Back again

P

pacey1800

Hi everyone,
After some time off, I've decided to come back to this forum. I know I've said this a lot but I'm sorry about all the complaining and pouting I've done here. I admit that I am still trying to get a thick skin about things, and I realize how everyone works around here now. With that being said, I finally have an idea for a documentary, and it's one that I thought of while attending a high school football game a while back. My cousin's husband is the coach there, and next year, for about a week, I am going to follow him through the preparation for one of their games, probably the first game of the season. I'll be shooting footage of him at home, workouts and training, probably coaching sessions, and the game itself, but since I only have one camera, what I'll be shooting is mostly reaction shots from the sideline. They do have someone up in the press box taping the game for replay on the local educational access channel and I will see about obtaining the tape of that game from them. I've checked everything out with them (my cousin and her husband) and they've told me it's okay. It's just a matter of scheduling and trying to fit everything in between college.

I do have some other ideas, but they will probably be very difficult to pull off logistically, if they can be at all. One I've thought about doing may not happen because I can't get in touch with the person who has the footage I would like. It's about the life of a well-known local TV news anchorman who worked in various markets back in the '70s and '80s, became a local radio talk show host in the '90s, suffered scandal, and ended up broke. He was a real Ron Burgundy-type and was mistakenly thought to be the inspiration for the movie, but he wasn't. His daughter told me that she had a bunch of old Beta tapes of his newscasts that he apparently taped himself (and since one of the stations he worked for suffered flood damage in Katrina, I'm not sure if among the tapes are the only existing copies of that station's newscasts for that time period, '82-mid '85). In addition, the story is just so sordid and scandalous that when he was alive, he never wanted anyone to make a movie about his life (at least a fictional film).

Anyway, please let me know what you think. Hope to see you soon.
 
Sort by date Sort by votes
:welcome: back!

I don't remember any serious offenses so you must not have been that bad. Don't worry about the past. Good luck with your new idea.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Well, to be honest I only started posting here recently, I completely forgot I registered in August of '03. I was into screenwriting back then, and I never thought I would have a chance of learning about filmmaking. The classes I took at the local community college have helped a lot. Thanks though.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
indietalk said:
I don't remember any serious offenses so you must not have been that bad. Don't worry about the past. Good luck with your new idea.
Click to expand...

No, no, I remember pacey. Real trouble, this one is. Quite the rebel-rouser. I do believe in second-chances, but I'll be keeping an eye on you, pacey.

As for your documentary idea, it sounds pretty sweet. If I can offer one piece of advice -- focus. I don't mean that, like, metaphorically. I mean your documentary needs to have a specific focus, long before the cameras roll.

I now do narrative work, but I got my start in documentaries, while getting my degree in anthropology. A while back, I wrote a blog, that was supposed to be part 1 in a longer series, about the basics of documentary-making. But then I got really busy, working on my current project, and it'll probably be a while before I write part 2 of that blog. A lot of people come onto this forum asking questions about making documentaries, and you'd think I'd want to answer their questions, but I don't. Some people might be annoyed by my honesty here, but I simply don't have the time or patience, not right now. Maybe later.

Cuz you see, most people don't give documentary-work even 1/10th the respect it deserves. Every time I read one of these posts, it feels like they're not giving it the same level of attention that they would, if they were working on a narrative project. For some reason, I don't know if it's the way you worded your inquiry, or maybe I'm just in a good mood, I don't know, but I feel like your inquiry is different.

Maybe it's because you're a student, and the bulk of my documentary-work was as a student. So, maybe you'll be able to relate to the lessons I can share, since we're in the same boat, in that sense. Anyway, as this project progresses, I'd enjoy seeing updates on your work, and would be glad to answer questions and give advice. For the time being, my first piece of advice is worth repeating:

FOCUS

You need to know what this documentary is really about, and don't tell me it's about a week in the life of a football coach.

Cheers. Best of luck. :)
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Cracker Jack,
Thanks for the reply, and I will try to be on my best behavior. My focus, to be honest, is not on a week in the life of a football coach. To me, it's more about the team, and the preparations for one game. They've been struggling for the past few years but this year they had a good season, a winning season, but they were eliminated in the playoffs, I think. I'll have to check. Right now, it's only in the planning stages. There's a chance that it may not turn out the way I want it to, given my schedule with college. I've tried setting a goal of doing this in one week, as opposed to an entire season. The way I see it, this is probably comparable to those HBO "24/7" documentaries they do about upcoming fights, or the one they're going to be doing on next year's NHL Winter Classic, focusing not on an entire season, but on one event. My film is probably going to be more in that vein, a look inside the preparation leading up to the big game, inside coaching sessions and practices and other places where people aren't normally allowed to go.

