Lecture:

Doing Docs Differently

A special lecture evening with two highly praised documentary directors

21 Nov 2008
21 Nov 2008

Cassian Harrison (Britain from Above) and Maartje Nevejan (Couscous & Cola and Couscous Global) are two documentary directors who initiated truly new ways of making documentaries. During their lecture, they showed and discussed the production of their latest projects.

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Britain from above - Picture taken from flowingdata.com .

Cassian Harrison directed episodes of the amazing BBC documentary series Britain from Above (aired August 2008). Unique about the series is its use of tools, along with film cameras, to creatively treat the actuality of life in Britain. Satellite data, GPS tracks, air traffic logs, demographic statistics and more are all employed to gorgeously visualize patterns in current British landscapes and urbanscapes. During the presentation Cassian Harrison presented and discussed the making of Britain from Above.

Maartje Nevejan made the documentary series Couscous & Cola, that was broadcast worldwide by Al Jazeera in 2007 and nominated for the prestigious Emmy Award in 2008. The broadcast provoked reactions from young people from all over the planet, which led Maartje Nevejan to start up Couscous Global, a hugely successful platform where young people from all continents debate their lives and the state the world is in through personal online videos.

These lectures were an extra Mediamatic event in the context of the Any Media Documentary workshop @ IDFA that started at November 21.