Weekly Progess (Week Beginning April 16th 07)

• This weekend I aimed to finish my production and finish off my evaluation.
• Throughout this week, I have stayed after school with Mr.Monro, and he helped me edit the script and carry out the voiceover. It was on Wednesday, that the voiceover was done. However when I put it in my documentary, some bits that were said were not said confidently as Mr.Monro did seem a little nervous at the beginning, however when he got into the flow, he was excellent. Also by me giving him signals (thumps up to start, and flat hand when I wanted him to stop) and from theses signals, I felt that it worked better. So, on Friday, Mr.Monro re-did the parts of the voiceover that I did not like and put it together. Whilst on Sunday, I editied my Brief and did my evaluation. Also, at the beginning I had a BBC Ident- Predator, however I decided I needed a female voiceover to introduce the programme and so I have chosen Ms.Spencer to perform this, with Ms.Stevens as a backup.
• By the end of this week, I aim to complete my 'Park Life' practical production

Weekly Progress

• This week I completed my capturing.
• This week I started and finished capturing 2hours and a half worth of footage which in the end took up a whopping 21GB! From Monday to Thursday, I stayed after school until -5.30pm capturing the footage and now I have taken it home to start my editing. In other news this week, I opened up a mini audition for a male teacher to do my voiceover. I auditioned Mr.Bush, who I immediately ruled out, and then I did Mr.Monro, (who before i even started it was my favourite choice), and I ave chosen him purely because he has the best voice. I was intending to do other teachers such as Mr.Jones, however I felt that it was pointless after hearing Mr.Monro. I have chosen him mainly because he has the voice that I am looking for within the school. I feel that he will have to develop the way he says things and this is somehting that I will guide him as the voiceover is being done.
• Over the next week I intend to get a large proportion of my editing done. Also I need to develop my script, early enough so Mr.Monro has time to practice.

To Present or NOT to present? That is the question

Its' decision time and I have made my choice on whether to present my documentary (or have someone present it) or not. I have seen that the majority of people who have posted up a comment on my blog about presenting or not have suggested that I should present my wildlife documentary as it will make it more personal, fun, interesting and exciting. Also I personally want to present my documentary HOWEVER, my final decision is that I will NOT present my wildlife documentary 'Park Life'. So why have I chose this decision you may ask?

First of all, the main convention of a wildlife documentary is the voiceover. The voiceover is performed by an male adult and as a narrator, telling the audience the the name of the animal, facts about the animal and the behaviour of the animal. As I do not have a voice of a adult male, yet, If I were to present the show (which I want to do), I would have to do the voiceover as well as only one person ever does a voiceover for a documentary. Also It would not sound professional and one of my objectives is to have a professional documentary. In addition, this means I will have to start to open a search for someone who I believe has the voice I am looking for, to do the voiceover for my documentary.

Having someone else presenting my documentary would not be a bad option, however they would have to give up a lot of time! and commintment. Also the person who would present my documentary would also have to get a muddy, and wet as they will have to perform in the park. Its a good option, but a bit complicated and also considering time I dont not have time on my side in order to search for someone that I would find suitable for my documentary.

Earlier in my 'Research' section (Blue Planet, Autumnwatch, Wild Events), I explained about their being two different styles of doucmentaries. As I will not be presenting my documentary, the style of my documentary will follow that of the David Attenborough documentaries e.g Blue Planet, in which their is just the animals and the narrator.

To conclude in terms of my narrative, It will have to follow the aim of the documentary. Now this aim is flexiable and may change to something else due to the footage I have. Currently the aim is 'To show that you don't have to go to the ends of the Earth, just to see some SPECTACULAR wildlife'. This means that I will need some amazing footage of wildlife spectales on my footage. However that can only be decided on luck for me. Time is also not an advantage as professionals have months and years to collect all their footage, whereas I have nowhere near the sametime as a professional would have. So in the case that I do not have any/enough spectacular wildife to show , the aim of my documentary will change to 'To show WHAT wildlife inhabits the parks'. So far, I can say from my footage that I may have not captured enough sepcatular wildlife, therefore, due to the topic I am doing, I have been granted extra time for my filming and I will extend it to one week only, in a last ditch attempt to capture something spectacular.