Story Boards and Beginning To Film

Storyboard

I drew out a quick plan using basic imagery to help the group sort out a possible order for the footage when it comes to filming and editing.

The first thing we did was film a short journey going into each school from the car. This creates a nice point of view shot that the students will experience every day they go to school. We did this because we thought it would be a nice way for the viewers to feel more involved and is a different way of showing the location.

Documentary Process So Far

Planning the Interviews

As a group we have written down a huge amount of questions that we felt were appropriate to ask. Many will be irrelevant in the end and may not be used and some we may film and cut out when we come to edit the interviews.

Some of these questions include:

- For Teachers 

• Do you enjoy teaching to the students in your school?
• Would it make a difference if you worked at a private or public school?
• Do you find that students are better behaved when in uniform?
• Do you think the teachers make the most of the facilities available?
• Are there any parts of the school that you think need improving?
• Does paying for education actually make a difference to how students learn?
• Is it unfair that private school is so expensive when students that cannot afford it would benefit from a better education?
• Is the location around the school suitable?
• Are there enough things for students to do as extra curricular?
• Does the school support every student equally?
• What does a normal school day consist of?

- For the Students

• Do you enjoy the school day?
• Is it easy to get on with everyone in your classes?
• Do you think money can buy better education?
• Do you enjoy wearing a uniform?
• Are the teachers strict enough or too strict?
• What is the general atmosphere at school?
• Do you find the breaks long enough?
• Are your lessons used to full potential?
• Do you think there are enough facilities?

There will be other questions we come up with during group discussions and filming periods. Adjustments will be made every day.

Location Shots

HEATHSIDE

It was obvious to us that taking location shots would help us plan where and what we are going to film for the final piece, by taking and examining the images we can therefore go into further detail and make observational comparisons. Being students at Heathside School we took these images from around the school grounds and plan on doing the same thing around St Georges College as the next step in our preparation.

Here we have: 

The entrance sign to the school.

Quiet Playground - surrounded by the Design Technology classrooms.

 The benches and bins in the quiet playground. (Ramp facility in the top left corner for the disabled)

 The long jump and sand pits.

 The outside area of the combined and concreted tennis/netball/hockey court.

 Inside of the courts.

Sports field with students using it.

 Students doing cross country training around the field.

ST GEORGES

Developing and Planning into the Final Idea

We have all the ideas written down in basic form and today we had a large discussion about ways in which we can make the documentary stand out and be interesting for our audience.
Agreeing and disagreeing are what helped us figure out ways in which we would carry out the project.
It became immediately apparent that we would need to go around each location and make a few discoveries and discuss how we could create footage on certain aspects of the subject.
We took a walk around Heathside and took photographs and are going to decide what parts we will include in the final documentary.
The next thing we want to do is practice filming interviews as this is an important thing to get right for the whole documentary to work and come together properly. We will take it in turns to film and ask questions so we can each get some experience before beginning the final production.
Creating well worded questions will be important because it is vital that we get interesting answers out of our interviews that will help support our topic and keep the documentary interesting.