# How the Pros Make Killer Documentaries ## Метаданные - **Канал:** This Guy Edits - **YouTube:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fJ5ujccCU0 - **Дата:** 17.09.2024 - **Длительность:** 21:42 - **Просмотры:** 15,636 ## Описание Free documentary webinar: https://thisguyedits.com/webinar Roger's Book: https://thisguyedits.com/roger Roger's earlier video: https://youtu.be/W1Mafk58zS0?si=FqtEUYTYQ7S1PIH6 Emmy-nominated filmmaker and documentary editor Roger Nygard, ACE, (known for "Curb Your Enthusiasm" and "Trekkies") reveals 9 essential secrets to making a great documentary. From finding the right idea to conducting interviews, proper framing, and bold storytelling, Roger shares insider tips from his extensive career in the film industry. Learn how to craft compelling stories, focus on key characters, and use editing to shape the final narrative. If you're an aspiring documentarian, this video is packed with valuable insights on topics like character-driven storytelling, how to ask the right interview questions, framing techniques (eyeline, negative space, camera angles), and the importance of pacing during editing. Whether you're just starting out or looking to refine your skills, this masterclass will help you elevate your documentary filmmaking. **Keywords:** documentary filmmaking, documentary editing, how to make a documentary, storytelling tips, camera framing techniques, Roger Nygard, filmmaking secrets, documentary structure, conducting interviews, pacing in editing, character-driven storytelling. 00:00 What Makes a Great Documentary 02:16 Secret 1 03:14 Secret 2 04:04 Secret 3 06:36 Secret 4 10:03 Free Webinar with Roger 10:34 Secret 5 12:32 Secret 6 15:14 Secret 7 16:22 Secret 8 17:47 Secret 9 20:05 Roger's Book ★- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - ★ THIS GUY EDITS (TGE) is a YouTube channel by film editor Sven Pape, an A.C.E. award nominee whose credits include work for directors James Cameron, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, and Sundance filmmaker Mark Webber. ➜ MY FREE MINI-COURSE- https://secreteditinghacks.com ➜ ONLINE EDITING TRAINING- https://thegotoeditor.com ★- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - ★ #documentaryfilmmaking #filmmakingtechniques #howtointerview ## Содержание ### [0:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fJ5ujccCU0) What Makes a Great Documentary - [Denise] We are here in Orlando, Florida at the dental offices of Dr. Denis Bourguignon. - Good morning. How are you? - [Sven] What makes a documentary great? - Welcome to Star Base Dental. We find that "Star Trek," the episodes are always geared with a moral. They're good doers. - It's not like any other dentist office I've ever been in. That's for sure. - [Sven] This Emmy nominated filmmaker has the answer. He directed the second highest selling documentary of its time, "Trekkies. " - What I didn't know was that I was becoming part of something much larger than just a new TV series. I was becoming part of a phenomenon. (intense music) - [Sven] In this video, Roger Nygard, ACE, editor of "Curb Your Enthusiasm," "Veep," many more TV shows, and still an active documentary filmmaker shares nine secrets from his new book, "The Documentarian. " (intense music) Are you ready? Let's go. Roger, you work as an editor. How do you know what makes a great documentary? - The best, most successful, enjoyable, captivating documentaries, they're plotted out. There's a protagonist or a small group of people with a goal, and there's an antagonist or group of antagonists who are in the way of reaching that goal, and we, as the viewer, go along and follow them as they pursue their goal and succeed or fail. - [Scammer] I wanted to ask you a favor. If you have an American Express credit card, I can link it to my account. - I'm his girlfriend. Of course, he would ask me. - When you're casting your documentary, you need to cast it with exceptional people. When Ken Burns made "Baseball," he featured the exceptional baseball players. When Joe DiMaggio had a 56-game hitting streak or when Ted Williams bat 400, those were the exceptional players and were captivated by them. And how do they get to that exceptional point? If you watch reality shows, they're hunting for narcissists. (intense music) - Joe, exotic for the people of America. - You want someone who's just wide open, here's who I am, here's what I'm doing, and you're following them around, asking them questions and you're getting unadulterated honesty. - Ladies and gentlemen, before you hear it on the news, I'm gonna tell you myself. About an hour ago we had an incident where one of the employees stuck their arm through the cage, and the tiger tore her arm off. (intense music) ### [2:16](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fJ5ujccCU0&t=136s) Secret 1 - [Sven] I guess the first thing would be the idea, when do you know you have a documentary? - [Roger] Number one, will the idea power me all the way over the finish line? If you don't have an idea that's going to keep you going, you need to keep looking. - Do you test your idea? - If you're