Research records

Information source?  What information did you select from this source?   Why did you select this information?
phobialist.com | Accurate names of phobias | To find people with these phobias, if possible
wikipedia.org/wiki/phobia | Definintion of phobias. The science behind it. | Useful for an introduction
Maury Povich | Reactions that people have | To expect their reaction if we were to film someone
// | Reactions that people have | Useful, related content
10 most common phobias | Spiders, being judged, flying, anxiety, enclosed spaces, vomitting, cancer, thunderstorms, death | Facts to help support documentary
http://www.hypnotheraphykettering.co.uk/ | How phobias can be treated | Could be used to film someone confronting their fear/phobia
news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/48376660.stm | Facts/statistics about phobias | Supports information
phobias-help.com/phobia_statistics.html | Whether women have more phobias than men | Who would be suitable to film
National Geographic (YouTube) | Professional help, serious treatment | Where informatiuon can be found, professionally
Frankfuiedi.com | Where the term phobia established in the 18th Century | Record of how long people have suffered from phobias
wikianswers.com | Where phobias came from | Introduction information
kidshealth.org | What age you can be to develop phobias | Inform our auidence
about.com | Are phobias real or made up by the media? | Ask auidence
disabled-world.com | Sme phobias are genetic influences| Ask auidence who experiences these
yahoo.answers | Death by phobia shocks | Inform audience about shocks

Research

Our Primary research consists of interviews with someone who is affected by their phobia so much that it stops them from leaving the house, a counsellor (Deb Instone) and a psychiatrist, these people have first hand experiences with phobias and know first hand how they are affected by them and why they are affected by them.
Our secondary research consists of archive footage from video game trailers such as dead space and F.E.A.R as we thought that sometimes phobias can stem from things that don't really exist,and facts from the various websites in our research records such as Phobialist.com

This is to help us find out how phobias affect people, why and how they develop by looking at by looking at footage from documentaries of people who suffer from them.



as well as what the most common phobias in Britain are with this websitehttp://psychology.about.com/od/phobias/p/commonphobias.htm

 , we also used images from google of the most common fears in the U.K such as spiders, clowns etc.

Formal proposal

Formal Proposal

                                                                     

The topic we decided to choose was from a range of ideas including house pets, fast food, tattoos, phobias and piercings. After brain storming and discussing reasons for and against we decided that phobias would be the most interesting topic for our documentary. The main reason we chose phobias is because it appeals to most people simply because they have a phobia of some sort.

The type of documentary is a mixed documentary. The channel we chose is channel 4 because it shows a large amount of documentaries such as dispatches, so people expect to watch a documentary on this channel. We wanted our documentary to show on a Monday at 8:00 because we feel this is a free slot with little competition from other documentaries and when we looked at the most common time people watch T.V. on a Monday we discover it was between 7 and 9. The target audience we think would be most interested is age 16-30 this is simply because we feel the documentary has a mature theme but will appeal to a wide range audience.

 For our documentary we will need a good amount of facts on phobias such as how many people in the U.K. are scared of spiders, how many people suffer from phobias in the U.K. and why most phobias develop including primeval phobias. We will definitely need to interview people with strange phobias and even people with normal phobias, it would also help maintain interest in our documentary if we confront people with their phobias and get a great reaction shot of them scared.

If we had enough time it would be great if we could help someone overcome their phobia, this would add a great story line to the documentary but it would take a long time for someone to overcome their fear.  We could also ask people why they think they have developed their phobias and then narrate all the facts as to why people develop them.  

The documentary running time is 27 minutes the reason for this is we feel an hour would be too long for this topic as everything that’s important we will cover in the 27 minutes. The people we would like to interview vary from a doctor with some insight on why phobias exist, people who are effected by phobias, someone who works with tarantulas at a pet store, someone who works at go ape that has first hand experience of people with a phobia of heights and perhaps get Fay to meet face to face with a snail! We will definitely need to film a tarantula but I am aware of a pet shop we could visit to get some footage of the eight legged fur ball.      

We will probably have the interview over lapping instead of just a five minute interview with one person and then the next; this should help maintain interest and quality for our documentary. Some of the props we could use are that persons phobia if possible and perhaps interview someone in front of the green screen ask them a question about an experience with their phobia and then react it and have the video playing in the background with the person narrating what happened almost like a crime investigation but this could either be for comedy if that persons phobia isn’t serious or for a more serious phobia.

