Video Production Company: Effective Documentary Interviews
A few years ago, our video production company was commissioned to create a documentary for an organisation celebrating its 30th anniversary. They provided us with interview footage of various stakeholders they had filmed themselves. While the footage was valuable, it felt like telling a story only to have someone else take over and steer it in a completely different direction than originally envisioned.
To create a cohesive and impactful documentary, it’s crucial to understand the elements that need to be implemented to successfully execute and use interviews. When choosing a video production company to bring your documentary to life, a good grasp on these interview necessities will help you look beyond just visually appealing content and focus on how well the interviews support the story. In this article, we’ll explore these essential documentary interview elements, helping you to identify what to look for when selecting a video production company to ensure your documentary tells a unified story.
Planning of interview questions
Before you can successfully carry out valuable interviews, you must carefully select interview subjects, and the questions must be formulated with the specific subject in mind. This ensures that each individual contributes meaningfully to the documentary’s narrative. It’s imperative that your questions are constructed with precision, taking into account the unique perspective and expertise of each subject. Generic or broad formulated questions run the risk of missing the mark, potentially leading to irrelevant responses. With that in mind, choosing a video production company with a skilled scriptwriter can relieve you of the task of constructing the interview questions yourself.
Prioritise pre-interview meetings
Besides formulating targeted questions, prioritise pre-shoot meetings with interviewees to refine questions based on their insights. For example, if your documentary focuses on technology in education but the interviewee emphasises hands-on learning, such curveballs can redirect your documentary. Planning meetings beforehand helps avoid these outcomes. If in-person meetings are impractical, other communication methods must be prioritised to ensure effective planning and fine-tuning. Although these elements might seem challenging to implement, the video production company you choose will manage all planning and coordination during the pre-production process, including pre-shoot meetings.
Give your interviewees their questions in advance
An obvious yet often overlooked element is to give your subjects their questions well in advance so that they have time to prepare their answers. Don’t allow your subjects to start their answers without having a clear map of where their words are taking them. Clear communication ensures that the subject’s answers align with the documentary’s objectives. Additionally, focused interviews simplify the editing process for the video production company by reducing the amount of footage to sift through, which ensures a smoother integration of content, a cohesive final product, and less time and cost spent on editing.
Keep it brief
In that same breath, inform subjects of time constraints and guide them toward a concise response. Give the subject an exact duration, for example 30 seconds. However, that doesn’t mean that you should put words into their mouths. Their response is still rooted in their own opinion and honest answers. It is important to remain ethical and never to manipulate a subject’s answer to support the bias of the documentary.
Engage with your interview subjects
Engage with your interview subjects and ask them how they feel about the questions they are asked. It’s important to foster an environment where subjects feel comfortable expressing their opinions, ensuring that the interview remains authentic and insightful. On a related note, sensitivity to personal boundaries and privacy is important. Clearly communicate to your interviewees how the video production company will leverage the interview footage and make sure they feel comfortable sharing their stories without feeling pressured or exploited.
Give your interviewees context
All documentaries and interviews rely on context. The subject needs to understand the documentary’s purpose, target audience, and central message. For instance, if you interview a geologist about fracking’s environmental impacts, their response might include technical jargon, which could alienate viewers. To avoid this, discuss the documentary’s purpose and audience with your subjects beforehand. This allows them to frame their responses, making the content inclusive and reinforcing the documentary’s core message. Additionally, remind them to explain any complex terminology or acronyms to ensure the message is accessible to all viewers.
The interview format influences responses
Sometimes interviewers actively participate in the documentary, appearing in the video and asking questions. However, most of the time, the interviewer does not appear in the video, making it essential for the interviewer to guide the subject to reflect the questions in their responses. Contextual clarity is crucial as it prevents disjointed interviews, improves viewer understanding, and avoids costly re-shoots.
Choosing the right video production company
Now that you understand the key elements of successful documentary interviews, you’re better equipped to choose a video production company that meets your needs. When evaluating potential partners, don’t be swayed by flashy slow-motion b-roll footage. Instead, focus on the quality of the interviews in their portfolio.
Ask yourself: Do the interviews maintain a clear plot, or do they lose focus? How well do they contribute to the overall flow of the documentary? Remember, the worst thing a documentary filmmaker can do is lose control of the production, as it will inevitably reflect in the final product.
When a documentary incorporates the elements of a good interview, the production team won’t be forced to sift through hours of footage to magically find one minute of valuable content from 30 minutes of waffle. Instead, every moment will serve a purpose, contributing to a polished, impactful documentary. That’s why it’s important to be mindful of these documentary interview elements, as it ensures you choose a video production company that plans every step of the process, delivering a documentary that aligns with your vision and resonates with your audience.
Rely on our essential tips for interview preparation and strategic planning. Let’s create impactful documentaries together- contact us today!
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