Evaluation- Preliminary taskBy Niamh Doherty

My class watched the documentary That my group and I made, in which they given feedback on what they liked about the documentary and when they thought could improve it even more. This is shown in the following...

What went well...

One of the points that my class said the documentary succeeded on was the range of interviews that we included which is the same as what professional documentaries have included as shown below. With this they said that it was good how we included people of different ages to give a wider range of opinions for different generations of people. This can be linked to the Uses and Gratifications Theory because the audience can interpret these in their own ways due to the different ages.

One other point that the class said went will with the documentary was the music that we added to the background. They said this because it fit well with the documentary and one of the songs was even a edited ringtone. Initially, the music was very upbeat, they said, which made the documentary more enjoyable.

One other point in which the class thought went well was the use of archive material as many other professional documentaries use archive footage to give the audience a better understanding of the topic, examples of this is shown below. For the archive material we used images off the internet which related to the topic of mobile phones, and also included a interview with a man talking about mobile phones.

The last point in which the class said went well with the documentary was the intro to the clip. They said that it was a good, fun way to start off the documentary because it showed clearly what the documentary was about straight away, in addition to the stack of mobile phones being created.

What could make it even better...

The first thing that the class said could be improved was the fact that the archive images that were added to the sequence turned out blurry. Initially, this made it confusing and hard to understand what is going on in each image. Therefore, I now know that when my group and I produce our next documentary, that we include archive images that are clear and well presented for the audience to understand.

Another thing that the class pointed out that can improve the documentary is the fact that in the interviews there was no mise-en-scene that resembled the theme of mobile phones. An example of this is shown on the right, as the man getting interviewed is wearing a uniform which resembles what the documentary is about. Therefore, in the future I will make sure to include props (e.g. A mobile phone) that resemble the theme. This can be linked to the Reception Theory because the audience may find it helps their own understanding for the topic when the mise-en-scene resembles the topic, although other may disagree and not need want it.

Another point that the class pointed out was that during the interviews the audio can not be heard as well as other times. Therefore, in the future I will make sure that the audio is clear and that when filming the environment that we are in is quiet.

Also, the class said that the interviews were very jumpy and so in the future my group and I will make sure to edit the footage that we took in a better way.

One final point that the class had about the documentary was that it would flow better if the interview audio was sometimes played over the archive material. In addition to this, in the future my group and I will consider doing this technique to help improve the flow of the documentary.