Documentary Film as Evidence in the Digital Era

Abstract

This PhD thesis consists of three components – a written component which follows, three short documentary films on a Digital Video Disc (DVD), which can be found attached at the back of the written thesis, and a website on the World Wide Web, which is dedicated to the aforementioned films and can be found at the following address: http://www.documentarytruth.comule.com/index.html. All three components complement each other and should be examined together. It is recommended that the reader/viewser first read the text, go on to examine the website and watch the short films in the end. The DVD contains a 29 minute documentary film, Syntagma 34 (Valsamis, 2011), and two variations of it: Syntagma Sq. (ibid., 6 m.), and Syntagma Diary (ibid., 5 m.). In all three I acted as producer, director, cameraperson, editor, and sound recordist and so I have exercised absolute creative control over the making of the project and I take final responsibility for the resulting films. I shot these short documentaries in Athens, Greece, at Syntagma (constitution) square on June 28-29, 2011. The shooting was done during the two-day general strike and the demonstrations that took place to protest against the recent cruel austerity measures as well as the widespread corruption in Greek politics. The website was also created by me and I am solely responsible for its design and contents. The films and the website account for approximately 35 percent of the thesis and the written component for about 65 percent.

Date of Award	Nov 2013
Original language	English
Supervisor	Stephen Lacey (Supervisor)