The music should influence fear into the audience with screams in the background and generally dark music if the phobia is one that most people have a fear of. But I feel we could have upbeat sections as phobias might be scary to that person but for everyone watching they will be amusing depending on the significance of the phobia. We believe that a documentary about phobias will attract a large audience and will have a significantly appreciated content.

Brainstorm of content

This is our brainstorm of content with ideas of what we can include in our documentary and whaqt we plan on doing.

Scheduling the documentary

Scheduling is important as we want the right audience to watch our documentary.
Inheritance: To inherit an certain type of audience e.g put a programme on after Coronation  street the audience will think 'might as well keep watching'
Pre-echo: If we put the documentary on before Coronation street the audience will turn over earlier ready for Coronation street and catch the end of our documentary.
Hammocking: Put our documentary in between two good programmes.

Different channels started for different reasons, BBC1 was aimed at families so programmes are more lighthearted, BBC2 was aimed at intelligent people and a niche audience so programmes on BBC2 aren't generally popular however when a programme for example 'The Royle Family' become popular they move to BBC1. ITV is the same as BBC1 and is aimed at families, C4 is aimed at students and educated people and C5 is the same as BBC1 and ITV but isn't as popular as when it first came out it tried to be like C4.

Our documentary will be about phobias and we are airing it on C4 as it is a very informational documentary and we are airing it at 8:30 to ensure we have an audience wanting to watch it because it's not on to late, our age range is 16-49 years old as many people of that age range have phobias and may be interested in finding out why they have the phobia that they have. The day we have chosen is Monday as most people come in from work and just want to relax and watch T.V.   

Interviews

graphs

This graph shows that the people who answered our questionnaire that their favourite channel is ITV, but we will be putting our documentary on C4 because C4 is a channel aimed at an intellectual audience and is a channel that mainly shows documentaries.

This graph shows that the people who answered our documentary preferred the third font so we will be using either font three or a font that is similar to font three.

This graph shows that the people who answered this question most of them are high up in the scale and only a few are OK with what they are scared of.

This graph shows that the majority of people asked to fill out our questionnaire are female with only a few male candidates filling it out, meaning that their is a shift as our data may be similarities in fears but only because of the fact our poll was answered by mainly females.

This graph shows that the age range is mainly in the 16-21 with only a few in the other age ranges, this is due to the fact we handed out our questionnaires in college and most of the people were students and only a few staff asked.

This graph shows that the favourite colour was red so we will be using this colour for the colour of our font for our documentary.

This graph shows that only a few people would be put off their food if something gross was shown on a documentary so to air on the side of caution we are going to make sure what is included on our documentary isn't going to make us lose any viewers.

This question was in relation to a picture of mugly the mutt and the majority of the people who answered replied with no and only a few said yes, we had however expected a result like this.

This graph shows that many people have a phobia but they are not willing to talk about it, only a few said yes and the other column was were people stated about a weird phobia they had e.g boats.

This graph shows us that the most popular answer was spiders which is in the top ten most common fears in the UK, so it is more than likely we will get a person on our documentary who is scared of spiders.

This graph shows us that the most popular music type is rock however we won't be using this type of music in our opening titles as we don't think it will fit in very well with the theme of our documentary.

In this question we had 5 pictures on the paper and the people who answered the questionnaire had to pick which one they thought would go best with the theme of our documentary, the most popular one was background 3 so we will be using either that picture or one very similar to it.

this graph shows that the majority of the people who answered the questionnaire had not had help with their phobia so we decided that ion our documentary we would show the effect of getting help from a professional and how it would benefit the person involved.

This graph shows that most people have only 1-2 phobias with a few in the other categories, however we understand that some phobias develop later on in life and as the majority of people who answered our questionnaire were 16-21 it fits in with the trend.

This graph shows that the people who answered our questionnaire think that a serious voice will go best with our documentary so we will be using a serious voice over. 

This graph shows us that people are more likely to watch our documentary if we include interesting clips, we will be including all of these categories as we are doing a mixed documentary but we will make sure we have interesting clips.



This graph shows us that even though a lot of people ranked how they felt about their phobia as an 8 it wouldn't stop them from going outside, but there are some people who are badly affected by what they are afraid of but this group is smaller than the No group.

This graph is almost evenly spread, the other column was for people who were unsure and had put N/A as their answer.

