Reflection

So today I set up quite a few interviews, and one in particular was with my athletic trainer Alana Alpert. I wanted to reflect on this interview specifically because I had completed the interview and was packing up my equipment, and as I was doing this Alana and I continued to talk about different technologies. During this conversation Alana started to say some really interesting things about technology and how it is used on campus and I noticed she had gotten really animated and into the conversation. Therefore I was really upset that I had turned the camera off and wasn't able to record what she was saying. I had a decision to make, it was between shrugging off this missed footage, which is what Barry Hampe suggests in his book, Making Documentary Films and Videos. Hampe states, "If you don't have the footage, then as far as this film is concerned, it never happened. Don't worry about it. Work with the visual evidence you do have" (67). However, my second choice was to just ask Alana to say what she had said over again. This is something that Hampe also mentions in his book. He actually describes one moment in particular where he was interviewing a police captain for a documentary he was making and because of technical issues he asks the captain to repeat what he is saying multiple times. However, in this example Hampe suggests not to do this because when the captain had to repeat himself multiple times he "had been reduced to a boring bureaucrat, spouting officialese and qualifying every statement" (63). Although, this is a negative quality that occurs when you ask the person you are interviewing to repeat themselves I decide to go with my gut and asked Alana to repeat what she had been saying for the camera. I decided to go in this direction because this is my senior project and I didn't want to take any chances in missing out on some quality information that could be useful.

However, it is only now that I am starting to regret my decision but only slightly, I guess I am regretting it enough to write about it, but I think I made the right decision. I guess what it comes down to is I am a little disappointed with myself because I was really hoping I could go through shooting without having to ask people to repeat themselves. I didn't want what happened to the captain in Hampe's story to happen to me and therefore I told myself I wouldn't make the same mistakes he made. However, to cut myself some slack I don't think it hurt when I asked Alana to repeat the same thing she had said, her personality hadn't changed from the rest of the interview and she was able to pretty much repeat everything I had found interesting.

My interaction with Alana was also interesting because I definitely noticed a difference in her behavior off and on camera. When the camera was off and we continued to talk about the subject she was much more energetic and passionate, however when the camera was on it wasn't like she was less energetic but she definitely seemed less passionate. Hampe also warns against this saying, "you can't just plop people down in front of a camera, tell them to be themselves, and start recording. What you'll get is people trying to remember how they act when they are being themselves" (64). Although I think Alana was acting like herself she definitely changed in front of the camera, which I think is going to be inevitable. I think some people feel like they have to act a certain way when the cameras are on, and in this case Alana acted more professional. I haven't noticed this with everyone I have interviewed, most of the people I am friends with act like themselves because they are comfortable, I think it all depends, it is just an interesting thing to take note of.

Since we are on the subject of interviews I also want to make note a new interview possibility. During Alana's interview she mentions the social network Twitter and it reminded me of the St. Lawrence twitter account, which is actually operated by someone in admissions, Tim Akers. Tim is also responsible for SLU's other forms of media like their facebook pages and even a tumblr account. Therefore, I am going to send Tim an email and see if he would be willing to talk to me about his job and how SLU is involved with these social networks and why they chose to use these different mediums.

Works Cited

Hampe, Barry. Making Documentary Films and Videos. New York: Holt Paperbacks, 2007.