The narrative view is universally used technique. Even if a person is filmed as a straight interview, often there is a section where the subject’s voice is heard, but the person is not seen. This is the narrative.
It’s a challenge for any filmmaker to produce a corporate video using narrative alone. One thing that works against this technique is time; to produce a narrative video there must be plenty of other footage showing the person talking actually doing something.
Day 8 The Narrative View from Tallboy Communications on Vimeo.
And when you watch someone on video making a cup of tea, the process of filming that sequence probably entailed the person making the same cup of tea at least three times. Hence why this technique can be time consuming. But useful for practicing tea-making skills.
The tea-making example raises another challenge. Making tea is not that exciting. Neither is walking along the street or being in a meeting. Even if there is lots of meaningless pointing by the participants. So it’s finding a task that the person can do that‘s natural to them, that also looks visually appealing and can be controlled in the filming process. So probably not a good idea to film a transplant team in action. Maybe best to stick to tea.
See the Narrative View in Action – Click here
