gilgaff

How to make your own Ob Doc

(Observational Documentary Film)

 

SUBJECT

That’s you! Show us what your life is like.

 

HOW TO SHOOT

• Use a phone or iPad as camera set to VIDEO

• Film yourself, hold cam out at arms length with cam on selfie setting

Or

• Prop up cam on something, table, chair, car roof, tree

Or 

• Get a friend to follow you with the cam

• You can talk to the cam, tell us what is going on

Or 

• pretend cam is not there and just do your thing 

 

(both are good) 

 

REMEMBER

• Best to hold cam sideways (landscape) not vertical (portrait, like TikTok) because it will look good on cinema screen

• Also best to ask a friend/brother/sister your age to hold cam, rather than mum or dad (should be young person’s POV, not adult’s)

 

HOW TO RECORD SOUND

The cam mic is very good and will hear you talking, singing, laughing etc

BUT it struggles with loud background noise like A/C, traffic, TV/radio blaring, so move away from such sounds if you can when filming

If you have to have loud bg noise - e.g. demonstrating ride on lawn mower - then SHOUT!

 

OTHER TIPS

Don’t worry if cam angle is a bit wonky, nobody cares

Don’t worry if the dog knocks the cam over, or your forget what you were going to say or something goes wrong

Ob docs are not meant to be perfect and professional but are meant to look real, show real life (and in real life things go wrong). How you react to things going wrong tells us more about you than a perfect script!

 

HOW TO EDIT

 

• Use iMovie (on iPads or iPhone) to select and trim good bits and put together in order

• Ob docs work best with simple editing, just interesting bits bumped together (no need to add music and titles etc)

 

HOW TO FINISH

 

• Students upload completed films to a Google drive from home (or school) - teachers can then download, preview and help finish, then upload to GFF for selection and screening plans - no USB's and file conversions needed!