ABSTRACT
As a scriptwriter, creator, director, producer or broadcaster, how are the conceptualization, development and writing phases of projects transformed by these new media, new platforms and technologies? How are they changing our ways of scripting? How would we describe these new documentary practices? This chapter explores and discusses the new variety of forms these documents are now taking, depending on the subject, the context and the target platform – cinema, TV, web, virtual reality, augmented and mixed reality or mobile application. We will propose a conceptualization approach targeted on the ways of writing and reading documentary projects for their development and financing. Pre-production documents and notes are no longer limited to standard presentation format scenarios, they can take a multitude of forms.
We will discuss both the issues related to documentary film-making today and the way in which new technologies and platforms stimulate creativity and invite documentary film-makers to move out of their comfort zones and imagine and create new documentary forms and formats. I put forth the concept of an expanded screenwriting practice that consists of adopting a conceptual approach of designing the project instead of relying on the more linear method of building content with a beginning, a middle and an end. The works described here are interactive, immersive, collaborative, participative and often co-creative and call for a design of the experience rather than the development of a story. The chapter includes interviews with directors, conceptors and designers, Anandana Kapur, Philippe Baylaucq and Jeff Soyk, who did just that.
