Expository Documentaries
Expository documentaries expose a person or a topic. They are well known for having a commentator explaining a story whilst pictures/ videos are being shown, reflecting the same story through visuals.
The main conventions of a expository documentary include:
- The use of facts
- A range of opinions
- Persuasive techniques
- A commentator
- Rhetorical questions
A technique that the commentator, who is arguably the main feature of this type of documentary, uses is talking directly to the audience. This is an attempt to engage the audience and inform them directly to the information given, and is a way of getting them thinking about the topic. These documentaries are often historical, biographical, or inform about a certain event. They include footage of interviews, and exclusive pictures for the documentary itself.
An example of this type of documentary is An Inconvential Truth, as it relies on verbal commentary and argumentative logic to make its strong case for prevention of global warming.
Please follow the link to a clip from the movie documentary http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXMarwAusY4&safe=active
Observational Documentaries
An observational documentary involves a film crew following the person the documentary os based around to capture events in their life. The equipment need can even be a hand held camera to capture the life of the subject. Traditionally, interviews with the subject are not needed and there is no use of a commentator. Usually, synchronous sounds are used and long takes are a common occurrence.
An example of this type of documentary is Teen Cribs, an MTV documentary series which follows teens round their wealthy family homes. Please follow the link to see an example of an episode http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=my4b4Y_iZBU
Although interviews are not conducted, a clip is shown of the teens' parents discussing the subject matter. Other examples include: Big Brothers, 16 and Pregnant, and Jersey Shore
Reflexive Documentaries
Within a reflexive documentary, the film maker is shown visually and provides a narrative to the documentary. This type of documentary is usually associated with experimental documentaries which is where the audience is just as interested in how the film was made. This makes the audience more aware of the problems that the film maker had while they made the film. This type of documentary tends to be more truthful as they often focus on realism and try to avoid editing to show how certain events unfold.
Please follow the link to an example of a reflexive documentary: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_M3ilX1reAQ
Participatory Documentaries
Participatory documentaries believe that it is impossible for the act of film making to not influence or alter the events being filmed. What these films do is emulate the approach of the anthropologist: participant-observation. Not only is the filmmaker part of the film, there is also a sense of how situations in the film are affected or altered by their presence.
What is a Documentary?
A documentary is an informative insight into certain topics. It is an attempt to capture or 'document' reality.
An example of a documentary is a classic, traditional documentary, stereotypically featuring David Attenborough if the genre is nature. These are usually slow paced, narrator-led, featuring an expert presenter, shows authority, features reconstructions, CUs-range of high quality shots, set ups, made by the use of technical kit (IMAX, hi-def) It can also be a documentary series which consist of long filming schedules and are usually expensive to make.
Types of Documentaries
- Nature
- lifestyle
- music
- science
- constructed reality (The Only Way is Essex)
- 'the making of...'
- Expert led
- celebrity led
- drama documentaries
- factual entertainment (My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding)
- Observational Documentary
What Affects the Type of Documentary made?
- Development of technology - more accessible to make and distribute
- range of climates and environments
- Access to people, location and information
- changes in society - liberal/open - more of a range of different types of documentaries and opinions
- more people have a voice
- world events - natural disasters, news events, anniversaries
- budget/talent
- commissioner and buyer - BBC, Channel 4, ITV, Sky
Release Date: October 30th 2009 (Vevo)
Ownership: Roc Nation
This video, filmed in New York due to the heavy referencing throughout the song, was made famous due to people taking an interest to the fact that it involved two of the biggest names in R&B collaborating together. The video is owned by Jay-Z's own record label, Roc Nation, so it's clear he had full control over what he would like to include in this promo. The video is mainly filmed in black and white to enhance the many aerial shots of New York. Despite this, there are many coloured shots featuring Jay-Z and Alicia Keys, which could reflect their power due to the fact they can change the theme of the music video.
Mostly still shots are used to produce a slide show format, almost as if it is advertising the city and displaying landmarks. Jay Z came out with an alternative version online which features more of the features of a stereotypical R&B video, including the use of super models.
However, this video is much more family friendly and shows a piano in a popular New York location being played, and again, making the artists seem successful to be able to play in such a destination. The black and white effect creates an old fashioned feel and gives the impression that New York is timeless. The video was marked groundbreaking due to it's highly anticipated collaboration between the two artists and also to its unusual presentation. The target audience would be R&B/popular music fans between 12 and 40. Men and women are also represented as equal due to pair singing/rapping in the centre of the city.