uncertain about whether your idea is strong enough to get you to the end, test it. I would often take my questions and try them out on my friends. When I was making "The Nature of Existence," my key question was... Hey Pope, Pope. Over here. Why do we exist? So imagine asking your friend, why do you think we exist, and see if they respond. And then you're gonna want to test your movie as you're shooting. Make a sizzle reel. Make a sample. Take your first interview, and cut it into a three minute short, and then show it to people. See how they respond. I know I'm onto something when I'm interviewing somebody, and I start to get excited because I can hear their answers. And when I hear the answer I'm thinking, oh, that's in the movie. ### [3:14](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fJ5ujccCU0&t=194s) Secret 2 (soft music) Concept documentary. It's where you have a core question that you ask, and you're trying to solve this mystery by the end of the film. A film like "Food Inc. " is a concept documentary, asking a question like, why is corporate farming so harmful? That's a mystery they're gonna try to solve. It's harder to do concept documentaries because it's not about people as much. It's about an idea, or a thing, or a place, or a historical story. I asked Ken Burns about that, and he said, "You can't. You can't make a documentary about things. It's always about people. " - [Ken] The story of the Brooklyn Bridge is Roebling family. I was not interested in excavating just the dry dates, facts, and events of the past. I was interested in an emotional archeology. ### [4:04](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fJ5ujccCU0&t=244s) Secret 3 (whimsical music) - Every film, every documentary must have a theme. The theme is your idea as a filmmaker that you're trying to get across. Tell me that in one sentence. Maybe this specific corporation is poisoning the water in this specific community. That's what you're gonna prove. If you cannot explain to me in one or two sentences what your theme is, you're not ready yet. - [Sven] So it's big ideas, big characters, and big themes. - The bigger your ideas and characters, the bigger your themes, the more engaging. - Talking about this in your book, you mention that one key element of making a good documentary is finding the ending early. - When I was making "Trekkies," I did not know what the ending was or where we were going. I was a neophyte, and I realized halfway through the filming of "Trekkies," that we were in the process of making a very flawed documentary. It was not a narrative documentary. We weren't following a protagonist with goals and obstacles and working toward a climax of some kind and an ending. So I had to find a way to solve that problem. And the way I solved it, or tried to, you be the judge, is "Trekkies" is more of a series of short stories. (intense music) Even if you don't really like or you're not enjoying this one all that much, you know another one's coming very quickly. I kept it fast paced. I tried to make it as humorous as possible. - [Narrator] Another fan wrote a Klingon sex manual. - Those were all band-aids on the problem that I did not have a strong core question. If you wanna in try to ensure your success, you need a strong substructure. Ideally, you wanna know all those things before you begin. Or, if you're telling a historical story that's already happened in the past, you're telling all these things, and you're finding the footage to tell that story. If you don't have that insurance, the way you can still succeed... many, many flawed documentaries succeed. It's gotta be either really funny, really engaging, really timely, a combination of all the above, or something really stands out. The greatest movies in history, the ones that I love the most, are usually gut wrenchingly emotional and really funny at the same time. One of the funniest lines in film history... (water sloshing) (intense music) - You're gonna need a bigger boat. - [Roger] That gets a big laugh, and it's because the moment is so serious and his response makes us laugh. Great documentaries do the same thing. ### [6:36](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fJ5ujccCU0&t=396s) Secret 4 - [Sven] What makes a good interview? - Interviews just like this, there are good interviews and bad interviews. You're going to contaminate this extremely serious interview with questions about my personal life. - Well, no I'm not, but what I wanna ask is, at one point you said it was a dirty tricks campaign... (moving music) - And you as a filmmaker will decide what's gonna make your interview good. There are several things you need to do. One of the first things is control the eye line. Right now I'm looking right at the camera. Errol Morris became obsessed with the idea of connecting with the camera, and he invented this gadget called the interrotron where people could look right at the camera and through a reflective mirror could see the interviewer off to the side and they could look at each other. Most documentaries you would talk to the interviewer and look off to the side