Pre-Video Assignment, Smith

The Good:


This video does a good job of telling a very vivid story. There is a good mix of both natural sound, voice overs, and interview footage. There is a really good use of the b-roll footage that they had and use it in between the narration to tell the story. They used pictures, b-roll, and interview footage in this project. They use specific examples and give background to the story. It was also I think creative to use the black and white pictures during the time that they were talking about the history of the high school. There were good transitions and the video quality of the multiple videos in different settings all matched each other well.

The Bad:

This video has a good use of graphics and transitions but there is one reason I deem the overall video as not that good. The main story was about a woman and her son living off of $7.50 an hour. The mother works at McDonalds and the short documentary illustrated her life through all financial aspects. With the mom being the focal point of this project, I think that they did a very poor job with her interviews and the placement of the cameras. They did some close up shots, but they also had a reoccurring shot they used to interview her where the camera was angled up at her. Although I think that possibly they could have chosen this angle to incorporate the background of her living room in the shot, I think that they could have done a better job portraying their main subject. This angle does not compliment her well and I think that they could have implemented other angles besides that one to accomplish a multi-shot interview. Otherwise, this project does a good job telling a story, especially their use of graphics.