Documentary Interview Tips | Part 1

[@RandomRouletteFun]

Hey Bill, your content and quality is amazing. I’m shocked to see how few subscribers you have. You deserve waaaay more - keep up the brilliant content. Thanks so much for all the effort you put in.

[@BillThisdell]

Hey! Thank you so much for the encouragement 😊 life got in the way but I promise I am working on new content! Happy New year!

[@LiamLyons]

Thank you very much, I’m making one on my grandparents’ lives and I found this very helping, I am subscribing lol

[@BillThisdell]

I've filmed my grandpa, very worthwhile!

[@DanielAvinashVOX]

I like that method! Lateral-Dive-Come up for air! Short and sharp! Thanks for the content!

[@BillThisdell]

It’s always served me well!

[@DWalkerMusic]

Awesome! Thanks.

[@tanyamiller130]

Your videos are so incredibly helpful, well made, and informative! I’ll be making my first ever documentary this summer, and your advice has helped me to feel more prepared. Thank you!

[@BillThisdell]

Good luck Tanya! Film as much as you can and be prepared for the story to go on a tangent haha that's just the messy nature of documentary but it's fun 😉😁

[@deanharriseditor]

Got yourself a new sub. Great tips, great edit and love the text overlays, nice touch.

[@BillThisdell]

Thanks make I really appreciate it! Hope it helps 🙏

[@Junkm3dia]

This was really helpful and refreshing! Thanks for sharing your experiences.

[@BillThisdell]

Glad to help!

[@JaredRibic]

Thanks for doing this video, very helpful tips.

[@BillThisdell]

You're welcome - I hope it was useful

[@Andreas.Haffner]

Great value !! Thanks man

[@Herman-unterwegsDe]

Thank you so much for these tips! Helps me so much!

[@BillThisdell]

You're very welcome! I'm glad 😊

[@sarahdippity]

These are very thoughtful tips. Thank you Bill!

[@BillThisdell]

Glad to hear it 😊

[@spin6668]

Very useful, thanks mate.

[@BillThisdell]

No worries!

[@spin6668]

@@BillThisdell It's a real shame your advice videos aren't more popular, i've been looking around for some tips and I wanna say 80% of them are over drawn out that give the same 2/3 main points of advice with what feels like 7 mins of filler in a 10/15 min video lol.

[@BillThisdell]

@@spin6668 I know what you mean - they can be so long-winded. Glad mine was useful, I really wanted the advice to be thoughtful. Appreciate your comment and glad you found me! Good luck with your interviews :)

[@forseki8339]

Hi, I'm working on a documentary now and I encountered many difficulties... I don't know how to show questions to the viewer...

[@forseki8339]

Also, I think you will be really successful one day💫

[@BillThisdell]

@@forseki8339 It's a really good question. If you don't want your voice to appear in the film, it's often a good idea to tell you interview subject to speak in full sentences. For example: don't say "it" say the full name of the subject. You can also ask your subject to clarify their answer or to put it in more context, and this can then be used in the edit to frame their answer. Another option is to remember that documentary is visual and so you can use additional footage, photos or archive material to give the audience clues and context for what's being discussed. These are a couple suggestions but there's lots of ways to do it. Study documentaries you enjoy and see how they handle this issue and then try and copy them. All the best!

[@izro1436]

Thank you for this video 😄 so helpful and so well put together :)

[@BillThisdell]

Happy to help 🙂 best of luck with any interviews you have!

[@hannahanana8241]

Do you have a example of a Joke? :)

[@BillThisdell]

Hard to have a specific example as it very much depends on the context, but maybe another way to say it is push back/challenge their statement playfully. You don't have to accept what someone says at face value and it's good for everyone to be critical but I don't mean confrontational. So don't always nod along but call someone out or gently tease what they say as a way to encourage them to open up further - the way you might tease a friend. The goal is always to get the other person to invest more in the conversation and open up as much as possible.