of the camera, and the interviewer will sit as close to the barrel of the lens as possible to pull your eye line as close to the camera as possible. And yet you can still have a conversation, and then you might alternate it. Maybe you'll sit on one side of the camera on the left, and then you'll switch to the other side to the right so that there is variation as your intercutting. You probably wanna avoid interviewing someone in profile. There's a disconnect, whereas the connection is much stronger when I'm looking right at the viewer. You may intentionally want to disconnect and cut to the side, and that's a tool you can use. And I'll do that occasionally just to be able to have a cutaway to cut to something else. But I generally don't stay on the side very long. - What is a cutaway and when is the best time to get them? - A cutaway might be cut to their hands. Just the like being worried. You can shoot that during the interview in a moment when what they're saying isn't really gelling. Frederick Wiseman told me that he will often be shooting something, and then he'll tilt down to the hands, or to a pencil, or to their writing, and then suddenly they say something important, and he'll tilt back up. And he keeps the audio running the whole time so he doesn't lose anything. But he is able to get that insert in the moment, but restage it at the end if you have to. I've shot inserts months later in my house where I just had to find a wall that looked similar to the wall of the room where I did the interview, and I shot an insert of some kind or of myself and, you know, that classic nodding shot. I mean you wanna have as few nodding shots as possible. That's such a cliche, but sometimes you need it. Or just get a shot of them just sitting there not talking, waiting for you to start the interview. Your editor's gonna need as much source material is possible to work with. You also ideally wanna put the camera at eye level, but sometimes maybe you want a high angle, and that will sort of diminish the person if that's what your goal is to like have the god's eye view looking down upon the person. And you might also wanna shoot a low angle. Now, if you're shooting from below, it's sort of a heroic angle. It makes your subject appear to be super human, but be careful you're not looking up their nose. That's a kind of a danger with the low, one danger with the low angle. I usually shoot with three cameras, usually a closeup and a medium shot both from the same angle, and then maybe a wide shot off to the side. Occasionally, I'll take that third camera and I'll point it at myself like, 'cause I'm the interviewer, and I'll ask the question. - Okay, so what about the framing then? (upbeat music) ### [10:03](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fJ5ujccCU0&t=603s) Free Webinar with Roger Before we get to the framing, Roger is going to host a free, live, but limited webinar about documentary filmmaking, editing, and storytelling. And you can secure your seat right now, sign up through the link in the video description, you will be notified. You will also get a detailed cheat sheet of all the takeaways he shares in this video that you should keep handy when planning out your next documentary. So again, use the link and sign up now. And if you miss the live session, we will still send you a link to the rebroadcast. Back to lesson five, proper framing. ### [10:34](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fJ5ujccCU0&t=634s) Secret 5 - The typical framing is if I'm looking off to this side, you wanna put my head on the left side of frame and leave negative space in front of me. (moving music) Maybe you'll put a lower third, which is an ID, and that will cover the negative space. That's typical. Now, if it's where I'm looking directly at the camera, then you might just put me right in the center of the frame, and that feels okay too. - Now, let's say you're gonna look over here this way, right? And I'm gonna frame more like you looking off to the thing. Is that something that's a no-go or? - That's the wrong way to do it, but it also can work. In the Comedy Store documentary series, Mike Binder framed everybody that way, almost everybody, and we actually used it. It worked well because it was about comedians whose lives are out of balance. It's a shot that's out of balance that's in sync with the subject. - I can't stay long. I'm in between meals, so bear with me. (audience laughing) - And what about like pickups and, like do that again. - When I was shooting "Trekkies," we were using 16 millimeter film, and that's expensive. So we would try to plan every shot. I would do pre-interviews, and I would select soundbite I wanted. We would rehearse it, and I would say action. And they would say the line we want, and then cut, and then we would move on. If I don't get the line I need, I'll go back and get it. Go back and have them re-say something or turn the camera around and get an insert on yourself asking the question. Anything you can find that could be an insert or a cutaway. With video, I have a completely different style, and most people