RMIT University
COMM2624 Media 1
Week 6 Workshop
EXERCISE – NARRATIVE STRUCTURE IN PB3
The following exercise is designed to prompt you to consider and analyse the narrative structure of your PB3 portrait piece. It doesn’t whether it is still a work-in-progress or finished.
It will be useful for your accompanying reflection.
It adapts some ideas from Michael Rabiger’s (2009) Directing the Documentary, 5th Edition (Focus Press). As he puts it: ’Answering these questions probably won’t produce ready solutions but will lead you to think hard about your story’s essentials, which is the spade work of creativity’ (p.317)
Exercise: Answer the following questions (and make sure you publish it as a blog post). Make sure you elaborate on each answer at least two or more sentences of context/explanation. (There may be some questions that you can’t answer or that don’t apply – that’s OK but you need to think carefully about why this is the case and explain in your response)
- What is the ‘controlling idea’ (Robert McKee) of your portrait? In other words, what is the most interesting thing about your participant/interviewee that you want to communicate?
The life of an athlete and the sacrifices they have to make to excel in their sport.
- How is your portrait film structured? (Remember there might be multiple forms of structure employed) E.g. Discussion and depiction of an event or process? A Journey? Use of voiceover narration? Other?
It’s an interview with my subject beginning with an introduction of who she is and what she does, and then adding in some footage of her training. I then continue with some harder questions about qualities of an athlete, with more found footage and the ending with a shot of a skiier skiiing into the distance.
- What do you want your audience to make of your interviewee? (e.g. What are you saying through them and/or human nature, human folly, or noble human inspiration?)
How much time and effort she puts into to do well at skiing and how passionate she is about it.
- How is your portrait being narrated? Why? How does it affect the structure?
It is being narrated by an interview that she is answering questions to that form the basic structure of what footage I am using and how I edit it.
- What role will the ‘found footage’ play in your portrait? For example, reinforcement? Ironic counterpoint? Contrast? Comparison? Other?
It is used as explanation with some of the training shots, reinforcement of certain points and just general added texture to some things she points out.
- Does your portrait have a dramatic turning point?
I wouldn’t say dramatic, however I ask her about a low point in her life and that is where she explains the difficulty she faced with Year 12 and skiing and juggling both but she was able to do it.
- When does this turning point in your portrait and why? At the beginning? At the end? Two-thirds through?
The turning point is ¾ through, towards the end as I feel like she resolves the struggle she has and then I add in footage of a skiier so it really ties up the video well.
- How does your portrait gather and maintain momentum?
By adding many shots of training and then olympic shots I feel as though it gradually builds up from her training at home, to her skiing overseas and thinking about the olympics.
- Where will your portrait’s dramatic tension come from? The gradual exposition of an overall situation? A volcanic, climactic moment? An impending change or crisis? The contrast between what the interviewee talks about and the found footage?
I didn’t have any dramatic tension within my piece, as I focused more on the positive outcomes of being able to balance life and sport at the same time, and I don’t think dramatic tension would be appropriate for the video.
- Does the portrait have a climax and/or resolution? Outline them.
The portrait has a finishing statement about the fact that she did manage to balance Year 12 and skiing and came out the other side keeping both important things in tact.