Factual film-making is an overcrowded profession and there’s no shortage of good ideas being sent to broadcast and online commissioners. With only the best stories finding a buyer, how can you distinguish between a strong and a weak idea for a documentary or current affairs film? And how do you present a film proposal in a way that grabs the attention of a reader from the top and keeps them reading to the very end? This chapter covers the process of treatment writing from initial idea to submitted proposal. Here you’ll learn about offering relevant and timely ideas; the kinds of stories and approaches that make good films – and those that don’t; how to draft your idea into a strong, easy to read proposal that captures the essence of the idea; and how to pitch the proposal in person if you’re lucky enough to attract a commissioner’s interest.

To visualise your film effectively - whether you are directing a professional camera operator or self-shooting - you need an ability to choose images that are appropriate to the part of the narrative they’ll be illustrating; a clear view of how you wish to film each image; and an understanding of the basic rules of filmic grammar. In this chapter you’ll find the core information you’ll need to direct or shoot relevant, well-composed images that will edit together. Also here are suggestions for making the best use of on-camera reporters – and how to decide what words your reporter should say to camera on location when the script for most factual films is not written until the story is edited together. Many of the examples in this chapter are illustrated with specially filmed sequences that can be viewed on this website.

Crafting a documentary or current affairs film also requires careful thought about the characters who will appear in your film. How do you decide who is – and who isn’t - going to perform well on camera? How can you coax the best performance out of your interviewees? How should you film, light and record their voices to make them look and sound great? This chapter offers some broad visual, audio, editorial and interview management principles to guide directors and self-shooters on how to bring back nicely composed, well lit, interesting, cuttable interviews. This will be enough information to keep your film editor happy, but not so much that - in the early part of a film-maker’s career - you become overwhelmed with techniques that you are not likely to need on many factual film shoots.

Story telling in a factual film is very different to story telling in the world of writing. A narrative unfolds on paper in two dimensions: illustrations on a page might draw a reader’s attention to a story in an eye catching way, but how engaged the reader is from moment to moment is entirely down to the writing skills of the author conveying the content. Engaging an audience with a film narrative is a multi-dimensional task in which it’s the balance of the sound and visual ingredients conveying a narrative that can give a film the power to capture an audience’s attention. This chapter outlines the process, makes suggestions for the kind of visual mix of ingredients needed to make any kind of film and offers an explanation of what’s called the linear narrative, the kind of story telling that works in factual films.

Discovering a film narrative hidden in an unruly mass of specially shot images, interviews, actuality sequences, stills and archive is a slow process of discovery. The raw ingredients of a film contain almost as many different cuts as there are film-makers to conceive them and editors to craft the visuals together. There’s no one correct finished version, no one right way to transform your rushes into a finished film. But there are better ways to do this, ways that prove to be more engaging for an audience. And there are worse ways that will leave your viewers at best yawning, at worst struggling for comprehension. In this chapter I will suggest a way of approaching the edit that will help you assemble the spine of your story, craft it into an engaging narrative and finally polish your cut into a strong, watchable film.

Today’s media landscape has been transformed by the meteoric rise of online and social media platforms. Factual producers and directors with an idea to sell now have a wider range of outlets for their work than ever before: Vice, Buzzfeed, NBCs Left Field, Field of Vision, CNNs Great Big Story, ProPublica, Business Insider, Vox, London 360, BBC Stories and others are all vying for strong factual films. Some broadsheet newspapers, notably The Guardian and the New York Times, have even opened documentary film commissioning departments. The downside of this digitally transformed film-making landscape is a lot of insecurity and a noticeable lack of money. It’s tough making a living making online films. So what do you need to know to survive in this digital landscape? In this chapter I’ve spoken to key online execs and commissioners to discover their survival advice.

Producers and directors need to demonstrate that they’ve done their best to ensure that their crew comes back safely and without incident, and that any potential harm to contributors or people unconnected with the shoot have, as far as possible, been minimized. Risk reduction is an important part of preparing for any research or film trip and must be taken seriously if you wish to keep your film-making reputation intact. Completing a risk assessment form is now part and parcel of the process of obtaining insurance to cover research and shooting trips. In this chapter I am going to look at the methodology behind reducing risks, offer insights into how best to assess the potential harm of any a factual production trip and outline the kind of information you’ll need to consider to complete a risk assessment form.

Factual film-making is driven forwards by creative inspiration – but however much flair you have, imagination must be underpinned by rigorous organisation or you’ll be overwhelmed by irreconcilable demands on your scarce time and resources. A systematic approach towards the logistics of your production allows you to create a space in which your vision can be executed. If you are not methodical, your filming and editing will over-run and the stress of this happening will prevent you from being able to craft a strong programme. In this chapter I offer some practical suggestions to help the process run like clockwork: how to prepare yourself for the task of filming; how to plan your shoot; and how to anticipate the time-sensitive and meticulous preparations needed to ensure your edit and post-production run smoothly.

This chapter is for more experienced film-makers who wish to make undercover investigations. Investigative journalism plays a key role in our democratic culture. By shining a search-light on corrupt, criminal or unethical actions that powerful individuals would rather keep under wraps, journalistic investigations underpin an informed democratic process. Modern digital technology has made undercover approaches easier than ever before. But what issues should a film-maker consider before embarking on an undercover film? Here I discuss the kind of evidence needed to persuade a commissioner to approve an undercover project; the legal aspects of your investigation; the safety of your production team and your contributors; and the judgment the outside world is likely to make about your actions once news of the film reaches a wider audience – in other words, the ethical dimension of your approach.

This chapter is also aimed at more experienced film-makers who wish to run projects through their own companies. Film-making is an expensive business, and if you overspend on a commissioned film you’re unlikely to be given a budget for another one. A budget is really just a categorized shopping list, albeit a sophisticated one. But if you’re costing a factual film for the first time, the detail required can look intimidating: it’s not always immediately obvious what some of the categories are for, whether you need to include them and, if you do, what the costs might be. This chapter demystifies the production budget by deconstructing it line-by-line. I explain the more obscure, technical or complicated spending categories and suggest what must be considered to complete each one. My comments are addressed both at reasonably budgeted films – and at those being made on low budgets.