Introduction

For the Junior Documentary project, students are tasked to interview and create projects for an individual or group. We use the information we are given, primarily from these interviews, and write a research paper and create various art pieces in our electives. Our goal was to develop a unique perspective on a subject and promote an overall message. The English paper was the large chunk of what we used in our art projects, serving as the text for our Magazine, which we create in the Digital Media elective.

I decided to interview and make a biography of the Mountain View High School Choir Director, Jill Denny. The reason I chose her as my interviewee is because she has been working at Mountain View High School for decades with many stories to share, she is also my Choir teacher so the subject is connected to my interests. So I decided to ask her if I could do a documentary on her.

English Production

After gathering our interview transcripts, which should’ve been two based on the information we needed, we started drafting our research papers that would eventually go into our magazine. My documentary was about the biography of a teacher who teaches a non-assessment class, so I chose questions to explain the lessons she teaches to her students.

Creating this essay was no easy task, it looks a considerable amount of time piecing together the information into one paper. Not counting that alongside creating the paper, we were tasked to find secondary sources and integrating them into our papers. In my opinion, I consider it the hardest part of this process due to the complexity of integrating a source similar to the claim I was trying to convey.

Digital Media Production

As I talked about, we were tasked to create a magazine using the Documentary Essay. For my Magazine design, I used colors that matched the mood and vibe of my interviewee and her personality. I used warm colors like yellow or tan to show her welcoming personality. She wears a ton of blue and has blue shirts hung up in her class room, so I decided to use blue to represent her, you’ll see that more in the animation I made for the documentary.

PDF of the Magazine Article

Animation Production

For my Documentary Animation, I mainly focused on my interviewee’s bubbly and extroverted personality. I used the color blue to make her backstory striking and unique. I also used different shades of yellow not only

Documentary Animation

Storyboard

Animation Process in Adobe Animate

Interviewee

Jill Denny is the choir director at Mountain View High School in California. She leads various ensembles, including the Madrigals and A Cappella groups, and organizes performances and tours for her students. She has been working at Mountain View High School for 28 years. Her love and dedication for her job is evident through her choir program, including events, fundraisers, and human resources.

Interview Transcripts

Reflection

Overall, the takeaways from this Unit is prioritizing the time you’re given when doing a large scale project like this one. I struggled quite a bit with writing the essay and it hindered other projects like the Magazine. In my personal opinion, my favorite thing that I made from this project was the magazine, I thought it had good color and composition. I greatly enjoyed the topic and the information my interviewee gave me. Looking back, my least favorite project from this Unit has to go to the Animation for many reasons, I didn’t like particularly making it, which caused me to have a block. I learned to always have a plan with a project like this, having a well-thought out plan with your projects will be to your advantage and you’ll most likely not face the same issues that I did.

dedicated TO:

Jill Denny, Michael Farnsley, Steve Hope, Peyton White 🙂