The Director of Photography (DP) workingon a documentary production works closely with the Director, often as collaborator, and camera operator. The DP is responsible for lighting or complementing the lighting of a given location. If the production crew includes a Gaffer the DP works with him to create either a subjective or objective lighting scheme depending on the Directors’ priorities. In a documentary situation the DP is often also the Camera Operator. The Director must convey to the DP/Camera Operator the exact type and style of coverage he requires so that the DP/Operator can anticipate what needs to be shot as events occur spontaneously.
On Location with Director of Photography Mike Goi(right) in Southeast Chicago
A subjective lighting approach tends to give the scene being shot a look and feel that interprets the actual reality in some way. An objective approach seeks to reinforce the natural feel of the location. For example a documentary interview conducted with an interviewee in her office might require some minimal lighting simply to insure a good exposure and give us a feel for the environment as it is. The more the scenes lighting is enhanced or re-created the more subjective it becomes.
A Camera Operator for a documentary film production is often required to handhold certain shots. This person should be adept holding the camera steady and working quickly to frame shots.
When you think, “feature film” it’s usually about the latest fiction theatrical release, but there’s another type of feature film playing in theaters and on television, which is Documentary or Non-fiction feature length films. Not all feature length documentaries are “top grossing” candidates at the box office; as successful theatrically as Inside Job or one of Michael Moore’s films. Often they will be in local “art house” theaters for a week and then gone not to be seen again until Netflix picks them up and/or they come out on DVD. There are many types of documentary films from advocacy and socially relevant stories to anthropological and nature productions. The first feature length documentary to play in theaters world wide was Nanook of the North, considered by some to be an Anthropological or by today’s standards “salvage anthropology.” Directed by Robert Flaherty this film was made to tell a story and be entertaining enough to play in theaters.
Many current documentary films find their roots in early Broadcast television including Robert Drews, Direct Cinema, Primary and the work of Fred Friendly and Edward R Murrow.
Early Broadcast Television Documentaries
Network News productions like CBS’s 60 Minutes carry on a tradition started by Edward R Murrow and Fred Friendly with documentaries for television like Harvest of Shame and McCarthy Hearings. Public Television documentaries produced independently and by PBS Network affiliates like WGBH’s Front Line documentaries and PBS Network productions like The Civil War by Ken Burns are feature length and longer documentary films made for Television.
Cable – Non-Broadcast
Network News productions like CBS’s 60 Minutes carry on a tradition started by Edward R Murrow and Fred Friendly with documentaries for television like Harvest of Shame and McCarthy Hearings. Public Television documentaries produced independently and by PBS Network affiliates like WGBH’s Front Line documentaries and PBS Network productions like The Civil War by Ken Burns are feature length and longer documentary films made for Television.
Cable – Non-Broadcast
A number of Cable Channels like HBO, Showtime, Discover and others feature non-fiction programming with emphasis on a particular subject. They either originate the programming or pick it up from Independent Producers and Syndicators. The programming is a mixture of non-fiction subjects and documentary productions. A few of these documentaries played theatrically before coming to TV.
Theatrical Documentaries
Documentaries made with the specific goal of playing Theatrically, i.e. in the theaters may cover a wide range of subjects. Every year the Motion Picture Academy awards an Oscar for Best Feature Length Documentary. What qualifies a documentary to be nominated for an Academy Award is that it is being distributed commercially and has shown in theaters to the public.
Directed by Robert Flarherty 1922
Robert Flaherty’s Nanook of the Northwas the first feature length documentary to run in theaters worldwide. Since then there have been a steady stream of documentary films shown in theaters, however the average theatergoer can probably count on one hand how many documentaries they have seen in a movie theater.
Many documentaries make the festival and art house rounds but are not seen in first run theaters. So the financial return is limited. With the advent of DVD documentaries have the opportunity to reach a larger audience. The financial returns of the majority of feature length documentaries that get theatrical release do not gross huge amounts of money in the theaters but do well on DVD. However there are some notable exceptions that have done exceptionally well in the theatrical circuit.
According to internet sources like www.boxofficemoho.com, as of August 2008, three out of the top five grossing documentaries in the US have been Produced and Directed by Michael Moore.
Top Grossing Documentary Film
The Number 1 top-grossing documentary is Fahrenheit 9/11, it played in 2011 theaters domestically, bringing in $119,195,000 at the Box Office.[i] The production budget is reported to have been $6,000,000, prints and advertising budget, $12,000,000. [ii] In addition the film grossed another $103,300,000 internationally bringing the world wide gross to $222,414,517.[iii]
The Number 3 documentary is Sicko, grossing $24,540,000 in 1117 theaters domestically. The production budget for Sicko is reported at $9,000,000. International Gross is reported at $9,000,000 bringing worldwide theatrical gross to $33,500,000.
