Documentary

Introduction

The Documentary Project has been one of the biggest challenges at freestyle; and one of the most rewarding. This project was all about opening yourself up to a new topic or idea, and creatively displaying it. It could be a person, it could be a concept, it could be a place. This project introduced me to a new world and new people I knew nothing about, and I absolutely loved it. Learning about different people and different cultures and religions has always been super important to me, and something I loved to do. This project gave me the skills to shared all the amazing things I learned. Being a film student, I learned how to properly film interviews, get b-roll, and edit together sound clips into a cohesive story. English gave me the tools to research and write a detailed paper on my topic, something that was a difficult but ultimately enjoyable experience, as I got to research something that I was also learning about through interviews and meeting people who are actually involved in the topic. This project gave me a film and paper that I am proud of. So, without further ado, welcome to my documentary.

 

Film

In film class, we learned the skills that came together to create a documentary. We learned how to properly film an interview, how to use natural lighting to get the best results, how to pick the best location for an interview, how to ask questions, and much more. Our first test of skills was in the Mockumentary. We picked any topic we liked related to freestyle, and ran with it. Some of the other Mockumentaries included topics such as dumpster diving on campus and the conspiracy theory that our English teacher was actually a ghost. We decided on the conspiracy route as well, and tried to solve the fake case of stolen money, with prime suspect Mr.Taylor.

Our Mockumentary had a plethora of issues. Bad lighting, boring backgrounds, bad focus, the works. But this was a crucial step in the process, because here we were able to make every mistake we wanted, so on shoot days we wouldn’t make those mistakes. Without this, our real documentary would have turned out similar to this, and no one wants that.

Speaking of our real documentary, here it is. This took many weeks of shooting and editing, and many long hours of making transcripts for audio files. The topic Arabella (my film partner) and I decided to focus on was the religion of Mormonism, or the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. I knew next to nothing about these people, but Arabella was good friends with a Mormon family in San Francisco. She wanted to highlight how the family faced discrimination due to their religion, how misinformation is spread, and how you should judge an individual based on their character, not on other factors like religion. So please enjoy Revelation.

The film took a lot of work in editing. Below is a screenshot of our documentary in premier, demonstrating the immense amounts of cuts, video, and audio we used to make the film happen.

English

In English class, we wrote an essay that reflected the topic we chose in our film/animation/design class. This means I wrote a paper about the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. I chose to frame it like a book, creating “chapters” that each held a different topic. It ended up being 3 chapter, not including the introduction and conclusion. The actual paper is only eleven-and-a-half pages, but my citations take up two-and-a-half pages all on their own. I have put my paper below in PDF form, so enjoy “Latter-Day Living.”

Documentary Paper PDF

Photogallery

Interviewee Bios

We interviewed 5 people during this project to get the information used in my documentary paper as well as the documentary film. Here is some information about them.

Curtis Atkisson

Practicing Mormon living in San Francisco, husband of Nettie Atkisson and father of Annie, Spencer, and Audrey Atkisson.

Nettie Atkisson

Practicing Mormon living in San Francisco, wife of Curtis Atkisson and mother of Annie, Spencer, and Audrey Atkisson. Used to work as a photographer, connecting her to my film partner, Arabella.

Spencer Atkisson

Practicing Mormon living in San Francisco, brother of Annie and Audrey Atkisson. Freshman in High School.

Annie Atkisson

Practicing Mormon living in San Francisco, sister of Spencer and Audrey Atkisson. Junior in High School.

Annie Shattuck

Practicing Mormon living in Palo Alto. Mother of two.