Feeling & Summary

Since I initially decided to use ‘elderly Chinese people living in Australia’ as the topic to do my documentary, I realised it is not easy. I should not only show their lives and experience but also explore their inner world. For this community, which is different from the Chinese oversea students at this decade, the reasons of coming to Australia is various. For us, we come here for the better education, or for the better lives. But for most of them at that age, they came here for surviving and making money. So I tried to focus on three main questions as “why came””why stay” and “which is better”. In terms of the first question, my three interviewees were different and gave various answers. For the second one, all of them had the same answers, which is they like Australia. It surprised me because I thought they would have said that they could earned more money. There is no exact answer for the last question. They thought two countries had their advantages and it was hard to compare. With time and their respective experience, they all had shift in mentalities and attitude to lives. I think it represents most of the Chinese migrants in this community. They got more peace in minds and love lives more. I have also learnt much through talking with them and producing this documentary.
Diligence, persistence, perserverance, and loving lives. I think it is the real attribute of this community, elderly Chinese migrants living in Australia.

Something you don’t know about my documentary

1. The average time of each interviews  is thirty minutes.
2. The interviews were conducted in Zhang’s massage parlor, Simon’s painting booth and Nacy’s house.
3. Three interviewees were all nice and friendly, but some liked to talk more about their past and some didn’t.
4. Interviewees are not good at speaking English especially during the interview so the interviews were conducted in their first language, Chinese.
5. Photos were taken in interviewees’ workplaces.
6. Nacy refused to take and provide photos for her personal reasons, and that is why there is no photo shown in her documentary part.
7. More Simon’s photos of his painting work aren’t shown in the documentary but I am keeping them.
8. Audio cutting and editing time: 5 hours.
9. Text part of documentary was finished as the narrative form of feature article and had been revised for three times.
10. The content of audio in the documentary were translated, paraphrased and shown in the text part, I think translating word by word is unnecessary and would affect the overal effects of the documentary.
11. The documentary was distributed in some Chinese social networks such as Renren and Weibo for the reason of community.
12. All the interviewees like the final work.

Yawen Qin’s Story

My documentary will be similar with Yawen Qin’s Story (see http://www.liveinvictoria.vic.gov.au/information/skilled-migrants/migrant-stories/yawen-qins-story) that including text and images, what is different is that the audio will be uploaded with the documentary. The structure of Yawen Qin’s story could be for reference for its structure and the way of story telling. In terms of the content, like Qin’s story, the state of mind and life experience of interviewees is the key point.

Helpful links

some webpages might be helpful to me, which are about Australia’s Chinese immigration history.

http://museumvictoria.com.au/origins/history.aspx?pid=9

http://museumvictoria.com.au/immigrationmuseum/discoverycentre/your-questions/chinese-immigration/

http://australia.gov.au/about-australia/australian-story/chinatowns-across-australia

Another immigration story

I saw an nine minute movie named The Path to Freedom: A Chinese Immigrant’s story from Youtube and it is an interest documentary with good content and production. The author used old pictures, historical images, video interview and relevant background music to tell the story, which is about a Chinese woman escaped from China to Taiwan during the Chinese communist era and then immigrated to the United States. This immigrant story may give me some inspiration to my future documentary. For example,”why immigrated to Australia” could be the core question that ask each interviewee during the interview. The story and life of Chu Shia Ching  in the movie have a close connection with the Chinese modern history yet in my documentary, my interviewees’ stories will be more personal and close to lives.

From C to C

The feature progeam called From C to C, which regards to Chinese Canadian stories of migrantion provide another alternative as the reference of my documentary (http://www.sfu.ca/fromctoc/social/). Historical timeline, current issues and personal hisories are presented in the website with some external blogs and external links. It is more about the histories and I think it will help me in tell the stories of migrants in their early lives. In terms of the structure, it is not a documentary so I think it is not appropiate for referencing.

Migrant Stories

I was enlightened after seeing the documentary called Migrant Stories by The Age, which was recommened by Jenny. It is an integrated documentray including several typical migrants’ and other relevant stories, immigrantion timeline, immigration statistics and news stories. As same as what I am going to present in my documentary, the Migrant Stories explores some problems that elderly migrants faced such as isolation, language difficulties and inability to access essential health, transport and social services. The documentray has a deep exploration into the elder migrants’ lives especially the loneliness and language problem. One of the functions of a documentary is to get a mine of information on issues and I think Migrant Stories did very well. What I should do in my future’s documentary is that trying to explore the issues and problems deeply rather than just tell a simple stories. Another element that inspired me of this documentary is the structure formed. it is a good production. I will try to get more information and think about the effect of final production presenting.

