Documentary

Intro

In the Documentary Unit, we as Juniors learn about documentary skills in order to tell the story of a significant person, group, place, idea, or issue in the community. Through multiple primary and secondary sources, we focus on bringing light to our chosen subjects’ worldly significance.

My goal is to artistically portray my subjects’ stories and to most truthfully illustrate their experiences in order to emphasize their importance in our community at large. Follow along as I do through narrative-style journalism.

For my documentary project, I chose to research a topic that I had always been curious about: domestic violence. I had always questioned why anyone would stay with an abusive partner, and through this project, I have discovered it so much more than even love and fear. 

It has led me to learn about intimate partner violence as a whole. Now, through my work, I hope to bring awareness to my community and peers, especially as intimate partner violence. 

Note: For the purpose of my research, I will mainly focus on the situation of women; though this does not imply that it is not relevant to other peoples’ situations. Intimate partner violence does not discriminate between gender, sexuality, social or economic or political affiliation. It can be found in any community.

click here to view
  • Upload it in your Media Library. Copy the URL to the PDF. Insert an image of your choice, select your image, click on gear at bottom right and paste in the link to PDF and also check the box to open in a new tab.

Design

Final Advertisement Moodboard

My documentary ad depicts a University targeting future engineering students, which ultimately represents my interviewee Maylin Salazar.  Now an aspiring engineer, she previously took Engineering I to fill an elective space. Since then she has uncovered her passion for solving problems, and now hopes to pursue a major in Mechatronics. As this major is not always offered, I wanted to present a dream school for engineering aspirants. 

When I first designed my mood board in Adobe Illustrator, I knew I wanted to reflect passion for engineering as well as its mechanics.  In this I was able to move rather quickly as it was simply organizing the concept idea.

Final Advertisement

On the other hand, when it came to the actual ad design, I struggled to differentiate my personal taste from the real-life scenario. This led me to reorganize my layout in order to become more neat and engaging once set in Adobe InDesign. It took a couple of graphic experiments in Illustrator and understanding the importance of background colors. Then came the importance of alignment and whitespace, to fully allow the ad to breathe and shine. Overall it was simply learning to recognize what worked and what did not.

About the Interviewees

Bios

Alma Garcia is currently a housewife who volunteers at First Five. She enjoys helping others and participating as a teacher at a center for children called First Five, an organization in California to help improve the lives of parents and children. In her free time, she enjoys creating crafts, helping others, and meeting new people.

Maylin Salazar is currently a high school student. When she was young she lived in Mexico, later moving to California. Ever since she discovered her passion for engineering, she strives to be admitted into UC Berkeley. In her free time, she enjoys playing mobile games and traveling.