Miraculously, I managed to edit the YEUF project documentary which I have been filming over the last year in five (and a half) days, in time for the screening event in Malmö Sweden and the two online screening events ahead of the EU elections (6 - 9th June).
The last time I filmed and edited a documentary like this was in 2019, during my tour of the EU27 which was funded by the European Cultural Foundation - similarly, I had filmed interviews with actvists across the UK and Europe, as well as capturing footage at a variety of protest events. So, I was fairly confident I could do it, I was just dubious about the quality given the short time window I had to make the edit. I just had to accept it wasn't going to be perfect and do the best job I could in the avilable time.
My approach was to start with the interviews - reviewing the footage in its entirety, cutting out the waffle and keeping the most powerful messaging with a focus on the topic of youth participation. I kept the interviews roughly in chronological order, but mixed up different interviewees from the same events when it made sense in terms of the development of arguments, for example, the two young poles discussing the recent Polish national elections. I tried to cut aout any repitition; either people repeating themselves or making the same point as others.
The interviews included campaigners from; France, Poland, Germany, Portugal, Spain and Greece. I had also filmed interviews with the Romanian changemakers but was devastated to discover that the audio had not recorded due to a technical problem with the microphone. To be fair, it did make the editing process a little easier as I was already struggling to get the interviews under 20 minutes.
The next step was overlays - I added videos and photographs from the events organised by or partner organisations to make the "talking heads" more interesting and give examples of the work they have been doing. I decided to open and close the documentary with the 'Europa Rede' speech by the president of the European Parliament, Roberta Metsola - since they were funding the project and documentary.
When I thought I had finished the edit I sent it to my colleague at the lead partner organisation who had a long list of edits which took another half a day to ammend before I could start the sibtitling. He also wanted to add some music (he is a music producer) and some opening credits, which he did after I had finished the subtitles (in yellow - which are the most inclusive).
The first online screening event was fun and we had really nice feedback from the partner organisations. So, I hope everyone is happy with the end product - it's been a long slog!
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