Documentary Learning Contract

1. CONTENT
1.1 What community will you make your documentary about?  
The community I will be looking at is the old Chinese immigrants community who have been to Australia and settled down for a long time. The people in this community has their families, jobs (some not work anymore) and relatively stable lives. They treat Australia as their second home to stay and land of death. People in this community have their stories of early years’ struggle and survival.
1.2 Why is it a community?
Australia is a nation of immigration and a multicultural country, and in those  thousands of immigrants, Chinese immigrants account for the largest proportion and play an important role. Chinese community is typical in immigrant community, especially the old immigrants who have been to Australia for twenty or thirty years and even more. Different from recent years’ immigrants, they have more materials to be explored and more stories could be told.
1.3  How do you, or will, communicate with that community?
I will communicate with the community with face to face interview, or telephone interview.
1.4 What social software do they use?
Because of the age, most of them do not use social software. But some might use Internet for information.
1.5 What is the issue, or controversy, that you want to explore? How do you know it is something that they worry about?
The issues I concern and to be explored about the community is their condition of existence, which including the difficulties they met in early years, how to overcome the language barrier, the process of adaptation after they just came to Australia, the seek of sense of belong, how to integrate into the society of Australia, which is totally different from China, and so on. The issue is  common for all immigrants around the world in any age, it is what the community worried or have worried about, maybe the problems are solved, maybe not, so that is what I am going to explore and discuss in my documentary.
1.6 Do you hope to propose some sort of answer/resolution/that will be assistance to the community?
No. It is about their lives, their experience, and their understanding. I will discuss rather than propose any answer and resolution to the community.
1.7 What is the structure of the documentary?
Interview three people as the representative in the community. Face-to-face interview is the major way, telephone interview would be supplementary.

2. TECHNICAL
2.1 What type of media will your documentary consist of?
Audios, text and images.
2.2 How will you tailor your production and post production to be appropriate?
I will get permission of interviewing and image using, and make sure interviewees sign the release form. If the music is necessary for the documentary, royalty free music or creative commons licensed music will be used.
2.3  What are your skills of making this style of media?
I majored in Journalisms and had internship at radio station, so I am able to use professional audio record and audio editing software such as Audicity and Adobe Audition.
2.4  Are you enlisting the help of any crew during the production phase of your documentary?
I can do the interview and record by my own; my friend Ji Tang might give me a hand in taking photo; for editing, I might need someone help me in some software such as iMovie if it is necessary.
2.5  Will you need to borrow technical equipment from the School techs?
No.

3. PERMISSION
3.1  What talent do you need to get release forms signed for?
All interviewees sign the release forms.
3.2 Are you going to interview any minors?
No.
3.3 Do you need permission to shoot on location?
Interviewees can be shot at the private space.

4. POST-PRODUCTION
4.1 What software do you need to edit your documentary?
Audicity, Adobe Audition, iMovie.
4.2 Do you have sufficient skills with that software?
Yes. I can use Audicity and Adobe Audition. With learning and practice, I think I can operate iMovie skillfully.
4.3  Do you have sufficient access to that software?
Yes.

5. PUBLICATION
5.1 What social media will you publish your documentary to and/or advertise your documentary in?
I would publish on my blog and promote on Twitter. Because the most of people in the community do not use social media, I would like to present the documentary to other Chinese immigrants community who use social media, such as young generation or immigrants in general. So both Facebook and Twitter could show the documentary (Facebook group, Twitter hashtag). Moreover, some Chinese social media such as Renren and Weibo could also be good platform to present due to its large poplulation on them.
5.2 What evidence do you have that your community uses that social media/s?
As I mentioned above, the community may not that social medias often. So I would give the Internet link to some of them to check the documentary and present it on other social media like Facebook, Twitter and Weibo to make more people to get it and expand influence.
5.3 Is the media you are creating appropriate for that environment?
Yes.
5.4  Have you become a member of that environment?
Yes.
5.5  Have you done a ‘test’ publication?
Yes. I have posted blog and twitter.
5.6  Dose the environment stipulate any limits that you will need to meet?
My project would be OK to fit into all limits at the environment.

6. LEGAL
6.1 Have you got copyright permission for all the content you use?
All interviewees will sign the release forms and all photo that would be used in the project would be approved and accredited.
6.2  Please provide a signed statement that there is no defamation or slander.
There will be no defamation or slander.
6.3  Any other legal issues?
No any other legal issues can be foreseen at this stage right now.
6.4  What Creative Commons license are you going to use?
I will employ the creative commons license: Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported (CC BY-NC-SA 3.0)
6.5  Where are you going to put that information?
The license will be in the documentary and post on the blog.

7. RISK
7.1  What are the most likely things that could go wrong with your project?
The content of interviews can not meet the purport I want to present.
Can not get the permission of using interviewees’ photos.
No deep conversation.
7.2  What is your back-up plan if these things occur?   
Arrange another interview
Change interviewees (I can find some interviewees that fit into project)
Find some photos that refect the lives of community and get permission and authorisation.

8. PROJECT MANAGEMENT
8.1  What is the date of your rough-cut showing?
15th of May 2012
8.2  What is the final due day?
22nd of May 2012
8.3  When do you intend to start production?
I started to schedule the interviews.
8.4  When do you intend to start post-production?
As soon as I finished the interviews.
8.5  Given your production start date, have you already booked any technical equipment you need?
No.
8.6  How does these days work in with assessment deadlines from other courses?
Collides with some other subjects, but I will sort it out.
8.7  If you are using talent, does their availability suit your production schedule?
To be determined.

Theme

The documentary is about the community of old Chinese migrant. The theme of the documentary is about ‘existence’. I am going to represent two or three Chines migrant in the documentary, they will talk about their lives, struggle, strive in the early years. In addition, the cultural conflict and fusion will also be the discussion point. I will have a deep conversation, and honest communication, to reveal the joys and sorrows of their lives.