The intention of A Model Son was to create a short documentary that would tell Kevin’s story and simultaneously, inspire viewers to reflect on their own ambitions and not be afraid to combat adversary. I think that A Model Son achieved this purpose. I am proud of my group and I for making a documentary that reflected our aims. This was possible due to Kevin’s enthusiasm to participate and the ability to collaborate. In saying this, I am proud of the way in which editing enabled us to succinctly tell Kevin’s story. Furthermore, I am proud of our ability to time sound with visuals. For example, the opening scene utilised the camera clicking sound to navigate the visuals thereby playing a storytelling role. It was fun to experiment with how the topic of modelling could influence our stylistic editing choices.

Commencing the editing process, I started to see the documentary take shape. I could imagine how I wanted the documentary to look more than from what was written in the treatment because I could play with what we had filmed. It was through this that I realised that I would do a lot of things differently the next time. After learning more about the structure of the documentary such as building the story first and then adding in the necessary broll, I’ve realised that I would want to film a lot more the next time. For example, changing locations of the interview to ensure the viewer isn’t in one place at all times. Whilst we strayed quite heavily from the treatment, it was still very useful but I think it can be even more useful moving forward as I am more comfortable with the structure of documentaries. In saying this, I’d like to improve my pre-production skills as it is important to build the necessary foundations before production.

Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed making this documentary and so, now that I have a better understanding of what goes into making a documentary, I want to be more ambitious in my subsequent projects. Furthermore, whether it be fiction or nonfiction, my production and collaboration skills have improved immensely.