Sheffield Doc/Fest… Rated!

More than a week after the Sheffield Doc/Fest, our team have returned with new perspectives on our projects. Some of the directing styles used gave us great ideas that we hope to incorporate and develop into our 60 second films.

Watch our vlog below: Filmed on the last day of the Sheffield Doc/Fest, Odira and Gabbie reflect on the festival…

Check out a selection of photos from the Sheffield Doc/Fest 2010 below. (See them all on Flickr)

Pai

Olivia

Katerina Cizek’s interactive documentary, Out My Window.

The Showroom

The Wilderness Downtown ‘postcard’ (part of the interactive film)

Rio

Uchenna

Campaigning training

Yesterday, the London team went for a very useful campaigning session with Livity, a socially responsible youth communications agency in Brixton. The aim was to discuss ways of  developing Digital Documenters as a brand.  Naturally, we focused on our target market and brand values, which are important factors in the build up of any brand or product. We also discussed different types of audiences and how we can make content to generate interest and communicate key messages.

We then moved onto something that us young people know a lot about- social media. Yes, we explored the likes and dislikes of Facebook and Twitter, and the usefulness of YouTube and Vimeo. After many debates and discussions over why we prefered some sites over others, and why the days of MySpace have long gone, we looked out how we were going to get our films out to the general public.

It was a great day and we took lots of notes. Now we have to put it all into practice!

Many thanks to Elle Moss, founder of Drew Creative Branding Ltd, Joshua Connell, Mira Jessani and Ben Maxwell who all work at Livity, and Ben Anderson, coordinator of Staying Alive project, Ignite.

Digital Documenters meet CentrePoint.

So this Monday 4 October, three of the 12 London team went on down to the Centrepoint Offices in Aldgate for a quick catch up with their team and to discuss how we could help them capture their Speak Out event.

The Speak Out events are designed with the service users in mind in order to give them the opportunity to do exactly that and speak out on issues affecting them. Now we at First Light strongly admire the many voices of the youth today and we’re more than delighted to have the chance to get involved with Centrepoint on this.

So here’s a big thank you to Sam Clarke (Participation Officer), Aaron Gray (Volunteering Officer), Helen Bryant (Volunteering Officer), Rachel Allen-Lowton (Participation Assistant) and Charmaine Charles (Media Liaison Volunteer) for their time and we look forward to working with them over the coming months

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For more information on Centrepoint click here

Want more?

We’ve been busy setting up some more pages just for you. On the want more? page you will find hints and tips about journalistic and media related skills from some of our Digital Documenters and industry professionals too!

And look out for the work experience section coming soon!

Vox pops- voice of the people

Image via Wikipedia

Now into our third weekly team meetings, the London team are getting organised with the various mygames (powered by v) projects and are rearing to go with the research side of things! We’re all at different stages on this project: Some of the group are getting in contact with their media liaison volunteers for their activities, whilst others are still researching but we’re still in the initial stages, so everything is going at a good steady pace.

We had a very productive session this week as we were joined by Ian Morris who works at the BBC World Service (the BBC’s international radio station) and he gave us lots of interviewing techniques to use, specifically for audio. Armed with knowledge about the do’s, don’ts and slip-ups of interviewing, we put it to test and went out onto the streets of Chalk Farm Road and into Camden’s Stables Market to carry out some vox pops on the general public about their views on the Olympics 2012. Armed with a voice recorder, a consent form and a flip camera, generally, the mission was very successful! We had some great responses from the public and business owners, so it was very interesting to see their viewpoint on how the Olympics will effect them.

One business woman was pleased that the Olympics would attract visitors from all over the world, that could boost her business, the economy and infrastructure. Whilst a man who ran a stall in the Stables Market was worried that the transport would not be ready and efficient enough for the amount of visitors expected.

Are you ready for Digital Documenters?

Image via Wikipedia

The ball is finally rolling and our weekly team meetings have started! We meet every week at the Roundhouse in Camden, and reside in the creative suites to let out imaginations flow! The first meeting went well, mainly filled with discussions about our projects and really focusing on what we want to get out of this project, as well as a brainstorming session on Olympic values.

Introduction to Documentary Film-making training

This three day residential training session at Aston University, Birmingham was lots of fun! On the first day we analysed the concepts of documentaries and the different formats that they come in. We watched lots of different film documentaries and discussed what made them original, so we started to think about how we can incorporate that into our own ones, which we will eventually make. The second day was much more practical which involved brainstorming ideas, pitching and shooting a short film to get us into the swing of things! It was good practice, as we will have to be repeating these steps very soon.

Many thanks to award-winning documentary filmmaker, Mandy Chang, from the Grierson Trust.

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Digital Promotions training

The training just gets better! Even though I’m a bit camera-shy, the professional mini photo-shoots were nonetheless great fun with good results. The Digital Promotions training was delivered by The Cut magazine. Nina Manandhar gave us some great advice about social networking and viral marketing which was really useful. The communications side to any company or brand is crucial and so a strong online presence is important.

Aside from this, we  learnt some great practical photography skills. Armed with a state of the art SLR camera- we were rearing to go! But some us were less keen to be posing for shots, we’d rather be the ones taking them! Check out some of the photography created below:

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