To create our
family history documentary video “In Search Of Grandma”, we began by
researching our family history. Taking the stories we already knew, we
backtracked via ancestry.com and other archival sources as far back as the 1790’s. This led to some interesting discoveries
about my family’s ancestors, as well as contacts all over the world with distant relatives we had never met before.
Then my brother,
sister, mother and I videotaped many hours of discussions of our family history
before two cameras. One of them was used for wide shots of the four of us. The
other was for close-ups of us individually.
In the studio I wove our on-camera
discussions together with our family photographs, documents, tied together with
some narration, mixed together with appropriate music tracks to create a
definitive family history documentary video. We focused especially on my
Grandmother and her role in making our family what it is today.
During this
time, I upgraded my studio’s facilities for this project, using the video
editing program Final Cut on my upgraded iMac to accommodate the complexities
of documentary filmmaking.
Creating “In
Search Of Grandma” took three months of intensive editing. Every week I burned
a DVD copy of what was completed up till then to view on a large screen
television with top of the line surround sound to view critically to see what
changes I needed to make. As the project got closer to completion, we planned
to premiere “In Search Of Grandma” in front of the entire family, including
relatives from all over the world, at my mother’s 90th birthday
party.
Next: The Premiere of “In Search Of
Grandma”