I do know that there are going to be seniors who will be playing, some of whom may have already committed to the big-time college programs, and I will try to also focus on them. I'll ask him about some of his players, maybe ask if I could talk to a few of them as well. I know my cousin told me that they gather at their house and just hang around, play games, etc. I think that it will be a very interesting experience, and I'm sure it will be fun too. I do have one question, though, since my old computer crashed back in September and I finally decided to get a Mac, so I could use Final Cut: when I went to the Apple Store and asked the salesman about Final Cut Express, he just told me "it's a fancy version of IMovie", which didn't really give me a lot of confidence in the product. Does Express have the same features as Final Cut Pro, like graphics, resizing the videos, putting multiple videos in the same picture, etc.)?

Anyway, thanks for the replies. Look forward to hearing any advice, if possible.


Cracker Funk said:
No, no, I remember pacey. Real trouble, this one is. Quite the rebel-rouser. I do believe in second-chances, but I'll be keeping an eye on you, pacey.

As for your documentary idea, it sounds pretty sweet. If I can offer one piece of advice -- focus. I don't mean that, like, metaphorically. I mean your documentary needs to have a specific focus, long before the cameras roll.

I now do narrative work, but I got my start in documentaries, while getting my degree in anthropology. A while back, I wrote a blog, that was supposed to be part 1 in a longer series, about the basics of documentary-making. But then I got really busy, working on my current project, and it'll probably be a while before I write part 2 of that blog. A lot of people come onto this forum asking questions about making documentaries, and you'd think I'd want to answer their questions, but I don't. Some people might be annoyed by my honesty here, but I simply don't have the time or patience, not right now. Maybe later.

Cuz you see, most people don't give documentary-work even 1/10th the respect it deserves. Every time I read one of these posts, it feels like they're not giving it the same level of attention that they would, if they were working on a narrative project. For some reason, I don't know if it's the way you worded your inquiry, or maybe I'm just in a good mood, I don't know, but I feel like your inquiry is different.

Maybe it's because you're a student, and the bulk of my documentary-work was as a student. So, maybe you'll be able to relate to the lessons I can share, since we're in the same boat, in that sense. Anyway, as this project progresses, I'd enjoy seeing updates on your work, and would be glad to answer questions and give advice. For the time being, my first piece of advice is worth repeating:

FOCUS

You need to know what this documentary is really about, and don't tell me it's about a week in the life of a football coach.

Cheers. Best of luck. :)
Click to expand...
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Fucking salespeople. I hate 'em. They just make stuff up. The dude at the Mac store is the absolute wrong source for advice on filmmaking tips.

NO, Final Cut Express is not a fancy version of iMovie. It's a slimmed-down, more-affordable, more-accessible version of Final Cut Pro. It does less, but I'd gladly work with it. I'm a PC guy, and even I know that.

You've come (back) to the right place.

Also, football is awesome. Maybe that's why I responded to your post. You're a fan of the sport?
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Yeah, I like football, and all other sports too, though I tend to like the NFL more than high school or college, though my favorite college team is LSU. As for the guy at the Mac store, he did not really appear to know a lot about the program itself, and he wasn't the guy who sold me the computer to begin with (he wasn't there that day). Football is awesome though, and I enjoy a lot of documentaries about sports. I can remember when I was a teenager back in the late '90s, I went one year to the New Orleans Saints mini-camp (like training camp for the players but people are invited to watch them practice).

I shot a scrimmage game that they had, but somehow I'm not sure if it was with another team or if it was just an intrasquad game (the same team's offense vs. defense). I can remember one particular shot that I admittedly took from those NFL Films shows I watched all the time, where I put my camera on the ground and shot way down at ground level while the game was going on, not really paying attention to the plays but shooting from a far angle. Of course, it was difficult to follow the ball in the air on pass plays, so I zoomed out. Obviously, I don't have that tape anymore, nor do I have any of the other stuff I shot because it was lost in Katrina. I used to shoot all kinds of stuff, even my sister's dance recitals. My parents told me I did a better job than the professional company that the studio hired to make their videos, mainly because they shot from a distance, and I wanted to get as close as I could for a better view of the dancers.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Sounds like a cool doc you have lined up. :cool:

You still need to go interview your aunt, though. One, it was an interesting story. Two, it's easy practice footage to work with!

Just picked up a new doc-gig today, myself. Fun fun fun.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Thanks, Steve. I appreciate it. Congratulations on your new gig. :)

I guess in terms of practice, I could do that, but it's been a long time since I've talked about interviewing her. I don't even think I remember mentioning it (if it was about the Katrina idea, I've sort of abandoned it because it just brings back a lot of bad memories). I've thought about maybe interviewing some of the professors at my college, like doing a profile of them, shooting B-roll during their classes, etc. People fascinate me and I like to get to know them a little bit better. I do have a real sense of curiosity about things, and that's one reason why I've taken up interest in filmmaking, aside from telling stories.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Welcome back, Pacey.

I remember you, too. But the past is the past, you seem focused and determined, with many swell ideas.

There is threads previous upon the subject of "Documentary". Give them a once over, perhaps they could help you. :)
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top