The Mini Doc
Introduction
Meet Jay DellaValle. A father, husband, business owner, entertainer, musician, DJ and songwriter. To add to the list, Jay also happens to be my neighbor! Having a neighbor with a unique entertainment business who plays in a band and DJs made me wonder: How does he do it? Many musicians struggle to make income, but Jay knew how to turn his passion into a successful livelihood.
For my final video design project, I knew Jay was the perfect candidate for a mini documentary. The 7 minute documentary dives into his business, Spinners Entertainment, and how he combines his passions for music, entrepreneurship, and family.
Research
Before starting my project on Jay, I did some research on documentaries and filming. While taking my video design course, I read “The Bare Bones Camera Course for Film and Video,” by Tom Schroeppel. In chapters seven and nine, he goes over lighting and conducting a shoot.
When it comes to lighting for video, it's important to consider the setting, natural lighting and the tools to have. For exterior lighting, it's beneficial to have a reflector to help reflect the natural sunlight or a fill light to create your own extra lighting. The downside to a fill light however is you would need an outlet to plug it in. When lighting indoors, there are three types of lights that are commonly used. These include focusing quartz, broads and softlights. The focusing quartz light is like a spotlight for movies. It creates a focused circle of light for the subject. Broad lights are less focused and spreads out more light. To soften this light, you would reflect it off a ceiling or wall. However, softlights are more convenient as they can be used anywhere. When placing your lights, it's important to use the three point method. By having a fill light, back light and key light, it adds depth to your subject.
When it comes time to shoot, it's important to use slates and plan your shots to have an idea of what to film. A slate helps mark your shots so when editing you know exactly what to expect in each shot. When planning your shots, it's a good idea to create a script to plan what shots to take. In an uncontrolled environment, like a breaking news story, it's important to grab shots with the best composition as possible and basic sequences.
While conducting my research, I also looked at different mini-documentary examples for inspiration and to see what looks good and what can look better. I focused on documentaries about musicians and small businesses, which is what my mini documentary is about. Below are a few examples that I found.
The Kid LAROI
This mini doc of The Kid Laroi is a video I chose as a strong reference because it's a profile on a musician that's short and to the point. I like the variety of Broll in the video as well as the flow of the soundbites. The video allowed Laroi and his colleagues to share the story themselves with a variety of bites creating one consistent narrative. This is the goal I have for my final min doc. I also liked the effects incorporated in the interview clips to make it more visually appealing.
Nissi
This is another mini doc on a musician that I found to be really compelling. With an even shorter timespan, the soundbites create one cohesive narrative that's easy to follow with a variety of elements to the story. I also really enjoyed the editing in this video. The variety of shots really made it visually interesting as well as the cuts. The background music also set a tone that made the video more engaging.
Pickles Pub
This video is a profile piece on a small local business. It's a good story with strong audio and interview clips, except there is definitely room for improvement with the Broll. To start, most of the Broll was shaky. This could've been easily avoided by using a tripod or even cleaning some *slightly* shaky clips with warp stabilizer. Another flaw in the Broll I noticed was a lot of the footage was out of focus. This could have also been fixed if the camera was recording a little longer and the videographer payed closer attention to the focus.
Pre-Production
Then, I needed to create my interview questions:
Music background
What made you pursue music?
How old were you when you started?
When did you realize it would be your livelihood
Spinners Entertainment
What is Spinners entertainment?
How did Spinners come about?
What inspired you to start it?
What makes Spinners unique?
How does it tie into your music?
What are some challenges you face?
How did you make your business grow?
Owls and Lions
When did the band start?
How did you guys meet?
What made you decide to start a band?
Explain the connection between the band and Spinners.
How often do you perform?
How often do you record?
How do you make a living from your music?
Where does your inspiration come from?
What are some challenges you face?
How do you keep the band growing?
Then and Now
How has raising a family changed your life as a performer?
What is your ultimate goal with your music/business?
How do you manage to raise a family and keep the music alive?
What advice would you give to aspiring musicians and/or entrepreneurs?
What is it like running a business while managing, producing and performing in a band?
Before filming and editing my project, there were some logistics I needed to consider beforehand. The first thing I thought of was what will the story angle be? What will the story focus on?
I decided to make this piece a profile business piece, that will focus more on Jay’s entertainment business and band, while incorporating a little bit of his family life into the mix. Taking a business story and being able to humanize it is something I’m very passionate about, on top of sharing the stories of unique individuals.
Jay is very unique as he found a formula to let music and entertainment be his source of income to raise and support his family. I wanted to pick his brain and dive deep into his business and creative decisions and how they influenced his overall career.
Jay also has many facets and this story can go in many different directions, so I wanted to challenge myself by boiling down 4 hours of Broll and interview footage into a 7 minute profile piece.
Production
To film my Broll and interview, I used a Canon DSLR T5i and used various microphones for different settings. For the interview, I used a lighting kit to create the three-point lighting dimension. The interview took place at Jay’s house, for a quiet, intimate setting. This project allowed me to learn and grow and further sparked my passion for video storytelling. Some challenges I faced were technical difficulties with the interview audio. However, with the use of Adobe's AI audio cleaner and my own editing on Premier Pro, I managed to fix the dialogue quality.
I also filmed a total of four hour Broll and interview footage. The biggest challenge was boiling the story down into a few minutes, with a lot of components. However, by allowing the story to speak for itself and focusing on the main story components, I managed to edit the bites down into a cohesive narrative.
