Jennifer Saunders: Back in the Saddle, ITV1 CLIP

Another documentary came out recently that I decided to look at was called Jennifer Saunders: Back in the Saddle, ITV1 even though horse racing is not included in the documentary it is the type of documentary that I wish to achieve.  In the first of a two-part series, Jennifer Saunders sets out to re-engage the nation with the equestrian sports that she has always loved - eventing, showjumping and dressage talking to many different people about the horse industry from different backgrounds and different sports within horse riding, she tells the story of her life very well and how advanced the horse industry is and how it has changed over the years adding humour to the documentary to make it become more enganging for the audience wish I hope to do with my documentary.

 Here is a short clip from the documentary.

Seabiscuit: The lost documentary

Seabiscuit: The lost documentary

Seabisbuit : the lost documentary is another excisting documentary and also documentray film I am going to look at, it is an extraordinary piece of horse racing history. This ‘Lost’ original documentray was made in 1939 by SEABICUITS’s owner, Charles Howard, in honor of SEABISCUIT winning the coveted title of, ‘Horse-of-the-year’

In the documentary you see SEABISCUIT’s birth, his early life at the stables and SEABISCUIT’s first race where his fourth place finish earned him $50. You can also watch Charles Howard purchase SEABISCUIT after claimin race and trainer Tom Smith put SEABUISCUIR through workouts.

Expertly restored in the original black-and-white format, and explanded to include a vibrant colour version. The film stars Martin Mason, Doc Bond and Charles Howard directed by Manny Nathan Hahn and produced by Legend Films and distrubuted by Hart sharp video. This is a very popular movie/ documentary but again unlike my documentary this has a storyline and just focuses on one horse and focuses on the storyline bringing attachment to the audience, this film also contains a voice oevr which is unusual in most films but mainly because it is a documentary film having conventions of a documentray and a film. Also the film expandes over a massive time scale.

Here is a clip from the film...

The Little Horse That Could: The Connemara Stallion, Erin Go Bragh (CLIP)

The Little Horse That Could: The Connemara Stallion, Erin Go Bragh

Even Early Films did the same creating a film through a documentary for example.. The Little Horse That Could: The Connemara Stallion, Erin Go Bragh this is a documentary on a Connemara stallion eventing horse named Erin Go Bragh & his owner Carol Kozlowski. It details everything from daily care, to training to the unfolding of actual events. For horse lovers of all ages. Which was Published by Dreams Come True Productions on DVD. This is different to the diea od my documentray as mine would be seen on the one show and not made to be a DVD. Also it would include many different people in the documentray not focusing on one.

Here is the trailer for the movie...

Documentarys in films: The first Saturday in May.

Documentarys in films.

Recently documentray films are becoming increasingly popular, and there are many examples of this in the horse racing catogary. For example..

The first day in may released on the 18 April 2008 in the USA this film shows The Hennegan brothers following six trainers from varying parts of the country (Arkansas, Florida, New York, Kentucky) on their prime 2005 horses' journeys through various graded stakes to the Kentucky Derby. The film consists of both heartbreak and joy and close reltionships with the people within the film, making the audience form an attatchment with the charcters, make the documentray more effective. The directors of the film are Brad Hennegan and John Hennegan and also stars Frank Amonte, Barbaro and Peter Brette. The production company was the Hennegan Brothers.

Here is a clip to show you...

The diffrence between this industry is that in film documentarys they often have a storyline of a particular character or horse… making the film more personal and enjoyable to watch adding fiction to make the film more exciting. Turning facts into a story but with my documentary it would purley be the facts and maybe a little story on a particular persons experience in the racing industry.

Martin Clunes Horse Power

Martin Clunes Horse Power Documentary.

Following on from the Youtube documentary I reserached I went on to look at HorsePower by Martin Clunes He travels the world to unlock the secrets of man’s partnership with horses in Horsepower, a new documentary series for ITV1.  His journey takes him from remotest Mongolia to the deserts of Arabia; to see the enigmatic wild Mustangs in Nevada, and watch the thrills and spills of rodeo in Las Vegas. Martin is a special guest at the world’s most glamorous and lavish racing event in Dubai, and watches the colourful Palio horse race in Italy, which dates back to the 1200’s. Martin unravels the story of how man and horse first got together, what the horse has done for us through the ages, and what the horse still means to us today.

He says  “I  wanted to find out how this animal became so important to us.  How did we manage to tame such a huge, fearful prey animal and make it both our servant and our friend,”

The series is made for ITV1 by ITV Studios and Buffalo Pictures.

You can now also buy the series on DVD.

Here is the links to some youtube clips... 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HBatY-u8Y34

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hOo-HMpp0no&feature=related

Here is a clip of the documentary...

 

Comments on the documentary on Youtube

I decided to look at the comments and reviews about the documentary on you tube and pick up the bad and good points the audience thought about this documentary..

Here are the comments that people had made..

The film looks absolutely fantastic. Hope you can make a sale

Where can I watch the full documentary?

