The work methodology of the Master in Making Documentaries starts from a central idea. Each participant contributes their own project, which they develop during the master’s degree programme. The theoretical apparatus necessary to be able to accompany the project is constructed around it.
This principle changes the perspective. It is not a question of following a general course with a final practical part, but rather it is planned the other way round. Each of the participant’s projects becomes the main figure and this project will have to allow the participant to have their own tool to have a greater chance of success with the different cultural initiatives and companies.
Obviously, this displacement of the main focus requires a radical change in the figure of the tutors or mentors, who become key characters in this process and who have special capacities to detect the needs that the projects have in order to make qualitative progress. On the Master in Making Documentaries, these tutors are in constant contact with the participants, and a minimum of three face-to-face encounters is guaranteed, in which each participant is confronted with an open debate with the tutor, which the other participants can attend. The effectiveness of this method has been proven. Understanding the improvement processes of others helps you to accept that of your own project more effectively.
This methodology has given tangible results in the history of the Master in Making Documentaries. Filmmakers and films which now form part of the heritage of the best documentary cinema were, originally, short, two-page projects, presented as a fundamental document to be selected for the master’s degree programme. Throughout the time during which their project matures, the participant is confronted with other experiences, film viewings, theoretical debates, practical sound, editing or production sessions, or even the production of a film by an acclaimed director in which they participate actively. All this baggage is, however, obtained bearing in mind the project of each participant, improving it, adapting it and succeeding, when it is presented in a final pitching to specialists, in giving the sensation that the project is ready to find ways to materialize. The project is strong when it is endorsed by international experts, and it is prepared to find its own production path, inserted in the network of real production systems.