This graph shows us that most people would laugh in a situation were their friends or someone they know is reacting to what they are afraid of, and it's because of this graph we decided to not only test someone reacting to their fear but also to test their friends reaction when they see how their friend reacts.

This graph shows us that the most common phobia was spiders, which fits in with some of the data we collected as having a phobia of spiders is in the top ten for the UK.

Blank questionnare

How old are you? (please circle)

16-21                           22-29                               30-38                                      39 or over

2.       What gender are you? (please circle)

Male                                    Female

3.       What’s your favourite colour?
Black      Yellow       Green     White    Red     Pink     Blue

4.       What channel do you normally watch? (please circle)

BBC1               BBC2                         ITV                           C4                            C5

5.       What’s your favourite font out of these examples? (please circle)

Phobia                            Phobia                      Phobia                  

                Phobia                               Phobia                             Phobia

6.       What’s your phobia if you have one?

7.       On a scale of 1-10 how scared are you of your phobia?

8.       Would you be put of your food if you saw something horrible in a documentary? E.g graphic surgery.

9.       What makes you scared? (please circle)

Clowns                           spiders                      slugs/snails                  people in hoodies

                  stickers                          insects                               rats                              the dark

10.   What’s your favourite type of music? (please circle)

reggie                              rock                             blues                              hip-hop

                  classic                               trance/dance                

11.   Do you find this scary? (please circle)   Yes     No   

12.   Do you have a strange phobia you’re willing to talk about?

13.   Would you be able to overcome your phobia if you were given help?

14.   What is your reaction to seeing someone react to something their scared of?

15.   What background would you associate with phobias? (chose one)

16.   What type of voice over would you like in a documentary about phobias? (circle one)

Sarcastic                         Eerie                           Sympathetic                   Serious

                 Informative                 Bored                                 Happy      

17.   What would make you want to watch our documentary? (circle one)

Interviews                          interesting clips                     reaction shots

                      Interesting information                          experts

18.   Has a phobia ever stopped you from going out the house etc?

19.   Have you ever had any help from professionals concerning your phobia?

20.   How many phobias do you have that you’re aware of? (Circle one)

           1-2                                 3-5                          6-8                        9 or more

Codes and Conventions

All the documentaries we have looked at are mixed documentaries, each of them has included Interviews with cutaways and archive footage. Various camera angles and a voice over are used to help move the narrative along. Opinions and decisions are normally left up to the viewer but a few mixed documentaries can be biased.

The Codes and Conventions of a documentary:

• Interviews-camera angles are used to show status.
• Voice over(voice of God)
• Cutaways-anchor meaning to a point being made.
• Reconstructions or Dramatisations.
• Archive footage.
• A linear narrative-helps the story to move along.
• Themes relevant to the documentary.
• Audience are often left to make their own opinion or decision on the topic.
• Music bed is often used and is either topical or incidental.
• Extreme close ups show important parts of the documentary.
• Graphics are used introduce who is talking or different segments.
• Non-diegetic and diagetic sound
• Relevant mise-en-scene.
• You don't hear the questions being asked in interviews.
• The subjects don't look into the camera when their talking, either to the side of the camera or to the top.
• Usually have conflicting views in the middle of the documentary to help move it along.
• Fast paced opening or montage to get the audience interested in watching the documentary.
• General rule is that you don't flip a subject from one side to the other.
• Camera angles are used to inflict an opinion e.g low angle on Marilyn Manson to show his power and influence.
• Footage filmed on location e.g the making of Meatloaf's music video.
• Voice of God often leads narrative.
• Graphics used to fir theme e.g Gothic writing for Meatloaf and small white graphics don't detract attention from the subject.
• Graphics often used ti introduce a subject or the next segment in a documentary.
• Green/blue screen and projectors often used to add a background.
• Actual footage.
• Clear expositions are used.
• Vox-pops.
• Match on action.
• Evidence is always used.
• Facts vs opinions to add to the conflict.
• Static camera/.
• A wide variety of camera angles are often used.
• Rule of thirds is used to make the documentary more visually stimulating.
• Dramatisation.
• Montages.
• Experts in a certain field are used.
• Observations.
• Witnesses are used.
• Transitions-these need to be snappy and interesting to keep the audience wanting to watch.
• Not one answer to the question that's been imposed.
• Normally unbiased.
• Variety of interviews.
• Interview is always interrupted-no full flowing interview.
• Graphics are always at the bottom of the screen.
• Clear narrative.
• Interviewee alternates on what side of the screen they appear.
• Tighter shots of more important people.

