Callum: Similar Product Research & Shot Analysis (Charlie Brooker's Gameswipe)

One of the most recent documentaries on videogames to be played on British TV is Charlie Brooker's Gameswipe, shown on BBC Four in 2009.  Hosted by British TV critic and ex-games journalist Charlie Brooker.  It's presented in a rather expository way that explains things for non-game players, but also goes into enough detail to appeal to actual gamers and not make them feel talked down to.  Seeing as the target audience for the documentary is, seemingly, men in the age range of 18 to 30 that either do or do not play videogames; this style fits.

It uses relatively simple techniques - interviews with an off-screen interviewer, direct-to-camera pieces and lots of file footage - but these are buoyed by other techniques such as humorous visualisations of non-sequitors and metaphors, sections where Brooker talks to the camera whilst playing the game he's talking about, and sardonically commenting on said file footage.  Some of these techniques are perfect examples of reportage, whilst others are more reminiscent of entertainment shows.   They help vary the style, keep the pace and make it interesting for the viewers, though, especially non-gamers.

The actual shooting style, however, is very simple.  Consisting almost entirely of Mid Shots and Medium Close-Ups; editing that purely utilises cuts and, sometimes, fades/dissolves.  There is, however, in the switch between multiple wildly different scenes and sections, a recurring image of, presumably, a Spectrum reset screen.  It makes an effective crash transition and makes a nice easy section break.  An indicator to the viewer that it's time to move on.

The institution that the show was broadcasted on is the BBC.  This documentary educational and informative, yet entertaining; easily achieving the three key aims of BBC programming.  This may be due to the production company of the show, Zeppotron, being an entertainment show company more than anything else (one responsible for such shows as 8 Out Of 10 Cats and A Touch Of Cloth among others), helping them avoid the supposed stuffiness of the usual documentary.  Seeing as they are an entertainment company, we probably shouldn't take many of their production techniques or audience research styles for use in our own project.

Gameswipe is hosted by Charlie Brooker, a man, funnily enough.  And all of the extra contributors are men, barring Rebecca Mayes whose gimmick is that she reviews games whilst playing music.  Being very male dominated, this makes the documentary fit two pre-conceptions.  The first: documentaries are fronted by men.  Second: games are mostly for men and, consequently, only men will be interested in the subject.  This is something that we could subvert by having a more prominent female contribution to the program; possibly even as a co-host.

This style of documentary is very appealing to me as it manages to remain interesting to the viewer throughout.  There's hardly a moment where it sags and, I believe, it's thanks to the informal presenting style.  Rather than drone on for 5 minutes in an extremely dry manner about one specific subject, Brooker and the show keep things moving and, for the times when it does slow down to focus on one topic, it's always livened up by a good joke or insightful line popping up every few seconds.  We could do well to take this style of documentary and apply it to ours for our target audience.

Shot Analysis
In the opening five minutes of the documentary, excluding the elaborate animated title sequence, there are a total of 29 different shots (not counting changes in camera angles during the file footage).  Of those 29 shots, 19 are different pieces of file footage.  That equates to an average of 10.3 shots a minute, though the sheer length of several pieces of the file footage definitely brings the shot total down considerably.  Average shot length varies between 30 seconds, for extended file footage and more elaborate sections of Brooker talking to the camera, and about 5 seconds, during short flashes of some pieces of file footage and Brooker making humorous asides to the camera.

A frequently used shot type is the Medium Close Up.  This is used almost whenever Brooker is talking to the camera and brings an air of authority to proceedings.  These are the serious moments where Brooker starts getting across genuine points.  He's both authoritative but also a relaxing presence; he's not getting completely up in your face and his demeanour is very relaxed.

The other frequently used shot type is the Mid Shot.  The usage of natural lighting and Brooker being sat on a couch creates a rather informal mood, like the viewer and him are buddies having a conversation and either watching TV or playing games together.  At the same time, he uses it to relay important information to the viewer; making these informal seeming situations just as formal as the previous shot style.  However, Brooker also uses these shots to sardonically quip on what footage has been shown, retaining the air of informality.

Occasionally, the show switches up its shot types to instil a sense of variety. This Long Shot, for example, gives the audience a sense of the environment nearby.  Plus, the sheer pullback of the shot gives the audience things to focus on besides Brooker.  For example, the TV and the ZX Spectrum that he's talking about in this sequence.  He would later pick up the Spectrum, turning it into a prop, and the shot would switch to an MCU of Brooker holding the Spectrum, switching the audience's point of focus.

For this contributor/interview segment, the shot type is a Two Shot that also doubles as a kind of Mid Shot.  It clearly shows both participants in the interview with no particular emphasis on one person or the other, save for the person on the right being more forward and forceful in the delivery of his answer/his section.  The pole in-between them gives one of them something to lean on, emphasising his less confrontational style, cleanly separates the two sides of the screen and, consequently, the interviewees and gives something for the audience to centre their gaze on.

Oftentimes during this interview segment, as well as interspersing file footage of what the two interviewees are talking about, it'll switch to Close Ups of the person talking at the time.  This is more to vary up the shots of the documentary, more than anything else, but it also provides extra emphasis on the person speaking.  The documentary guiding the viewers gaze to a specific place on the screen.

