The idea for this project came when I was looking through old images I had on my computer and on my Facebook. Seeing these images made me realize the sort of loose timeline they had become of my life and the way my social circles have evolved. I could clearly see the evolution of my friends from my early elementary years, to high school, and through college. This seemed particularly significant to me due to my introverted nature and acute awareness of my own social standing throughout my life. To showcase some of the qualities of participatory documentary filmmaking, I decided to combine the best of these photos into a sort of slideshow, kind of like a casual photographic timeline. I am included in each of these photos, typical of the participatory mode. There is no separation between myself and my subjects – in this case, my various friends through time. Additionally, the narrative accompanying the photos and providing some context is entirely from my point of view. I am a part of the photographs themselves, as well as the most prominent voice explaining their significance to my audience.
The fact that I selected only specific images to include in this project is also an example of the participatory documentary mode. As Bill Nichols stated, “the filmmakers impact on the events being recorded is acknowledged, indeed, it is often celebrated.” This is certainly true in the case of my project as I not only had an impact on those around me when the photograph was taken, but I had an impact on the message to the audience of this project by only selecting a few photos from my past to convey my message, and I also impacted the worth of the photos themselves by providing my own personal reflections to accompany and add value the images.
I chose to make this project something very personal and unique to myself because, in my opinion, the participatory documentary mode is one of the most personal modes of filmmaking. It is this honest and intimate method of sharing narratives close to one’s own self that I wished to convey in my own participatory photographic timeline.