Initial plans

As a group we had several intial ideas these being:

• Piercings
• Tattoos
• Old people
• Phobias

We decided to go with Phobias as well felt it would be not only an interesting topic for the viewers to watch but also an interesting topic for us to research and do ourselves, we also felt that this subject would be more visually stimulating and would get us a higher mark. we had other topics such as tea, coffee but we wanted phobias because we felt no one else had done this before and wanted something that was different to the other subjects and something that we felt no one else had done.

Documnetary ideas.

The ideas that me and my group considered were:

• Fast Food
• Tattoos
• Piercings
• House pets
• Phobias

We finally decided to do Phobias as we all agreed that it would be very interesting to do and has a high potential to be visually stimulating as we can make a lot of use of sight, sounds and the senses. The problems we have though about are getting hold of people to interview such as Doctors, counsellors and people who are afraid of various things. We are going to use Vox-pops and interview random people, we will also discuss with the subjects we are interviewing whether phobias comes from certain stereotypes and we will include cutaways of the things that people are afraid of. 

Sylvia Plath (documentary)

This is a mixed documentary as it includes a voice over, interviews with cutaways and a series of dramatisations.

The themes in this documentary are peotry, motherhood, death and loss.



The narrative structure is linear and helps to move the story along, at the start of the documentary we are introduced to who Sylvia Plath is and what she did for a living, in the middle we find out that she is a manic depressive and attempted to committ suicide when she suffered a nervous breakdown. At the end of the documentary we find out she did eventually committ suicide and people consider it a loss to the world of peotry that shes dead but that it was expected because she could only take so much before she ended up
killing herself.



The camera angles used were:

•  Arial shot of cyclist.
• A pan across a suburban city.

• Tilt up and across of flats where Sylvia lived.
• Close up of a typewriter and a womans hands.

• Crab shot across a dark park.
• Establishing shot of a woman pushing a pram across a park.

• Close-ups used in interviews aswell as head and shoulder shots.

• Long shot of a statue.

The mise-en scene used was relevant as it was set in the city where Sylvia lived when she was in England , candles blown out which is relevant as Sylvias life was blown out at a young age. The critic has books in the background relevant as it is books she reviews and the professor was sat in his classroom where he teaches. The writer was sat in a studio and Sylvias mum was sat in her home with a picture of Sylvia next to her.

The sound used was diagetic such as a voice over to help move the narrative along and to help the story and develop aswell as a music bed to evoke emotion at a certain point in the documentary. We also had the ambient sound of the seashore and the sound of the interviews, and Sylvias voice as she read out her poems.

The editing used was:

• Cutaways during interviews to help anchor meaning.
• intercutting interviews.
• Slow paced editing as this documentary is more informational.
• Shots of people going about their daily life.
• Cuts of different parts of the city.

the archive material used included a film reel of people rioting abou Cuba, Sylvias voice recording of her reading her poems out. We were also shown a family photograph of her with her mum aswell as glances at a journal Sylvia keep. There was footage of the college that she attended and footage of people partaking in college activities.

The graphics used was an opening animation of 'voices and visions' and small white graphics were used to introduce the subjects and prevent attention being detracted form the subject.

Lara Croft:That Thing

This was a mixed documentary as this contained archive footage, cutaways in between interviews and interviews.

The themes in this documentary were the virtual world, such as reality vs. fantasy, technology and a breakthrough for the role playing game as this was the first to have a strong woman as a main playable character, leading to girl power and feminist themes.




The narrative structure was linear, the beginning of the documentary we are introduced to Lara Croft, who she is, what she is and why she was made. The middle of the documentary we were introduced to the type of people who played this game and how  new gaming audience was appearing thanks to this game and how she became a virtual idol for many people. At the end of the documentary we are shown the film adaptation of the game and how Lara's now been treated as a real person thanks to the film giving her a sense of realism now, as an audience we are left wondering whether or not this obsession with Lara has gone to far and is the game still successful.



The camerawork used in this documentary was:

• Close ups of the man who created Lara croft and Angelina Jolie the actress who plays her showing how important these two people are were the game is concerned.
• The man in the computer screen is shot at a cantered angle.
• Pan across of the Tomb Raider title to show us what the documentary is going to be about.
• Tilt-tack and crane shot used in the arcade.
• Within the game the camera pans around Lara.

