1. Filming Your Interviews

2. Features: Fully digital; High Definition; built-in USB connector
and software; 2 hours recording time*
• Applications: Digital video recording that can be easily transferred
to computer for editing ; tripod available for check-out
• 5 Available.
• 1 Day Loan.
* video clips are limited to 29 minutes

3. Features: Fully digital; High Definition; built-in USB connector
and software; 2 hours recording time*
• Applications: Digital video recording that can be easily transferred
to computer for editing ; tripod available for check-out
• 5 Available.
• 1 Day Loan.
* video clips are limited to 29 minutes

4. Create a schedule. This will keep you focused on
your project.
•Get a diary.
•Identify what days you and your crew are available.
•Jot down priority scenes.
•Film interviews early on.

5. Interviewing
I. Plan questions. The easiest way of doing this and keeping focus is to
write who, what, why, when, where, how, and when and brainstorm
questions around these.
II. Subject must be comfortable around the camera and open and honest.
II. Talk to them before filming, you could talk for half an hour or more to
make the subject comfortable around you.

6. Keep a diary and review footage
•Keep a diary where you write how the filming went, what mistakes
you made and how you could avoid these next time and ideas for
what to film on other shoots.
•Before you proceed to editing your film watch all your footage
through, writing notes on every shots stating if it works, are there
technical problems. This will save you a lot of time when editing.

7. Documentary Techniques
• Direct Interview technique (we see subject talking on camera, and we see and hear the interviewer asking questions in the same shot or in
part B of a two‑part parallel track; suggests journalistic basis of reporting).
• Indirect Interview technique (we see subject talking on camera, but we don't see or hear the interviewer asking questions in the same shot;
this gives the impression of the character speaking directly to the viewer.
• Voiceover narration (in one case, we hear a character speaking about some issue/problem/conflict), and we may or may not see that
person engaged in some action on the screen at the same time; gives impression of audience overhearing the character reveal thoughts and
feelings / in another case, the voiceover is done by a narrator (someone not seen in the film) who comments on action; this suggests a
more objective voice than the prior example)
• Direct narration (we see and hear the narrator of the film as the narration is presented; suggests an intimacy between narrator and
audience; this type of narration is seldom objective‑‑its biases reflect the speaker's background, conflicts, values)
• Graphics : Use of titles or other written information displayed on the screen; often used in Ken Burns' documentaries to suggest divisions
(like chapters) of the film.
• Music : or sound, within scenes or through scenes, to complement visual images; sound track, theme, montage-music, all applied external
(asynchronous) to the visuals.

8. Framing and Composition
•Tripods/Stability
•Wide Shot vs. Close UP
•Eye lines

9. Camera Shot Framing
•Place the subject in the center of the frame, and
balance the tripod level.

10. Headroom
•Headroom Example

11. White Balance and Iris (if you have it)
•Room Light
•Glare
•Zebra stripes

12. Audio
•Best Practices
•Adjusting Levels
•Reading the Audio Meter
•Checking Sources

13. Media Storage
•2 copies on different drives
•Save all of the media on the card as it is (retain file structure)
•Offload as soon as possible
•Check your video on location
•Make sure that file sizes on both backups are the same

14. Contact
Corey Clark
Dornsife Technology Services
coreycla@Dornsife.usc.edu
213-905-2474
Damon Dunbar
Dornsife Technology Services
djdunbar@Dornsife.usc.edu
323-304-2434