Pre-Production: Cinematography Research - Buddy Squires

Introduction

During my research, I came across an article from the website documentary.org about a cinematographer named Buddy Squires. Buddy Squires was awarded 'Outstanding Documentary Achievement in Cinematography' in 2007 in which he was surprised he won as his career was still 'in working progress'. This article explores some tips and information about Buddy which will hopefully give me a better understanding on how to become an effective documentary cinematographer.

"Most of his work is done in people's homes because the subject felt more at ease there."

Buddy's success has led his cinematic work to have 18 Emmys and 8 Oscar nominations. But what makes his work so successful? Quoted by Ken Burns, one of Buddy's co-ventures, Ken says that "Most of his work is done in people's homes because the subject felt more at ease there." Although this isn't entirely relevant to Mockumentaries due to them being constructed versions of reality, this idea of filming in the character's comfortable habitat is what I hope to incorporate into our Mockumentary - however taking advantage of this idea of allowing 'the subject to feel at ease' and twist it so that we see the Documentary Crew almost 'spy' on the characters in their comfortable habitats.

For example, we see the Crew spying on a conversation between Chantelle and her father in her father's car, which is likely to be much more relaxed compared to being in front of the camera. This enables the audience to view a different perspective of the characters off-camera (despite still being on camera) to see what they're like when they aren't on camera. This happens a couple other times:
   - John having a breakdown in his car and on the phone to his mother
   - Chantelle bribing John
   - Jamie going to talk to Ruby and then realising the camera is there.

"No cinematographer is invisible. People notice you, but you can make it a comfortable experience for them. If people feel that you respect them and aren't invading their privacy, they'll treat you like a friend."

Taken from the article on documentary.org

Here Buddy explores how building a relationship with the auditionee is a successful way of gaining effective footage. Although our auditionees are actors and what we are filming is all fixed, I feel that it is still important to engage in a close relationship with the actors in order for them to maximise their experience and perform to their highest standards. Buddy then goes onto to explaining ways of bringing relationship together is to "be calm, act confident and be patient". Therefore, having a close bond with my actors will potentially improve their performance by enabling them to feel much more relaxed, thus enabling communication to increase.


Reference:
http://www.documentary.org/feature/outstanding-documentary-achievement-cinematography-award-visual-poet-buddy-squires