The mise-en-scene was relevant as it was mainly of game and film footage playing behind the subjects being interviewed. The arcade and computer rooms were relevant to technology theme that ran throughout the documentary. The man who created Lara Croft was always inside an editing screen when he was interviewed and we saw people editing game play of a Lara Croft game.

The sound that was present in the documentary was game play sounds such as Lara's voice when she spoke, gun shots etc. Music played to fit the theme of the documentary, such as techno music played to show the intensity of the game and Madonna played in the background when the subjects being interviewed stated that Lara was a strong independent woman....much like Madonna. Noises were also added to sexualise Lara Croft to her male audience.

The editing that was used was:

• Interviews inter cut each other to make it more visually stimulating to watch.
• Lara footage from films and games was played behind the interviewees either by means of blue/green screen or projector.
• Fast paced editing was used to reflect the intensity of the documentary and the game.
•  Lots of cutaways of game/film footage in between interviews.
• Clips of the game inter cut each other at the beginning of the documentary as a fast paced montage to get the viewer interested.
• Small screen of game play near the subjects who are being interviewed at the start of the documentary.
• The man who created Lara Croft is in an editing screen for his interviews.

The archive material used was film and game footage of the Lara Croft film and game, we were also shown various adverts such as the Barbie and the Nike advert to help anchor meaning to the point that Lara Croft is now a idol to some people and that she was often compared to Barbie. We were also shown an interview with Angelina Jolie the actress who plays her in the film, and websites were many fans sent pictures of themselves dressed up as her, or writing letters or poetry to her. We had an issue of Time magazine were she was on the front cover and a Japanese pop star who was also virtual like Lara Croft.

The Graphics used were small, simple white graphics to prevent any attention being taken away from the subject material or the person being interviewed. We also had graphics of Lara Croft shooting her gun or posing between segments of the documentary to act as a visual aid of her being a strong independent woman.

Grizzly man

This is a mixed documentary as it contains mainly archive footage with cutaways, a voice over to lead the narrative and intercuttting interviews.

The themes of grizzly man are wild-life and nature, death, protecting/fighting for something we belive in.



The narrative structure is Linear and tells a clear story, at the beginning of the documentary we are introduced to Timonthy Treadwell, a man who lives with bears, in the middle of the documentary conflict is added as his friends and family believe that he was a good man who would've done anything for the bears whereas other people believe it was his fault he got eaten and when an native american is interviewed he statse that Timothy did the ultimate act of disgrace/arrogance. At the end of the documentary we are left to decide whetehr Timothy has impacted the wildlife park where the bears life and that is nature ever truly tamed.

The camera shots used were:

• Hand held to show the frantic nature of particular scenes

• A zoom out of a bear drinking, shows us what the documentary will mainly feature.

• Close up of bear, shows importance .

• Establishing shot of wildlife park, shows where the action will take place.

• 2 way shot of ecologists

• Pans around the native american who works in the museum.
• Zooms out of a picture of Timothy to show him and his girlfriend together, shows us that the documentary is mainly about him however she does get mentioned.

• Arial-pan show to show the wildlife park

The mise-en-scene is mainly in the wild as that is where Timothy stays when filming his expedition, and when Timothy is interviewed the background is a forest/vegetation of some sort. The bear biologist is interviewed in his office to show his status and that he is an intelligent person, we are shown inside the museum that has a grizzly bear statue and the women who is an ex-girlfriend of timothys is interviewed in her own home-a comfort zone.



the sound that is used is diagetics such as the speaking of the Timothy and his girlfriend on the recordings, the ambient sound of the wildlife can be heard in the recordings aswell, we can hear the questions being asked in the interviews and slow sombre music is played when we learn of Timothys death.

The editing used was:

•  The interviews intrecut each other.
• Cutaways were used to anchor meaning to make a point during interviews.
• Slow-paced editing as this was more of an informational documentary.
• Music bed was used.
• A lot of archive footage such as Timothys recordings of when he was in the wild to help the stroy develop and move along.

The archive material that was used was Timothys recordings of him in the wild with the bears, and photographs of him teachign at the school where he worked. We were also shown drawings by children of Timothy, a radio presenter talking at one point as well as photograpphs of the autopsy done on the bear. His parents also read aloud from one of the last letters he sent.

The gaphics used were small white graphics to introduce who people were and were used to show a time scale.