do this now, they just let the video roll. Where it adds up is on the time that your editor has to put into it, that's where you're gonna pay for it. But I'd rather have the camera rolling and shooting a complete interview that's useless than I miss something. - Now, so we kind of know how to shoot it. ### [12:32](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fJ5ujccCU0&t=752s) Secret 6 What about the questions? (intense music) - The interviewer's best skill is listening. Ask your question... - Then shut the up. The first one to speak loses. - [Interviewer] You know, there are American heroes who don't like this idea. I was very sad to see that because those guys are, yeah, you know, those guys are heroes of mine. So it's really tough. - People will indict themselves. They fill the space and eventually the id unloads itself, and that gives you gold. - [Interviewer] And to see them casting stones in your direction? (inense music) - It's difficult. - Another thing to be very careful of in interviews is how you frame your questions. Eliminate the lead ins. Don't say, okay, now this is a very important question. Just ask the question. It's the mistake that sometimes, you know, people make when they're telling a joke. Oh, this is a really funny story. Well, now you've set my expectations up here, and there's no way it's you're gonna reach it. Complete death for a question is a yes or no question. Do you like being a doctor? Yes, complete stop. Talk about what it feels like working in the ER. Now, you get them to go on for 30 minutes. Do not ask multi-part questions. Just ask one question at a time. If you ask a two part question, they're only gonna answer the second part. Keep your questions short, simple, concise. So you're not coming in with jumbled ideas that are half formed. Davis Guggenheim said his process is a little different. He puts all his questions on a piece of paper, and then he folds it up, and puts it in his back pocket, and doesn't look at it again, until the end of the interview to see if he missed anything. And he said he usually finds out he covered everything but he got more of an interaction, more of a conversation by not having questions in front of him because he feels like every time you go to, okay, next question. You've deflated the energy. It's more like a morning show interview. - So just explain, if anybody doesn't know, what has been announced. (intense music) - Another trick is to put your subjects at ease. Oh, your office is wonderful. Picture of your kids? That's terrific. That puts into a really comfortable mood with you, and use their name. Sven, I read your book. Sven, I love your office. This is amazing. And be sure to compliment their responses. They need to know how they're doing. They wanna hear from you that it's going well. And when the interview's over, tell 'em it went great, even if it didn't. Make them feel good about participating, because you're gonna need their help promoting your film when it's done. ### [15:14](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fJ5ujccCU0&t=914s) Secret 7 - One of the tips that you have in the book about doing a good interview, and this surprised me, is to actually ask a lot of why questions. I always thought like a why is a very controversial, like not controversial, like confrontational. - The most important thing is to ask why. That's what the documentary is about. I'm watching a documentary to learn why this happened. Why was there this school shooting? Why did they poison the water? Why do we exist? Why are marriages so much work? People will flock to your documentary if you've got good why questions. - Do you ask your why questions right away? Or do you warm up the interview before you get to them? - You wanna lead in carefully, and slowly, and ease into the tough questions. Start off with the factual questions. Those are easy. When I was shooting the "Nature of Existence," I would ask questions like that of the physicists, for instance, like how old is the universe? And then halfway through the interview I would throw in, is it a sin to masturbate? - Well, it's a strange question. - You can actually create an entire universe, and you've got nothing better to do, but worry whether people are putting their hands in their pants. Does that seem a little fishy? ### [16:22](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fJ5ujccCU0&t=982s) Secret 8 (upbeat music) - Don't be afraid to charge right in there. Get emotional, get aggressive. The camera gives you authority, and the person being interviewed will respond. I remember once when I was interviewing this archbishop in Loretto in Italy. I happened to just run across him when I was at this particular church or cathedral, and I said, "Oh, could I interview you? " And he said, 'Sure. " So I had my camera up and I started firing off questions, and my questions got harder and harder. I could see he was getting more and more uncomfortable, but he couldn't leave. He was stuck there because the camera was looking right at him. Can all religions be right? - I think, no. I know that in the world there are many