Construction of Reality

• A construction of reality means that it is constructed for the audience.
• Gate keeping is a term that refers to the selection and rejection of information. Make decisions of what goes in the documentary > Select what you want to use. Play around with time and reorder the clips.

Different types of narrative structure:
There are six main types of narrative structure used when making a documentary:

Open
There are loose ends and questions are left unanswered. The audience is left to make up their own mind.

Closed
All loose ends are tied up. No questions are remaining in the mind of the audience.

Single Strand
One narrative running throughout the documentary.

Multi Strand
More than one narrative running throughout, they sometimes cross over or converge.

Linear
Follows chronological order. Events follow the order of time i.e. things happen in order.

Non Linear
Doesn’t follow time e.g. flashbacks can be used and flash forwards.

Circular Narrative
Is usually a documentary that begins with a question and throughout the programme you get evidence which could answer the question. There are normally two sides to the answer. At the end of the documentary it goes back to the question (in a circle) Start and end point is the same.