Documentary Conventions

Documentary Conventions

Documentary Conventions from Jeppe Laursen

There are many conventions that make a documentary what it is. I will explain some of these very common conventions in the following post. A documentary is defined as; a recording of an event , generally based on peoples perspectives and/or genuine facts.

Voice over- Usually in documentaries there will be a narrator, the point of this is to explain specific points to your audience and encourage them into thinking they have some specialist knowledge. It is important to use a clear and understandable voice so audiences can be convinced and are able to acknowledge the information being shown to them.

Real Footage- Documentaries are seen as non-fiction, although some people disagree. However the convention is that real footage is used at least have the audience convinced it is real. When making the documentary a lot of time is spent trying to ensure the audience the footage is real, but this can be hard as editing and voice overs often make it seem unreal.

Interviews- These are a significant part of documentaries, as audiences tend to believe experts within the issue being presented, interview with experts are often conducted. This backs up information in the documentary, makes it seem like a legit issue and provides producers with more detail. Victims and people trying to solve the issue are also often used in order to put real life stories behind the facts being presented. 

Text- Facts, opinions and statements are often presented throughout the documentary in text over the screen. When using this it is important to have clear and readable text and have it smoothly edited in.

Sound- It is important to use real sounds, relating to the events again to try and create a sense of realism, same goes for the lighting. Background music and other sounds are also used to try bring out a point, for example in the famous documentary 'Supersize Me' they use very childish music to try and put down McDonald's are a kids restaurant.

We intend to follow many of these conventions in our product. Interviews are going to be a major part of our piece, this includes victims and experts, we want to have both real time and planned interviews. We will also be backing a lot of the things we say in the film up with facts, we are going to use text for this which is very conventional. We want to find someone with a very calm voice to do the voice over as well as this is vital to explanatory documentaries. We want to be a bit unconventional with our sound track as we want to make it a bit more up beat and happy since we feel our audience would enjoy this more.