Hi, the documentary is currentlyy with broadcasters, waiting to see if it gets aired! Thanks for viewing

Very nicely shot, giving a good insight into what is an all embracing sport and the different characters it produces

Because there were only 4 comments that were not very useful on Youtube I decided to ask the whole of my class to view the documentary and comment on it describing the good and bad points of the documentary..

I did this by putting a link to the video on the U drive so that everybody could access the video.

These are the comments I got from my fellow piers about this video...

Comments on the Documentary on youtube.

Analysing mini documentary- Newmarket Horse Racing Documentary - A Sporting Chance

Newmarket Horse Racing Documentary - A Sporting Chance

To get an idea of what shots and how I am going to present my documentary I started looking at mini horse racing documentarys that are already out there and look how they are presented asking myself questions like have they just got a voiceover? Have they got a presenter? What shots are used? What are the positives and negatives about these documentarys?

At the very start of the video it shows a long shot, sunset in the background showing horses running also has a title: A film by Aric Averkiou with tense music as the background sound. This brings another question I have to ask myself do I want my titles at the beginning or the end of my documentary?

Then it goes on to show a shot of the horses walking round with the jockeys riding them at the stables. Then again it cuts to another shot of a close up of horses heading out their stable doors looking down the stables showing more than one horse which is a side shot.

Then more titling is shown with a black background and white writing asking ‘The Trainer, tough but fair or just tough?’ engaging the audience and also asking the audience a question bringing it into a debate showing the documentary is revealing something about the trainers and leaving it up to the audience to decide.

Then it cuts to a mid shot of what seems to be a trainer, with horses in the background with a voiceover of his voice but showing him talking to the jockeys. Which is clever as it shows the man who is the voiceover in action.

Then again it cuts to show a jockey untacking his horse in a mid-shot and then cuts again showing more horses in the stables and walking, with the voiceover stopped. Then it cuts again to text again with a black background and white text asking ‘The jockey lives for racing but can he make it?’ to create the same effect.

Again it cuts to another mid shot of a jockey walking and the voiceover is brought in again of the person who is on the screen and another cut is made to show someone picking out horses hooves  as a close up then cuts again showing a jockey mounting the horse and riding off showing the transition of the preparation of the horse to the riding of the horse then again another cut is made showing the jockey riding round with the other horses in the yard still with the tense music in the background then again a cut is made to show the horses walking and the voiceover is introduced again. Then it cuts to in a car with the trainer in the front of the car and the horses along side the car trotting to show this more closley it cuts to again a close up of the previous jockey and trainer we saw before trotting at a side view. Through the rest of the documentray it does the same cutting from close ups and mid shots of the trainer,  jockeys and horses. With changes of music when the horses pace gets quicker to add atmosphere showing the horses racing along side each other to create that adrenaline through the music. They use an effect when showing a close up of the faces horses running using slow motion to capture the face pace, using a lot fo panning shots when filming the horses racing. It also shows an interview with the trainer and jockey that we have seen throughout the mini documentary, diffrence betweeen the two interviews is that the jockey is grooming the horse when the interview is been taken place. This could be another thing to consider when creating my interviews with the jockeys and trainers in my documentary, how am I going position them, what will they be doing when I am asking them questions? Do I want it to look like a set up interview? Another interesting element in this mini documentary is to the end of the documentray there is an interview with attenders of the racecourse asking their views.

They end the documentary with a slow motion shot of the horses racing and the production company’s logo with the interviews ended  the fast pace music in the background fading out.

Here is link to the first documentary I decided to analyse called Newmarket Horse Racing Documentary - A Sporting Chance which I found on Youtube. It is a 5 minute 17 second video.

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gzXBFVDbL8gzXBFVDbL8

Here is a clip..

Beverley Racecourse

BEVERELEY RACECOURSE

I am going to be filming at Beverley racecourse my local racecourse but before I decide on dates ect I need to look at the facilities they have and get permission off them to film.

I went onto sending an email to the events organiser of Beverley Racecourse and Beverley Racecourse itself and they replied by letter asking when I was going to go and film and more detail about the documentary here is a copy of the contact infomation..

I then looked at the upcoming race days to get an idea of when would be ideal to film..

link to Beverley racecourse website:
http://www.beverley-racecourse.co.uk/

Channel 4 documentaries shot

Screenshot of what some of the clip will show the video will scroll down this page on the website and show all the documentaires Channel 4 does...

Channel 4 Documentaries

Channel 4

I went onto look at the most popular choice on my survey, Channel 4 documentaires.

Here is a link to their website where all their documentaries are listed…

And here is the home page of Channel 4’s website

It looks a lot more sophisticated and serious than the One Show's Home website advertising a documentray called daredevils: life on the edge at 10 pm about people who do crazy wild things showing that channel 4 focuses on more documentarys than interviews and debates of politics which the one show does regulary and only features short clips of documentaires on mainly wildlife.

Looking at the documentarys they do they have a wide variety of documentarys ranging from Thelma’s Gypsy girls to the worlds largest snake channel 4 looking at many different genres of documentaires on a variety of things making more accessable for my documentary to be accepted and fit into that programme.

