Giving the camera to someone else

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Last week I was at an excellent knowledge cafe about video run by David Gurteen, where Brad Meyer, of I-T-L, was telling us about his work. He had used video to bring together two groups of people who otherwise had difficulty communicating. 
I was fortunate enough to be sitting at the table with Brad, and since I had my camera with me, I wanted to capture something from him directly. But the session was about how the introduction of video cameras to a situation made a difference to the dynamics of communication. So why just talk about it ... why not do it? 
I handed the camera to Jason Bates, of Beaufortes, who was sitting with us. I didn't give Jason any warning, but I think we ended up with a better interview than I could have done - plus some observations on how the experiment had changed the nature of the conversation. At Brad's suggestion, I also used a very simple technique to get Jason's persmission to use the clip. Watch the end and you'll see.

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Comments

[Simon Berry]

Brilliant!!

[Ron Lubensky]

I like it a lot. There is authenticity to a self-recorded video. Yes, the camera focusses everybody's minds, but it is still a conversation between peers rather than an interview.

Unfortunately, for research ethics committees of universities (well, in Australia where I am anyway), such informal consent as was included at the end of the clip wouldn't be sufficient.

But then, in your situation everyone participated equally--nobody has a special role as researcher, reporter or documentary-maker.

[David Wilcox]

What I liked - in retrospect - was the chance to take something we were talking about, then turn it into an action which demonstrated something at the time, and produced a blog item, and some further discussion. In future I'm going to think more - OK, what can we do NOW!

[Nick Booth]

The consent on tape is a standard journalistic technique - even if it's not "broadcast" it acts as evidence of how you explained to the person how you would like to use the material, what they said in return and even how enthusiastic or cooperative they appeared to be. It seems odd to me that such high quality evidence of consent would not cut it in (Australian) academic circles. It is easier to forge a signature than a filmed consent!