After class discussion, a pair of documentaries on glass blowing are compared and contrasted. Students then showcase their 99 Ways to Tell a Story Assignment and if assigned, the Print to Screen Assignment. The Documentary Dilemma activity can be used if time permits.
- Define the term story.
- Identify key elements that make a story successful.
- Describe effective methods to develop a compelling story.
- Describe examples of documentary film and documentary activism.
- Examine challenges to engaging in documentary film making.
Core readings were used for the 2 credit pass/fail course and the 3 credit graded course used both Core and Additional resources.
- Story Proof: The Science Behind the Startling Power of Story, Kendall Haven
- Documentary Film: A Very Short Introduction, Aufderheide, Patricia
- Defining Documentary (pages 1 - 14)
- TED TALK: Clues to a Great Story
- Where it all started: The Center for Digital Storytelling in California, Lambert in Storycircle
- Video for change : a guide for advocacy and activism, Gregory, et. al.
- Chapter 1: Using Video for Advocacy
- Documentary Film : A Very Short Introduction, Aufderheide, Patricia
- Advocacy (pages 77 - 91)
- Hybrid Practices, Sharon Daniel, Cinema Journal 48, no 2, Winter 2009
The first 15 to 20 minutes of class are dedicated to discussion of the weekly resources. If you assign a weekly reaction paper, you can also pull questions students ask in those papers.
- How do you define a story? (Review page 79 of Haven)
- Do you agree with Haven’s better definition of a story? Why or why not?
- Who owns a story?
- Did any of the Magnificent Seven Concepts of a story resonate with you? What are some ways you can incorporate thee concepts into your final project?
- Aufderheide attempts to define documentary a number of different ways, but can’t seem to come up with a definitive definition. Based on what you have read, how would you define documentary?
- Artistic representation of actuality – about real life, but not real life.
- On the bottom of page 9, Aufderheide says there are two crucial elements that are in tension in the genre of documentary.
Compare and contrast the glass blowing documentaries and examine ways they can be improved. Do you learn anything about the process of glass blowing in either of the documentaries?
- Thomas Long Blow Glass PBS segment
- This documentary is fast paced yet is unclear in the purpose. Is it meant to document glass blowing, highlight the artist or is it a marketing piece for St. Augstine?
- Bert Haanstra - Glas (1958)
- Provides a juxtaposition of the classic glass blowing method versus the automated process. The filmmaker spent a lot of time in the factory capturing the daily activities of the workers.
If time permits, the Hotel 22 op doc can be shown. This short documentary was made by a student at Stanford University and can be used as an example that one does not need a multi million dollar budget or years of experience to create a documentary.
To make things go quicker, students turn in their work the before class, this allows for the instructor to have the content downloaded to the computer in the classroom.
To make things go quicker, students turn in their work the before class, this allows for the instructor to have the content downloaded to the computer in the classroom.
(adapted from Introducing Documentaries to Your Students, PBS POV)
The class is broken into groups and asked to review the scenario and after about 10 minutes discussing the questions, the groups report out their answers.
Read the scenario below and discuss the questions at the bottom of the page amongst your group. Then select a person to present the results of your discussion to the class.
In preparation for a community-wide open house, students and faculty at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee’s School of Freshwater Sciences decided that it would help people understand their research and provide a good student recruitment tool if they recorded a video of a typical day aboard their research vessel the Neeskay. Due to time constraints and limited access to the recording equipment, the school could only shoot for two consecutive days.
During the first day of recording, the Neeskay was doing routine water sample collection in the Milwaukee River and the Milwaukee inner harbor. The students and faculty didn’t think that the footage of them mostly pouring water from buckets and Niskin bottles into containers and doing some on board analysis of the water was representative of their normal cruise activities in which they used Remotely Operated Vehicles, SONAR, PONAR and coring. But that left them with a dilemma. Should they use that footage of what actually happened that day, or should they re-enact what would happen on a more typical day?
To make things even more complicated, on the second day of their shoot, the Neeskay went out to photograph and collect samples from around the shipwreck of the Prins Willem V, a freighter that sank just outside of Milwaukee’s harbor in 1954. During the cruise the Remotely Operated Vehicle had trouble capturing good footage of the wreck due to heavy sediment in the water, a pair of Niskin bottles fell overboard and had to be fished out of the lake and someone accidentally knocked over a tray with test tubes and beakers in the onboard lab. Students disagreed about whether to leave in or edit out the footage of the rescuing of the Niskin bottles and the accident and cleanup in the lab.
- In your view, in these circumstances, what production choices would a documentary filmmaker make and why?
- How about a Hollywood filmmaker?
- How about a reporter from a local television station?
- What would be the best representation of the research cruises and why?
- Are there things they could have done to convey their message besides re-enactment or shooting the footage they did?
- Some theorists describe characters having a “spine”, an inner motivation, dominant unconscious goal they're striving for. What would the spine be for the character(s) in this scenario?
- How would you incorporate the Magnificent Seven into the crafting of your story?
If your institution has access to AdForum, that can be used as a source for finding campaigns.
Select a social media campaign focused on a specific issue or problem, like AIDS, violence, poverty, etc.
See the heading on How to Find Campaigns at the end of this document for tips on how you can find the information you need to complete this assignment. Don’t forget, when in doubt or in need of help, ask a librarian or the instructor!
Once you’ve found a campaign, compare and contrast the campaign alongside the Stop Kony effort by addressing the following questions:
- How did the campaign get attention?
- What was the campaign goal?
- What, if anything, did the campaign achieve?
- How did you feel about the campaign, did it sway your opinion on the issue or inspire you to act on the campaigns message? Why or why not?
- Based on the resources you have read for this week, what criticisms, if any could be made of this campaign.
- Based on the resources you have read this week, does this campaign inspire activism, slacktivism or both? Why?
Ads of the World is an advertising archive containing ads and campaigns from around the world. In addition to the ads, it also contains case studies and making of videos developed by the agency, these should answer the majority of the assignment questions.
Below are the steps you can use to search the site for a topic:
- From the home page you will see three drop downs near the top of the page - Medium, Industry and Country.
- Click the Industry drop down and select either Education or Public Interest, NGO.
- Next, click the green Apply button.
- View the results and select a campaign. Below each caption is a Description heading that should contain all the information you will need to answer the assignment questions.
Post in the assignment discussion board the campaign you will be using. You don’t need to post a link, just tell us what it is, i.e. Type With Pride. This is to ensure that no one does the same campaign.
During the next class you will briefly present on your campaign, i.e. show the image or video that you found and answer the assignment questions.