Number 5 is Bowling for Columbine with $21,146,000 from a run in only 248 theaters nationally. Together three out five top grossing documentaries films grossed $164,881,000 released from October 2002 to June 2007iv
Three of the top five documentary theatrical release films have a total worldwide gross of $314,576,000.This does not include DVD Sales. As of this date the totals may be higher.
The Number 2 top-grossing documentary is March of The Penguins, at about $77, 500,000 domestically plus $52,000,000 internationally equals $129,000,500 worldwide. An Inconvenient Truth is Number 4 grossing about $24,146,161 domestically and another $25,603,190 internationally bringing the worldwide gross to $49,749,351.
While these documentary numbers may sound impressive they are small when compared to fictional feature films. For example, at this writing The Dark Knight, a fictional theatrical release has grossed $203.8 million in its first five days in release. Of note is that The Dark Knight cost about $185 million to make whereas most documentaries have much lower budgets. Released in November 2009, Twilight – New Moon, is reported to have grossed $160,000,000. Avatar, released in 2010 is reported to have reached two billion dollars gross revenues internationally!
International release revenues often equal or surpass domestic grosses for theatrical films. Documentary Films may or may not have appeal internationally since many focus on issues of interest to domestic audiences.
DVD SALES
DVD Sales may exceed theatrical box office revenue for many films.
J R Martin — Create Documentary Films, Videos and Multimedia –
[i] Source All distribution data from TheNumbers.com/box office data and BoxOfficeMojo.com Gross numbers not adjusted for inflation and not including DVD Sales
iv Source BoxOfficeMojo.com –Dark Knight’ Begins Smashingly Brandon Gray July 23, 2008
Source BoxOfficeMojo.com — Brandon Gray October 5,2004
Non-fiction storytelling – Documentary – is about exploring reality, current issues and other subjects with the purpose of informing and possibly bringing candid insights to the viewer. Hopefully, giving the viewer choices about how they end up feeling about the subject. Documentaries are very different from the news or “Reality” programming in that documentaries are about conveying information in a narrative form. Some documentaries are both informative and entertaining.
Unlike, for example, a news broadcast on the BBC, where someone sits at a desk and reads the day’s news to the audience; television in the United States is an entertainment medium. We watch television to be entertained. American Television, both broadcast and cable, has turned “News” into entertainment because that’s how they get ratings and advertisers. Not only is the news presented as entertainment it’s exploited by people, corporate interests, political groups and others; so we end up with entertaining propaganda.
There is an overwhelming amount of true and false information coming from various sources including the serious press, tabloids, internet, cable TV, broadcast TV, political organizations, public relations companies, and foreign governments. These sources should not be lumped into one big mass, called “The Media.”
As far as Television (broadcast [radio too] and cable) people are watching and listening to programming that takes information and presents it in such a way as to attract a certain demographic. People who watch Fox Cable News are interested in “fake news” stories, with a right-wing twist on the information. This twist does not need to conform to any factual realities. What they watch supports their beliefs. The entire population is divided by the diverse sources of the information they receive. This applies to all demographics not just people who watch Fox Cable.
The big difference between Fox Fake News and the others, is that the other cable news outlets do not have the goal of creating propaganda.
James R Martin
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Many interviews for documentary projects are shot under less than ideal conditions in offices, at events, factories, on the street and in dangerous or hostile environments. Lighting is essential in getting a properly exposed segment.
Crew Setting Up Lighting
Shooting Interior Interviews
Indoor lighting can vary in a some ways from daylight and tungsten in homes to daylight and fluorescent in office situations. There may be mixed lighting sources with varying color temperatures. A light kit with a few lights can help with supplemental lighting but often it’s more about working with available light. White balancing is important.
An office often has a window and a person’s desk in front of it. There are a number of possible choices. If there are blinds or drapes see if they can be drawn and use a simple 3 or 4 light set up with at least a key, fill and backlight light setup.
What if there is no way to block the light from the window? Is a better environment available like a conference room? One alternative is to consider how to shoot the interview using available light. Can we use the light coming from the window as a key light? For example it might be possible to shoot the interview from an angle or from the side of the desk where you use the light coming from the window as the key and then use a reflector to bounce light in from the other side. Your subject is facing the camera and both are parallel to the window. Remember to white balance for daylight.
Whenever possible think about lighting a subject with a key, fill and back-light whether it is available light, lighting instruments, reflectors or a combination of light sources. A key to fill ratio of between 2 to 1 and 4 to 1 is ideal for most video interviews and other documentary situations. Appropriate subjective lighting may be used to get a certain look or feel for an interview, however, most of the time, in documentary situations, we’re looking to capture the flavor of the environment; we try to reinforce the existing lighting so that we can get a decent exposure without adding our own interpretation.
Example of an interior interview may be seen in the preview of The Baldwin Park Story. In this situation we had a number of options including an office, conference room or meeting room area. We chose a neutral background that we could light to give some minimal contrast with a lighting ratio of about 2.5 to 1.
Actuality Interviewing and Listening by James R Martin
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