Research task 1

Primary research

The majority of my primary research was talking to relatives of mine, including my nana who would be featuring in the documentary. The idea behind this was to gain information about her life and her story, which I could then use to visualise the final product. These snippets of information allowed me to mentally edit the final piece.

My nana also documented her war time experiences on paper roughly 10 years ago for my primary school project. Thankfully, I still have the writing, which I read through many times to familiarise myself with the story and it also gave me something a detailed guide to the documentary. I noted down subjects and interesting events from her written document, which I could then prompt in the filming.

Secondary research

I spent much time watching documentaries of a similar concept and with similar content. I took many notes on things I could use in my own, such as camera positioning, colour grades, music beds and also questions that could be asked to the individual.

I noticed that quite a few of the documentaries I watched included extra footage, such as stock footage, which would break up the documentary and make it more visually interesting. I took this into account and started looking for my own stock footage to use.

Audience research

In my research, I came across many high budget documentaries with the same interests as mine. They all had good ratings from large audiences, these documentaries included:

-Children Of The Camps

-The Nazis: A Warning From History

-Gladiators Of World War II

Market research

There are many amateur documentaries on the internet, which contain a similar theme to the one I have in mind. However, I wish to make a documentary to a near professional standard, meaning I have a better chance for a large audience.

Every story is unique.

Production research

One location and one individual.

Location and kit are easily accessible.

Production dates are loose and can be changed.

Weather is not an issue, due to it being indoors.

-location

Interpreting results

My research allowed me to structure and plan the project more efficiently.

Without research, the project would be really hard to achieve, as I’d have little knowledge of my competition.