Documentary Editing: Principles & Practice

by Jacob Bricca, ACE

Overview

This book offers clear and detailed strategies for tackling every stage of the documentary editing process, from organizing raw footage and building select reels to fine cutting and final export. Written by a Sundance award-winning documentary editor with a dozen features to his credit and containing examples from over 100 films, this book presents a step-by-step guide for how to turn seemingly shapeless footage into focused scenes, and how to craft a structure for a documentary of any length. The book contains insights and examples from seven of America’s top documentary editors, including Geoffrey Richman, ACE (The Cove, Tiger King), Kate Amend, ACE (¡Viva Maestro!, The Keepers), and Mary Lampson (Harlan County U.S.A.).

Written for both practitioners and enthusiasts, this book offers unique and invaluable insights into the documentary editing process.

The second edition is completely revised and updated with contemporary examples and contains a new chapter titled, "Editing the Short Documentary."

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780367725730
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	06/19/2023
Edition description:	2nd ed.
Pages:	266
Product dimensions:	7.00(w) x 10.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Jacob Bricca, ACE is an award-winning documentary editor, producer, director, and teacher. His editing credits include the international theatrical hit Lost in La Mancha, the New Yorker Films theatrical release Con Artist, the 2016 Sundance Special Jury Award winner The Bad Kids and the 2020 Critics Choice Documentary Awards nominee Missing in Brooks County. He is an Associate Professor at the University of Arizon's School of Theatre, Film and Television, where he teaches classes on editing and documentary filmmaking.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements Introduction Part I 1. Planning Your Schedule 2. Organizing Your Footage 3. Everyday Work Practices Part II 4. Viewing and Digesting 5. Making and Refining Select Reels Part IIIa 6. Evidentiary Editing: Building Interview-Based Scenes 7. Verité Editing: Building Observational Scenes 8. Building Montages Part IIIb 9. Choosing and Framing Footage 10. The Fundamentals of Narrative 11. Working with Narrative 12. Working with Details 13. Working with Time Part IV 14. Feedback and Revision 15. Fine Cut to Final Cut and Beyond Part V 16. Editing the Short Documentary 17. Analysis of Two Feature Documentaries Appendix

Editorial Reviews

"Anyone involved in the intellectually-challenging and labor-intensive work of documentary editing will find this book an essential companion. Whether you are a novice editor or an experienced hand, Bricca's unwavering faith in the process of editing will guide you securely down the bumpy road to the finished film."

—Julie Sloane, Tisch School of the Arts, New York University

"Jacob Bricca’s Documentary Editing is a critical addition to the documentary filmmaker, editor, or professor’s collection. In fifteen years of filmmaking and teaching I have not come across such a straight-forward, cohesive, and useful manual for how to tackle that most daunting of challenges: editing the documentary film."

—Sally Rubin, Documentary Filmmaker, Editor; Professor, Chapman University

"The book finishes up with an analysis of four films, two feature length and two short. Along the way a multitude of other narrative documentaries are discussed and analyzed. Bricca's writing is clear and focused."

—Conrad J. Obregon

"Author, educator and film editor Jacob Bricca asks the question in the introduction to this how-to book on editing the documentary and then spends the next 240 pages providing a very satisfying answer. He clearly reminds us of the difference and relative ease of editing a narrative fiction film, in which ‘by and large, we already know the intention of every scene and the approximate purpose of every shot.’ Compare that to the twists and turns that often occur in the filming process of documentary, where the filmmaker may think they are making one film at the start, and by the end of filming, the meaning or purpose of the available footage is still debatable. It is a well-accepted truism that in documentary film practice ‘the story is created in the editing room.’

There is much to recommend in this book for teaching in film production classes, but as a writer I found that certain elements could be applied to my own editing in words, rather than pictures. Ultimately, Bricca unravels the complexity of editing, demystifying the art of storytelling in the process."

—Cynthia Close, Documentary Magazine, Fall 2018; "Reality Ink: The Zen of Editing: A Primer"

"Jacob has done a great service to aspiring documentary editors by demystifying the creative process. Ideas don’t come to an editor in a flash of inspiration. They come after hours of looking at footage, organizing clips and making connections. Jacob gives his students a process from which an insight or structure can emerge. He describes each step to show what'should be happening in the little baby steps you make until the whole starts to form. The footage writes the script, and Jacob explains how to open the mind and heart to let it through."

—Bee Ottinger, CEO, SnapCuts and Former Head of National Avid User Group

From the Publisher