Major Project: Research-Drift Queen

Major Project: Research-Drift Queen

For the final part of proper source material research in the lead up to the creation of our documentary. I came across a brand new, online exclusive documentary series entitled "drift queen". I watched the trailer and was immediately intrigued by the premise of the show. It's story and primary contributor seemed to emulate exactly what we were trying to achieve with our project. As such I watched the first few episodes of the series and began taking notes immediately. My findings are presented below. 

• Contributor introduces themself, their dad (and other people that will play a big role in the doc), as well as the aims of the documentary straight away.
• Use of stock footage (old clips of presenter racing) to help us visualise the points she discusses.
• The presenter talks about their childhood memories (humanising them).
• Great use of montages early on and throughout when they need to move the narrative along quickly.
• Interviews are trimmed and edited down to get to the key points.
• Presenter sits with their dad and goes through old clips from when they were a kid (this really helps us connect with them).
• They use their childhood bedroom as a “diary room”.
• The presenter makes their aim in this documentary clear, and also talks about the challenges they might face.
• A cool fast-paced and steady narrative is maintained throughout.
• The presenter “bigs up” each contributor before we meet them (builds up hype), with voice over we may be able to do the same.
• Loads of relevant cutaways used.
• After each interview, the presenter talks about what they’ve learned from each contributor and how their feeling after. We should try to emulate this in some way (likely through voice-over) in our film.
• Cool use of graphics and visual effects.

• Nice depth of field in some shots.
• Effective editing and camera set-up in interviews (clear shot/reverse shot, great use of reaction shots and the 180° rule).
• There's an obvious use of a “sting” and channel branding throughout, depending on our branding we might try something similar.
• Car Shots are used again in this series, a very effective way to transition the narrative and get on the spot thoughts from a contributor.
• Nice subtle movement in B-Roll shots, this is another editing technique that is subtle yet effective and could be used in our film.
• Some things are “glossed over” or “magicked up” to push the narrative forward when really we could have done with spending more time/focus on them. E.g. budget, why she left motorsport, car shopping etc.
• PTC’s on location(s) help ground the subject.
• Presenter visits places that are sentimental to them (but also relevant to the narrative), using this time to be reflective, but to also speculate on what is about to happen and how their feeling about it.  
• Subtle yet effective use of music.
• The fast-paced narrative works for the documentary in places, but against it in others.
• The documentary often uses very technical/industry terms and Mrs Brown feels lost at times as there isn't much for her.
• Would have liked to learn a little more about the presenter and their history with motorsport.

Closing Thoughts

• I felt the show had a really similar style to the one we’re after.
• It keeps you interested and engaged throughout.
• Seems to know it’s audience pretty well (but as a result there’s not a lot for Mrs Brown).
• Decent Range Of Contributors, everyone ads something to the story that pushes the journey forward.
• Needed put more emphasis on certain aspects e.g. budget as they’re kinda glossed over just so the narrative can move on quickly.
• Perhaps some things seemed a little “magicked up” just to move the narrative along.
• This is only the first episode, so hopefully, certain things that I have expressed concern over will become more fleshed out over the coming episodes.

Overall Relevance Score 8.5/10