( In my overall research video i will have a shot of Channel 4's page of documentary scrolling down the page in slow motion to show all the documentaries channel 4 does)

One show research

I started to look at the one show first looking at what they are about on their website watching an episode on tv and looking at the documentarys they do…

Here is a few recent documentarys they have done…

. Tawny release
. Killer shrimp
. Solitary dolphin
. Flourishing otters
. Star Gazing for beginners
. Woodland specticle and many more




I made a table showing the things that would make my documentray fit into the One show and also showing why it would not fit into the One show.

 WEBSITE LINK FOR ONE SHOW http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b007tcw7

WEBSITE LINK FOR ONE SHOW NATURE (WHERE MY DOCUMENTARY WOULD BE PLACED ON THE WEBSITE) http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/18594493

Results of Survey 2

Here are my results… Judging by the results I got it looks like the more popular choice was channel 4 documentaries and second most popular was the one show… from here I went on to do some more research into the two channels looking why and what made my audience choose these two and what I think personally my documentary would fit into and where my audience would watch it most…

Survey 2- What channel?

So the next question I asked myself in my research process was where would my documentary appear  focusing on my audiences and where would they watch a documentary and would fit in best as there are various documentary tv programmes such as..

The one show

Channel 4 documentaries

Dave

Itv

You tube Documentaries

I carried out another survey to see where would people expect and go to watch a documentary on horse racing, focusing more on audience and where they think it would fit in.

Survey 1- Audience

I Decided to contruct a survey, to find out what audience i was aiming at and also what my audience would like to see in the documentary... Here is my Survey...

If unable to read some of the questions are...

How old are you?

Are you male of Female?

How many times have you been to the races or are you a regular visitor?

When would you usually visit the races?

Do you bet on the horses if you do go to the races or do you go for an enjoyable day out?

Do you like horses or do you horse ride or neither?

If you do or do not like horses what would you be more interested in? (please tick, you may tick more than one)

The horse racing industry    

The horses themselves facts about them    

The jockeys and how they prepare  

What would you like to know about the race horse industry?

Would you rather know… (please tick one)

Positives            

Negatives          

Or both about the racing industry     

Script for documentary research.

Today i have created a script of infomation that i have found out about for my research..
looking at conventions of a documentary and what a documentary consists of, what techniques are used, the simple research to create a good documentary. As i have decided to create a documentary of horse racing, and the preparation what goes into the racing but the brutal truth at the end of the horses racing life. i have also emailed one of the managers at beverley race course to organise dates when i am going to film and who i am going to interview.
Here is my script so far..

Conventions

So the question is what makes a documentary?

From my research looking at short documentary’s, I have found the conventional expectations of a documentary are..

It has to be non-fiction, discussing the ‘real’ historical, political and cultural events ect.. basing itself on observations rather than interventions, Making it educational to others trying to uncover something, showing pros and cons of its genre.

There are various documentarys on..

Motorbikes, cars, coins, diseases , fashion  and anything you could imagine.

They often contain a voiceover, someone talking about the facts of the subject, also they do many interviews talking to various different people related to your genre of your documentary’s finding different opinions to make controversy and create different sides to the genre and what you are talking about, Going into depth within the genre splitting up into sections, often containing alot of repition, jumping from one subject in the genre to the next.

The voiceover.

The voiceover is usually very authoritative encouraging the audience to believe that they have some sort of knowledge as in the case of people like Michael Moore and Nick Broomfield ‘the right’ opinions that people should pay attention to.

Language used

Some of the language techniques they use to shape realism in a documentary is..

Placing the audience in the action by Location Shooting, Un even, hand-held camera work to show that it is not all serious, also using Natural Light to do the same, Following the action so that the audience is following the documentary’s journey, and Amateur effect.

Others techniques that allow the audience to be ‘objective’ are allowing the material to structure into an argument and also allowing it to structure into a narrative.

Interviews

The interviews with experts ..  are used to authenticate the views expressed in the documentary some may disagree with the the message of the documentary and the argument it is creating but the film maker usually disapproves them in some way to balance the argument and get a clear understanding to the audience.

Text

There are not much text or many titles used in a documentary if text is used it is normally to anchor images in time and Labels,dates etc tend to be believed unquestioningly and are a quick and cheap way of conveying information to the audience. In short documentarys I have found that they do have credits at the end of the documentary and logos of the distribution company at the beginning this also makes the documentary believable.

Research on documentarys

Today i have looked at documentarys on various subjects, i have found with a lot of documentarys they are trying to uncover something, educate its audience in an interesting way showing pros and cons of its genre.
There are various documentarys on..
moterbikes
cars
coins
diseases
fashion
anything you could imagine.
They often contain a voiceover, someone talking about the facts of the subject, also they do many interviews talking to various diffrent people related to your genre of your documentarys finding different opinions to show make contraversy and diffrent sides to the genre and what you are talking about. Going into depth within the genre splitting up into sections, often containing alot of repition, jumping from one subject in the genre to the next.