Showing the Story

Normally, people say, “tell me a story”. With your film however, the audience really needs you to, “show them a story”. The difference may sound trivial, yet the difference in the impact is huge. In another piece we presented the concept of telling verses showing a story. Tell them what to think and they will probably forget most of it because they don’t have a stake in the story. However, when you empower them to think for themselves by showing them the story, they will assume ownership of the topic by making their own decisions based on their value system. And when someone decides on an issue using their value system, that will likely hold fast to that viewpoint.

Here’s an example. We tell you, “This is the greatest science and wildlife filmmaking book ever published that will change your life forever.” That sounds like a bunch of hype, right? Who would believe that? Internally, you’re resistant to being told what to think about something when you have the intelligence to analyze and deduce for yourself. So we keep our mouths shut and don’t tell anything about how good we are within these pages. We simply take you on an informational ride, revealing our story by giving you the tools to make good filmmaking decisions for your benefit. Then when you get done reading the book and try making your film, you eventually turn to your friend and say, “Hey, that was the best science and wildlife filmmaking book I ever read that I think is going to change the way I make films.” We didn’t tell you what to think. You came up with that all by yourself. And because you did, you’ll probably believe that forever. Same principle holds true in filmmaking.

Before we dive into the details of showing your story verse telling it, we should take a closer look at the key elements of a compelling story. Most of those elements should also be part of any story that you show with your film. It doesn’t matter if it’s a factual portrayal of a species or science topic, or a science fiction thriller. If you look closely enough, those common elements are somewhere within your story. Whether it’s a caveman eons ago sitting near a fire recalling an encounter with a saber tooth, or James Cameron portraying AVATAR, the elements of a compelling story have endured the ages. You read them in your favorite novels and watch them in captivating films. They are the brick and mortar that build the foundational elements of any good story. Here’s a list of those key elements. However, the order in which they’re arranged and presented can dramatically affect the impact of your story. We’ll get to that in a moment using the timeline-tension graph.

• Setting/s – places where your story unfolds – from grand overview to little details
• Characters – main characters, host/s, and side players
• Time line – begins with intro to setting or characters and ends with “the end”
• Protagonist/s – the main character or “hero” that the viewer roots for
• Antagonist/s – the evil forces that will try to foil or destroy the protagonist
• Tension or conflict – this is the steam that drives the power of any story and increases in a sea-saw pattern as we progress along the timeline.
• Theme – good against evil, weak against strong, transformation of character through story, revelation of some kind, discovery of something historical, scientific, mystical…

Using these key elements, let’s expose them in greater detail to see how they might fit into our save the manatee example. After we define them, then we’ll creatively arrange them on the timeline in graphic form to help show the development of a compelling story.

Setting/s – These are the geographical locations of where the story unfolds. Revealing the setting includes the big picture, such as an aerial view, to a small as a blade of sea grass on the bottom of the ocean. The story could be shown with only one setting but more likely we need to give it more interest with at least a handful. For this manatee story they could include;

• clearwater spring (gathering refuge for manatees – over and under water)
• water discharge into gulf (warm water refuge or pollution sources - over and under water)
• pleasure boating canals - over and under water
• marine zoo - over and under water, inside and out
• research lab – inside and out
• save manatee HQ – inside and out (or manatee rescue vet)

Characters – Characters are the “players” who help reveal the content of the story and carry the action while creating tension along the timeline. Your characters might include:

• manatees
• pleasure boaters
• manatee researcher or biologist
• water discharge engineer
• save the manatee spokesperson
• host/s
• tourism spokesperson
• fish & game official
• protagonist/s
• antagonist/s

We listed the “host” as one of the potential characters. Depending on the style of your film, a host can add some valuable elements to your science or wildlife film. We’ve produced films with and without hosts and viewers typically connect more when they have a host as their helpful guide with a face, voice and actions – and a personality they can connect with. While it’s okay for National Geo to “tell” a wildlife story using the detached omniscient voice of a narrator, we want to more strongly connect our manatee audience with the characters and message within our story. And one very effective way of doing that is by using an on-camera host. Unlike a narrator, the host can;

• Talk “first-person” into the “eyes of the camera” to connect the audience with the story. They can make the audience feel like they are hand-in-hand sharing in the discovery of the information.
• Ask crucial questions during the interviews and information discovery processes. They can ask questions to the experts and to the viewer to further connect them.
• Interact with the camera using body language and gestures during discovery to make the audience feel actively like part of the process.
• Offer dialog between segments to set up content, transitions and summaries.

So the take-home message on this part is strongly consider using an on-camera host IF you have someone with the talent and connection with the camera to pull if off. If not, stick to narration.

Protagonist – This can be a tricky one sometimes in science and wildlife films. It’s normally the “hero” in an action movie fighting the forces of evil during some great quest. It’s the main character that the audience connects with and wants to prevail. The protagonist normally has a voice so we can better understand their pain and frustration. But here in our wildlife-science example, we have a number of choices of whom we may want to root for or associate with. Our obvious choices might be the manatees, biologist, vet, host, or save the manatee spokesperson. Each could fulfill that protagonist role as we want each of them to win their individual struggles.

Before we chose one though, let’s go back and consider the goals of the film. We want people to care about saving the manatees. Caring is an emotion. So what character might offer the greatest potential for generating that emotion? Right, it’s the defenseless manatee. Though they lack true spoken voice, the on-camera experts and spokespersons will give them plenty of voice. So will the way you show them within the story development. The forces of evil are certainly working more against them than the other potential protagonists. That’s why the manatee assumes the role of our protagonist. However, if you had the biologist or save the manatee person as a funding partner in the project, you might consider have them share that role.

