Documentary Unit - Evaluation

Documentary Unit - Evaluation

Throughout this unit, I have learned a lot about what it takes to make a documentary through building experience and making mistakes, and I made a lot of mistakes. I do not feel as though our documentary is as strong as it could be, however there is a lot I can take from it. I have a better understanding on how to organise shoots better, how to communicate with contributors, why patience is key when shooting a wildlife documentary amongst other things. Being the first unit I've actively worked with a group (Jack Nix, Troy Smith and Josh Bayly), I feel that we have all learned a lot more about each other, some good some bad, but all that we were able to deal with appropriately.

Pre-production almost went without a hitch, particularly at the beginning. We were able to develop and idea quickly and we were able to find points of research easily. We made initial plans on how we were going to shoot the documentary unit and we knew a couple of different locations that we could potentially film at, we only had to go and get them. However work on the script took time, we didn't feel like we had enough to talk about until we actually visited the sites, meaning shoot dates were pushed back a lot. Communications also broke down a bit as we couldn't seem to come in at the same time as one another due to other commitments.

When we came to production time, we found picking shoot dates awkward, we couldn't seem to get everyone in on the same day and Great Bells could only let us film once we had gone through the RSPB communications officer and gained permission from them, which took time. It almost looked as though this documentary would never happen as Great Bells was the required location. That was until the final shoot day came when we gained permission to film and despite expecting heavy showers, the sun came out the whole time we were filming which was great. I would say the final shoot date saved our documentary, we met with various people like Phil Haynes and another bird watcher and we even got an interview with Rob Peck.

Though not the best documentary, I am happy with the outcome given what we learned as individuals as well as a group. I may not have fulfilled my potential, but I certainly gained a lot of much needed experience to help boost my work in future projects.

Documentary Unit - Meeting with the Contributors

During our shoot, we met up with a number of contributors, including Phil Haynes, a local wildlife photographer, Gareth Fulton, the site manager at Elmley, Nick May, the site manager at Great Bells and Rob Peck, one of the campaigners against the wind turbines. Each provided their own pieces of information, whether it be about the wildlife, the turbines or the local area, and we used this information to help build on the script and develop the documentary.

Nick May was the first person we met up with when we were doing our first location recce around Great Bells Farm. He is the site manager of the farm and works alongside the RSPB. We only spoke to Nick briefly but he gave us a great starting point on our script and gave us a lot of useful information about the turbines that we did not know previously. It was rather difficult gaining permission to film at the site however as we had to go through the RSPB communications officer, Martin Jensen to do so.

The next contributor we met with was Gareth Fulton, the site manager of Elmley Nature Reserve. Gareth was especially helpful, giving us a lift round the site and giving us a large amount of information about the local wildlife and about the site. It was a shame we couldn't get an interview with him as he seemed very passionate about the subject, but work commitments got in the way of an interview.

We met up with Phil Haynes at Great Bells Farm during our last shoot. We had a brief chat about the turbines and how they affect the local wildlife before he offered to take us around the farm and show us the best places to get shots of the birds. Up until this point, we struggled to even find let alone get a shot at a Marsh Harrier and with his help we managed to find and film multiple Marsh Harriers. Phil also got us in contact with Rob Peck.

And finally we met with Rob Peck, who we was recommended to speak to by both Nick May and Phil Haynes. Though we were able to get an interview with him, it did not fit with the documentary as well as we hoped meaning we didn't go through with it in the end. However the meeting we had with him was very useful, I felt that we learned more about the turbines in that one meeting than we did through our own research and the other meetings put together. I was hoping he too was passionate about bird watching like the three mentioned previously, that way we might have been able to link the interview we filmed with the documentary.

Documentary Unit - Research into documentary - Birds

In order to familiarise ourselves to the documentary subject, wildlife, each member of the group, including myself, took it unto themselves to get to know a specific area of the documentary. For example one person will get to know the turbines, how they work and the positives and negatives they bring to the environment whereas someone else will get to know the location and habitat. My job was to look into what birds you can expect to find at each time of the year and their general behaviour.

Finding out what birds will be available when was not too hard to find. This information can be found on the RSPB website as well as the Elmley website. However general bird behaviour is not quite so easy. Though there is information available online, the behaviour of the birds has been altered due to the position of the turbines, meaning you have to be there to really understand it. I got a bit of information on this through word of mouth on our first visit to Great Bells from Nick May and more on our second visit with Phil Haynes.

Here is a list of just some of the birds you can expect to see at Elmley at this time of the year. In all there are 52 known species of bird at Elmley with a total bird population of almost 24,000.

It's hard to say how many of these birds we saw during our visits, but I was able to identify a small portion of the birds listed. The Wigeon for example was very easy to spot, almost making up the entire population, they are frequently seen by the large ponds by the bird hides. These were particularly easy to film due to their large numbers.

Birds such as the Marsh Harrier however were a lot harder to spot and far harder to film. We often only caught glimpses of the Marsh Harrier and often didn't have enough time to get the camera out and film them. They only ever hung around for about 5-10 seconds before swooping back down in the distance.

One of the more common birds at Elmley and Great Bells, the Wigeon

A Marsh Harrier in flight