is done step by step regarding each and every aspects such as transportation, equipment, etc.