Antagonist – This can also be a challenging role to assign as we have more than a single force working against the manatees. It would be easy if only one evil manatee poacher was causing all the grief. In this case however it’s a whole host of issues and we want to be careful not to label any particular person or group as the “evil antagonist”. Remember, many could belong to our target audience who we want to embrace the film and help save the manatee. The last thing we want to do is portray them as the bad guys and alienate them. So let’s depersonalize things by respectfully listing the antagonists something like this; 

• boat propellers
• fishing lines
• affluent discharge
• coastal climate change
• sea grass impacts
• sanctuary loss
• time ticking by
• society expanding

Though we know that humans are directly and indirectly creating these “antagonistic forces”, we can still tell the story effectively without implicating anyone in particular. As humans, your audience is smart enough to know that we collectively share the responsibility of harming the manatees and how they might share in the solutions.

Tension and Conflict – If you consider for a moment your favorite or most compelling films, we bet that they all have two key elements in common… tension and conflict. Those are the forces that drive the engine within any great story. They don’t have to be as dramatic as those portrayed in Ridley Scott’s Gladiator. If you look closely enough, there’s almost always some level of tension and conflict even in science and wildlife stories. It can be as simple as the unanswered void between your big question and your take-home message. And there’s plenty of tension in our manatee example.

Tension and conflict can be lumped together graphically on the timeline. See how they work together in Figure 1. If you think about it, most stories exhibit similar tension-conflict profiles. Early in the story, tension and conflict start out small. But as we reveal more of the story, they soon escalate along the timeline in a saw-tooth pattern until that line peaks just before the final conflict resolution. Well, that all sounds logical for some great tale of good verses evil. But how can we build that into our real-life manatee story?

We simply insert the various antagonists along the timeline to most accurately and effectively tell our story. Each antagonistic element comes with it’s own built in tension as the audience discovers how it threatens our manatees. As we add more and more, the tension and conflicts increase. And don’t worry about inventing that tension. It’s real and it will come out in the voices of your characters and your host.

At the end of the curve is a sharp fall off of tension. This is where the solution or resolution to the conflict happens. It can be the end of your story and is the logical place to insert a final take-home message from your host before you close with the credits.

Theme – Theme is tied directly to your goals and take-home message with a little extra refinement. Generally, it’s a simple as good verse evil. However, we need to frame science and wildlife films with a more delicate touch. Our theme for the manatee film could easily be, “Helpless manatees need society’s help to survive”. A variation on theme could be something like, “If humans created the threats, how can humans play a role in saving manatees?” How you refine your theme depends on your audience, big question and take-home message.

To help visualize how this all might look in graphic form, we’ve show how to create your story along the timeline with the different elements. It’s easy for you to create your own graphs using variations of where and whom you introduce characters and action on the timeline. Once you decide on the best version to engage your audience, you can use your graph as a guide to create your production outline or script.
Graphic of timeline with rising tension-conflict and where characters are introduced.

Script or Outline?

To script or not to script? That isn’t the question if you’re doing the part of Hamlet in Shakespeare’s play. On stage with other actors you need to follow your script. But using a script verses an outline in your science or wildlife film depends on a number of things. Let’s look at the pros and cons of each relative to the story you’re telling and your audience.

Here’s a good rule of thumb to consider. Few people can deliver engaging, believable scripted lines in front of a camera. That’s one reason why top actors earn top dollar. For most of us, speaking someone else’s written word from memory fails to convey genuine feeling and show emotion. Plus, the written word often doesn’t sound like the spoken word. However, ask anyone how he or she feels about careless boaters slicing manatees with their propellers and you’ll likely get some genuine heartfelt responses in front of the camera. They will sound more convincing than any scripted lines you could write.

Now here’s your second rule of thumb. Few people can consistently present scientifically accurate and complete phrases in front of the camera without memorizing scripted lines. Does that mean that your scientifically accurate films are going to sound stilted and boring? Not if you get creative.

We’ve produced hundreds of science videos that companion textbooks and every detail had to be scientifically accurate. But even with using quality hosts, scientifically accurate videos that follow every word of a script can sound and feel less engaging than voices that come unscripted from the heart of a scientist. Plus, following a rigid script can turn a potentially fun production into stressful grind. You can feel the difference when you see and hear it. And that difference is often huge when trying to engage the hearts and minds of your audience. What’s the solution? Employ your third rule of thumb.

Unless you’re using a professional actor, don’t ask your host or characters to perform all the scripted lines in front of the camera. Have them read the critical scientifically accurate lines off camera to be used as voice over. Here’s a word of caution though. It’s also common for most people to read lines with unnatural pacing and weak inflection in their voice. Don’t fret though. We’ll offer you some tricks for getting natural sounding voiceovers from your talent in the next chapter.

To get content that comes from the heart in front of the camera, simply let your characters tell their stories. And to accomplish that, you can simply work from a detailed outline that lists the concepts that you want to explain. If a host or character tells you the story behind a science concept, you’ll feel the truth behind their story and will likely embrace the content. If however, they spew strings of scripted science facts that read like a textbook, the audience will quickly tune out with their mental mute buttons. So the solution is to try and capture a blend of unscripted vibrant stories told to the camera with an occasional voiced section read from a script on the stickier science stuff.

Now please don’t think for a minute that we don’t want you to always be scientifically accurate in your films. It’s crucial that you’re accurate. You’ll still get plenty of good science accurate stuff from your host and on-camera characters telling their stories. That’s why they’re experts in their fields. If and when they miss an important science point, you can cover it with footage and your host’s voice over. So your take-home message from this section is to: 

• Create and use an outline based on your tension-character-timeline graph.
• Encourage your on-camera characters to tell you a story about a concept and how they feel about it. You’ll likely strike gold from the heart that will rivet your audience.
• Script the important science specific sections that can be read as a narrative voiceover by your host.