Blog: This weekend we are finally beginning to film. We still don't have a focus for a film which is starting to frustrate all of us. I really feel like I need to have something to direct my attention to, like a focus, and not having one is driving me a little crazy. I'm hoping that over the weekend something pops out to us and we find a focus/topic to work with! The filming that is happening this weekend is going to be b-roll of Leah's family away at their cabin for the weekend. Leah will be shooting her family gathering and the interactions made between her sister and her parents. Sarah and I plan to think of interview questions tomorrow in class during VOICES. Then we will all be contributing to the group documentary in some way.
Response: When reading this article, I paid particular attention to the framing questions section. That was very useful to me. From this section I learned that using general questions is not always the best idea. There should only be focused questions to choose from. Also that it is not a good idea to use long, intricate questions because your interviewee will not remember all that was asked and their response may then be useless. Another good thing to think about when preparing questions is the phrasing of a question. If you manipulate a question in hoping to get a particular response, the answer will be yes or no and also useless. Framing questions around previous information and elaborating on them is the key to good questions. This leaves the interviewee feeling in control about what their response is. These ideas that I learned with be very helpful when Sarah and I ponder possible questions tomorrow in class.
A problem arose in my mind as I read the article section titled Who Interviews. Sarah, Leah and I thought that all of us would be doing the interviews, but mainly Leah because her family is most comfortable around her. However after reading the section I thought maybe Leah being there wouldn't be the best idea. Leah spends all of her time with our interviewees. Perhaps if she interviewed them they wouldn't tell a story because she already knows it, wouldn't be comfortable sharing information if it is about Leah, or Leah asked a question while fishing for a particular answer, as brought up in another section. These are concerns of mine. I'm glad that the article brought this up because we may have unknowingly given up good interview information if Leah was doing all of the interviews.
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