and many religion. I know my religion is the true religion. - And then my tape ran out. As soon as the camera was off, he was gone. But I got the release form signed before he left at the beginning of the interview, so I was able to use it. Those are the interviews you want where people are a little off guard and off and they're kind of, they're, "I don't know. I don't like talking about this. " Great talk about it. Something else to be careful of is avoid superiority. The dumber you seem to your interview subjects, the better. If you seem like kind of an idiot, they'll try to help you. If you seem superior, they're more likely to clam up. ### [17:47](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fJ5ujccCU0&t=1067s) Secret 9 - [Sven] I want to pivot towards editing a little bit. Why is editing so important as part of the documentary filmmaking process? - Very often producers will go out and shoot a ton of footage and dump it on the editor and say, "Make this into something. " What they're saying is become a writer and write the documentary using this footage. So an editor has to understand story because that's how you'll find out where the flaw is, what's missing, and then you can tell your producer, we need more of this. One of the most important techniques in editing is putting like with like, if you don't know where to start, just find similar things. Start putting them in bins and eventually you can cut together a nugget of people talking about the same idea. And that will expand into a sequence. Pretty soon you've got a whole chapter, and maybe several chapters become an act. The editor is writing the documentary by building scenes out of individual units that are similar to each other, or compliment each other, are opposite to each other. It's very funny when you show someone say something, and you cut to someone saying the exact opposite. - [Denise] Who is your favorite captain? - Ah, it would have to be Captain Kirk. - I could almost say Janeway. - Janeway is a stud too, but... - [Denise] Who's your favorite captain? (John laughing) - I am. - [Roger] When you're editing, if you're not sure where to start, start at the ending. If you can find your two poles and you're pretty solid on here's where the film's gonna start and here's where it's gonna end. Now, you can start filling in the spaces in between, and it'll help cut down on the meandering of trying to get there. - I find that a lot of documentaries just have this, what I would call a talking head syndrome. It's just one interview after another, after another. Just soundbite, over soundbite. - Yeah, try to avoid soundbite after soundbite. Or they're called soundbite trains. I'm guilty of this. I have a lot of them. What I try to do, and what you should try to do, is cover it up with B roll. Cut to what they're talking about. Get stock footage, get stills, animation, digital effects, anything to cut away from people's heads talking. Only go there when you absolutely have to, or it's really an emotional moment and you're getting a lot of information from their face. Try to challenge yourself to cut to anywhere else you can. - Well, maybe then to finish off ### [20:05](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fJ5ujccCU0&t=1205s) Roger's Book so you wrote this book. - Occasionally, I get a phone call or an email from somebody. "Hey, I've got a documentary idea. What do you think of this? " And I realized they're all making the same mistakes. I was repeating myself over and over again. So I wrote it down. So now I can go, "Great questions. Here's my book. " I really wanted to have, here's the go-to manual for everything you need to know to be a successful documentary filmmaker - [Sven] Roger's book, "The Documentarian, just came out. and you can grab it now by clicking the link in the video description. This book is a must read. It not only covers how to make a good documentary, but also how to make it happen from concept to pitching, production, editing, to selling your film. This is actually the second time Roger and I spoke. The first time was when he shared tips on editing comedies, which turned into an amazing video with over 500,000 views. - Go, go, go. - [Sven] And I highly recommend you check that out because his advice is invaluable. - [Roger] In improv comedy particularly, they have a rule called "Yes, and... " - [Actor] Yes, they are orphans. - [Roger] The rule comes from the idea that if you're in a scene with somebody and they throw an idea to you, you wanna catch it. - [Actor] Did you say orphans? - Yes, the apartment comes with orphans. - Oh - Yes, yes. - [Roger] Add to it and throw it back. - Does the landlord mind if I paint? - Well, you can't paint the orphans. No, but you can paint the walls. - [Roger] You don't wanna stop the progression by saying something negative. For example, if someone says... - Hey man, I got you this new pen. - [Roger] And if you say... - "That's actually not a pen, that's a fish. And you dumb. (buzzer buzzing) - [Roger] You stopped all movement. And then the scene is over. --- *Источник: https://ekstraktznaniy.ru/video/18134*