Research- Car Crash Statistics

As we have been going through research, as i have said before we are taking note of some interesting ones and we plan on putting the most shocking into our documentary. Here are some of the ones that have caught our eye-
Teenage Car Accidents

- Car accidents can cause extensive personal injuries and property damage. There are several causes of car accidents, but reckless teenage drivers are a main cause of car accidents.
- Many teenagers tend to neglect the safety precautionary measures as soon as they are behind the wheel. Reckless fast driving, unsafe passing techniques, and driving under the influence of alcohol are the most common causes of teenage car accidents.
- Teenagers between the age of 15 and 20 years cause most teenage car accidents. Sadly, even minimum precautionary measures such as wearing a seat belt at all times are also neglected. Also, teenagers high on alcohol and drugs are the reason for a large number of accidents. The worst part is that all the others in the car would also sustain severe injuries due to recklessness of the driver.
- All states have strict rules regarding drinking and driving in an attempt to reduce the number of teenage car accidents.
- Another cause for more number of teenage car accidents is inexperience of young drivers. Due to a lack of experience, these teenagers are more prone to accidents, especially on highways and other places with considerably more traffic. Backing up in the driveways, parking, and reversing are other difficult driving techniques that often lead to accidents.

Statistics Teenage Car Accidents:
- The number 1 one killer of teenagers is car crashes.
- Around 6,000 teenage drivers are killed in auto accidents each year.
- Teen Drivers ages 16 to 19 have death rates four times that of a driver age 25-29 years of age.
(NEW TEEN CAR ACCIDENT DATA: Complied 2005, 2007 posted)
• Automobile accidents are the top killer among teenagers.• In 2005, 23% of teenagers killed were under the influence of drugs or alcohol.• You’re more likely to get in an accident at 16 than at any other age.• Accident rates for 16 to 19 year olds are higher at those ages than any other group.• Teens are 3 times more likely to get in an accident after 9:00pm daily.• Teens are more likely to have an accident when they have passengers than without.• Males between 16 and 19 are 1.5 times more likely to be involved in a fatal crash than females within the same age group.• Teens have the lowest use of seatbelt rate.
- 35% - car accidents that cause teenage deaths.
- In the first 14 years of life, one in every 50 children will have been killed or injured whilst travelling as a passenger in a car.

Initial filming- interview scene

In the video shown above, is our first attempt at shooting and editing a scene we intend to use in our documentary. The shots and camer angles are those that we are going to use in our final piece. With the use of the dark lighting in the interview, it makes the audience feel like he had something to hide, because of teh dark lighting. It adds to the serious tone of the interview.

Car Crash Research

Having not been able to get hold of Drive Alive as a group we decided that we would be able to find enough information that we needed to get an understanding of the subject on the internet. As we haven't started filming yet, as a group we have been spending most of our lessons researching any car crash statistics just so we can get a better understanding of the subject. We also are taking down any of these if statistics if they are particularly shocking, as we will put them into our documentary. Although we could not get hold of someone from Drive Alive personally, we managed to get a hold of their magazine that they produce which are full of safety tips for young drivers. It also includes many facts and statistics that we will put into our final documentary.

Practice Interview

We have completed a practice interview to give us an idea of how we will film our actual piece which will go in our film. We went throughmany different ideas of how we would shoot the interview, we finally decided on setting it in a scene where the dark lighting would set tension, therefore people would want to know what was happening. We set the angle of the interviewee so that you couldn't see his face as he was talking, which also adds suspicion to the shot aswell. We decided to take a serious approach on this interview because the theme in our documentary is a serious issue.
We have also edited a shot of Josh driving down the lane to go over the clip of Josh talking, so that it looks the memory he's having about his accident. This is a technique that we wish to use in our final piece.

Starting Filming

Since we have finished the storyboard we have decided to start filming the basics of what our documentary is going to include. As a group we have been out driving, and doing different shots of Josh driving. One of our techniques is whilst Josh is driving, filming the the rear view mirror to see his reflection as well as the road.
We have discovered that the use of close up shots are good to cause tension in the scene, whether its on the interviewees mouth whilst they are talking, or their face, we also thought that a clsoe up shot of the car as it drives part the camera is a useful shot, but we need to practice shooting that specific shot so that it doesn't look too blurry.
During our editing we have also sped up some shots of Josh driving, so that the cars going past on the other side of the road look like they are going quicker than they are, so that Josh didn't break the speed limit anywhere. We also took safety precations when filming the shot down the lane, we had two people stood on either end of the lane so that there was chance of them driving into Josh.

Storyboarding

Now that we have chosen our topic, we have started discussing the storyboard and have started to talk about what we are going to actually include in the documentary, talking about what statistics we will put in, what archive footage we could put in. What we could talk about in interviews. We have also discussed the different "storyline" through the documentary. We have discussed filming someone whilst they are driving, and using different editing shots to show they are going quickly. We have discussed the typical documetnary techiniques that we will use such as in the interview we will have the interviewee on the left hand side of the shot.
Instead of doing a written storyboard, we have done a storyboard with pictures and captions explaining what is happennig in the shot.

Chosen documentary

We have chosen our final documentary topic, after going through different choices of topics we have chosen to do Teenage driving, we will put in statistics and do interview on people's views on teenage driving. As a year group last year we went to a drive alive show. Which showed you the dangers of driving and the consequences it had on people. A member of our group Hester emailed the company asking for some statistics or film shots. We have also been on the website to look and see what information they have to see if we acn take any of their statistics. http://www.safedrive.org.uk/news.html
We have also been looking at different typical documentary techniques, which include handheld shots and steady shots, we are experimenting with different shots so that we choose certain ones that will fitr in with our documentary.

Research

Michael Moore:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7gGyQ0pjio-fahrenheit 9/11 introduction.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=gHzRsH-1Xjs&feature=related - Sicko part 1.

Michael Moore uses typical documentary techniques, such as he's not in the shots he uses voice overs to explain if there is a change in the storyline or something happens.

Louis theroux-
www.youtube.com/watch?v=n2ZFR4DbC5o - America's Most hated family Part 1.

Whilst watching Louis Theroux' documentary you can see certain characteristics that he uses whist doing his documentaries. He is normally in the shots and you can hear what he's saying to the subject. Sometimes he uses voiceovers if there is a change in the storyline or something happens, but is normally included in the shot.

Research and planning

So far we have researched some different documentary makers, including Nick Broomfield, Michael Moore and Louis Theroux. We have researched them and watched some extracts of their work.