Kyle: How has your chosen genre developed over time?

How has sexism in gaming developed over the years?

As depicted in the first post, the project we have decided to produce a documentary with its genre being gaming and sexism in gaming.

The industry of gaming itself has developed thoroughly over the years, from “Pong!” being developed and created in the early 70's to some of the most expanded gaming franchies in the last 20 years, including the Call of Duty and Warcraft series', both dominating the gaming markets. However, most of the franchises around today rarely include female protagonists, and those that do usually depict them poorly, as they are usually seen as the “damsel in distress”. Considering a good percent of the world constantly play video games, the way these games depict them are also affecting how women are seen in the outside world, especially in more violent games such as Grand Theft Auto IV (2008), where it is implied it is OK to beat up innocent women for no reason (which usually leads to sexual violence cases in courts).
It is not to be implied, however, that there are no game franchises whatsoever that do not feature female protagonists. This is shown in the Tomb Raider franchise, which has developed well since its debut to the industry in 1996. It has crossed through several industry's such as the video game industry and, subs-sequentially, the film industry, producing 2 films currently to date; Lara Croft: Tomb Raider (2001) and Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life (2003). Ignoring the concepts of other video games, this video game features Lara Croft as a strong adventurer hunting in ancient relics, finding ways through anything she encounters on her journey (human, natural or other). Her human opponents are almost all male, who are usually defeated by Lara and are seen as helpless, which flips the sexism table so that men are seen as lower than women.

There are some games with female protagonists, and some games where women are shot for no reason. Thats right; those games ACTUALLY exist.

How have documentary's developed over the years?

As we know, documentary's dated back originally in 1895. But the term “documentary” wasn't invented until 1922, when the first official documentary was released: Nanook of the North. Nowadays, documentaries have crossed into the film industry and have been able to produce sub-genres i.e. Docudramas, docusoaps etc. Documentaries has seen a fair few theorists study them closely to try and analyse them, a good example of this being Bill Nichols, who looked at the history of documentary and identified 6 distinct modes; observational (“window on the world”), participatory (interaction between director and actors), reflexive (awareness of the process), performative (filmmakers as participant), expository (“voice of God”) and poetic (subjective, artistic expression). These mode's were used to categorise documentaries, making the range of styles between them distinct and recognisable.

Another theorist who has helped to apply theory to documentaries is Michael Rabiger. He was an expert in documentaries, considering he had written Directing the Documentary (1998), and believed that a documentary “should adhere to certain conventions in order to be considered a proper documentary”. An example of this criteria is that a documentary should “not really value neutral information like a textbook”, meaning that the documentary should not be biased in favour of either side of the story being told in the documentary.

Documentaries have also passed through into the film industry, shown through docu-films such as Senna (2010), which depicted the life and career of three times Formula 1 Brazilian World Champion Ayrton Senna.

Documentaries have developed well since their official branding 90 years ago, and still stand today as very popular, as they cover the majority of topics available, including nature-relevant documentaries (such as Bear Grylls) and (relevant to our project) gaming-related documentaries.

Past documentaries Bear Grylls: Man vs Wild, Nanook of the North and Senna

Both: Initial Ideas And Initial Treatment

Our group for this A2 project consists of Callum Petch and Kyle Edwards and we are both doing a documentary together.  We have set two deadlines for our project; the film needs to be completed and burnt to a DVD by December 21st and the evaluation of the product needs to be completed by February 14th.

Subject, Length & Purpose

We have chosen to base our documentary on Representations of Women and Sexism in Videogames through the ages (which, in the grand scheme of projects, would be an extract from a TV series on videogames).  It will last roughly 5 minutes, maybe a couple of seconds either side.  The purpose of the documentary is to inform and educate whilst also remaining interesting and accessible to those who don't necessarily know much about or are that interested in videogames.  This fits with our audience of 18-30 year olds with a slight focus more towards women for the extract, given the topic of the "episode".

Style

Our style will be informal but in the "keeping things interesting" sense, rather than being unprofessional or straight comedy.  It will be age-appropriate, as such, and educational for those who are looking to learn.  It will also be argumentative as a way of calling for a better representations of female characters and actual stories as the extract progresses.

Budget

The budget for this project is at a maximum of £40, though we are aiming to keep it as low as humanly possible.  This is taking into account if we need any props, costumes, transport and such that other people don't happen to have or have access to.  Hopefully, though, we shouldn't need to worry too much about that.

Equipment

As for equipment: we will be utilising a video camera, a camera tape or card for recording on to, screen capture software on a computer to record appropriate videogame footage, a tripod to steady the camera and some prop consoles and controllers for specific "talking to the camera" sections.

Genre Theory

John Hartley once said that "genres... limit the potential of a given text."  This means that the conventions of a documentary limit the documentary's ability to be anything but.  We plan to challenge this concept by adhering to certain conventions of a documentary (voice over, file footage, etc.) whilst subverting and breaking other conventions (having a female co-host for a talk about sexism, for example).