KisamboMedia

BASIC SHORT DOCUMENTARY WORKSHOP

This 4-Week Workshop is designed to take you through all major stages of factual filmmaking. The workshop will provide you with all the skills necessary to produce your own 5-minute film. You will cover:

1. STORYTELLING
• Finding Good Stories • Developing Story Ideas • Research Character Driven Stories • Story Focus • Story Structure • Basic Script Writing • Basic Storyboarding • Shot List Development

2. PRODUCING AND DIRECTING YOUR FILM
• Location Scouting • Release Forms • Permits • Logistics
• Promoting your Film • Doing a Recce • Telling stories through Pictures and Sound • Directing story Participants • Directing Camera and Sound • Developing Questions • Interview Techniques

3. CAMERA LIGHTING AND SOUND
• Learning to operate your own Camera and Microphone optimally • Framing and Composition • Mood and Atmosphere • Quality of Light • Camera Angles • Deciding on Visual Themes • Music and Copyright • Room Tone and Ambient Sounds • Recording Location Sound • Recording Interviews • Filming and Recording Actuality

4. EDITING
• Editing Software • Organizing your Footage • Transcribing • Developing a Paper Edit • Bringing Pictures and Sound together • Creating Pace and Rhythm • Blending Pictures, Sound and Music • Exporting Final Film • Different Formats • Uploading onto your own on-line channel or platform • Designing and Maintaining your Channel or platform

YOUR TUTORS:

HEIN UNGERER:
[Storytelling, Research and content development, Interviewing Skills]
Hein has been in radio and television broadcasting for 30 years.
He spent half of this time working for the SABC and the other half working mainly as a freelance investigative journalist/producer for M-Net's Carte Blanche.
The story he is probably best known for is the expose he did on the 'Tuli Elephant' scandal.
Hein has won several local and international awards.
For the past four years Hein has been running television workshops for the following Institutions:
"AFDA" (2010) teaching television production to 2nd and 3rd year students .
"Big Fish School of Digital Filmmaking" (2011 to present) where he is the Head Mentor for the NQF4 class.
"The Centre for Film and Media Studies” at UCT where he has for the past five years run several production workshops, and is currently involved in their "Stepping Stone" project.
He also started teaching Documentary Filmmaking at the SAE Institute this year.

RUAN LOTTER:
[Camera and Lighting, Editing, Visual Effects, New Media Development]
Ruan, a filmmaker from Cape Town, has directed / DP-ed and edited several short-films. He is experienced working with small budgets and small crews. Within those parameters he manages to achieve a high quality, cinematic look using DSLR cameras. His speciality is the Canon 5D mkii.
Ruan also has an extensive IT background which he uses in his filmmaking. His on-going interest in new technologies first led him to explore the world of DLSR filmmaking and increasingly powerful Visual Effects software. When you meet him he will tell you he has never looked back.
He specializes in Editing, Colour Grading, Visual Effects and Motion Graphics using software such as Final Cut Pro / Adobe Premiere / Adobe After Effects / 3Dsmax and Boujou.
He currently runs a YouTube channel called TunnelvizionTV where he showcases VFX related videos and tutorials.

GREG McEWAN-KOCOVAOS:
[Sound Design, Sound Editing, Enhancing stories through sound]
Greg specializes in sound design, effects placement, editing, sound engineering, re-recording, synchronization and Dolby Surround final mixes.
Greg currently works at e.TV in Cape Town. His main focus here is on long-form documentaries produced by Sabido Productions (Factuals and Crime & Investigation), NHU (National History Unit), eProductions (a division of e.TV in Cape Town, South Africa) and eNCA (e News Channel Africa).
Greg has done final broadcast mixes on long-form documentaries for both local and international markets and prepared films for broadcasters such as National Geographic, Sky TV, Animal Planet, Discovery Channel etc.