Release: March 29th 1990
Ownership: Sire, Warner Bros
The video was released just after the initial rise in popularity of the promotional technique. The dance routine within the video helped make it one of the most successful videos of all times, creating a buzz around it and making both the song and video very famous and successful. Madonna was an already known name with countless awards to her name before this particular song, meaning she already had fans which would be interested in viewing this video.
The video takes stylistic inspiration from from the 1920-30's era and takes on the looks of many films from Hollywood's golden era. These themes are reflected through the black and white effect throughout the video. There are two versions of the video, one is the regular version shown on television and the other is the longer version which is over 3 minutes longer.
The use of dolly shots at the start are used to make the audience almost follow until they see Madonna, which builds an anticipation to see Madonna for her fans. The video was shot in Burbank studios, California between 10-11 February.
Both men and women are presented equally through their styling as they are all dressed in suits ect. However, Madonna being the only woman still shows power over the men as she is the one singing and leading the famous dance routine. This video was essentially aimed at teens/early twenties due to it's modern song and popular artist. The video, however may have attracted an older audience who were intrigued by the old fashioned feel to the video therefore gaining more popularity and sales for the song.
Released: August 19th 2011
Ownership: Syco Records
This was the debut video for the band and is known for being a stereotypical 'boyband' video consisting of the boys running around after girls. This video is interesting as the male gaze isn't so present. Obviously the band are attempting to gain attention from the girls, however, the camera does not follow this as fans of the band are generally girls who are more interested in seeing the boys, hence the topless scene. Interestingly, it was filmed on the same location as Blink 182's video 'All the Small Things' which was a video made to mock stereotypical boy band videos, made over a decade before 'What Makes you Beautiful' The beach film helps give the impression that the band live the desirable life in California (where it was set) making them more appealing to the audience who will then go on to purchase more copies of the song.
Many close ups where used to, again, let the audience see the band which is likely to be the primary reason they are watching the video. This presents how it is a typical boy band video.
The target audience for this video would be females 17 and under because that is the same fan base for the band, who are almost the theme for the video.
The concept of gaze refers to how an audience is supposed to view the people presented decided by the director. The types of gaze are mostly based on who is doing the looking and who is controlling the gaze. This could either be the director, camera, or lead actor, but they are known as mostly being male.
Jonathan Schroeder (1998) said 'to gaze implies more than to look at - it signifies a psychological relationship of power, in which the gazer is superior to the object of the gaze.'
Features of the 'male gaze' include:
- voyeuristic - pleasure in 'watching' where the camera lingers on the curves of a female)
- relegates women to the status of objects
- male active/ female passive - where the female viewer experiences the narrative secondarily, by identification with the male.
From a feminist perspective, the 'Male Gaze' can be reduced to:
- How men look at women
- How women look at other women
- How women look at themselves
Music videos, which are also called promotion videos (promos), date back many decades, but did not reach their popularity till the early 80's. Music Television, now more known as MTV, premiered on 1st August 1981 allowing audiences to see many more music videos than before and therefore was a major factor in creating the music videos we know today. MTV didn't have the multiple spin off channels that they now have available so they were forced to air a mixture of music genres, mostly rock/pop.
Thanks to music videos we know today, there are many more music genres available, both on YouTube and specific music channels e.g. 'MTV Rocks' 'MTV Hits' and also allows certain images to be created due to the visuals available through promos. Stereotypes for a music video were also invented based on genre of music alone. Please see my other posts for examples.
Sources
http://www.slideshare.net/crosswaysfederation/music-video-a-brief-history
http://www.enotes.com/homework-help/when-did-mtv-first-air-286590
A music video follows a short film with a backing of a song throughout, which usually follows a story and is around the length of the song. Music videos are a major investment and essential in the music industry, with channels such as MTV and it's sub channels playing both hits and classics all day. YouTube has made them a global need with the use of comments and view count to detect who are watching particular videos and the general feedback. Despite this modern feature, music videos have been around for a number of decades, becoming popular during the 80's with the launch of MTV.
The purpose of a video is to create a promotion tool for selling singles and downloads of the artist or band.They can also create a story behind the lyrics and may present a different interpretation to a song, which may not come across through just listening to it. Videos also create a reaction and engage the viewer in the artist as well as the song.
