BACK                                                                             Professional Practice

 As an individual photographer and media worker, the Ofcom rules and regulations are significant to me because they affect my own work. These following rules are ones I feel should be applied to myself and the final documentary we produce:

2.2- to ensure that factual programmes, items, or portrayal of factual matters does not mislead the audience and is truthful. As we plan on producing a documentary in which opinions are portrayed we need to make sure to follow this regulation so we do not cause any misconceptions about any factual evidence we portray.

2.3- We must ensure that if any of our material shown contains any violence, offencive language, scenes of a sexual nature, or any discriminating acts that we must warn the audience prior to ensure that we do not offend anyone. As a production company we must be aware that if we were to display discrimination towards any one person or party in our film then we risk breaking an Ofcom rule and not having our film entered into any festivals or broadcasted.

2.4 - Ensure that our production does not display any material which does not condone or glamorise any acts of dangerous, violent, or seriously anti-social behaviour. This must take into account the context in which it is presented.

5.7- Any views or facts cannot be misrepresented. This means we must display any factual evidence truthfully as to not manipulate the audience.

8.22: We need to guarantee that if we film or interview anyone under the age of 16 that we have written constant (signed release form) of their parent or guardian.
Source: http://stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/broadcasting/broadcast-codes/broadcast-code/

We also need make sure we are aware of the following:
-Only allowed to show 30 seconds of archive footage
-right to reply this is if we want to be seen as unbiased
-We must not entrap our interviewees as it does break Ofcom rules.

How this relates to our Documentary
Since our documentary focus is on Greyhound racing, a topic that has quite a bit of negative portrayal. We need to be careful not to misrepresent anyone who works in the racing industry. For example, our primary is a trainer who races his own Greyhounds; of course we expect that he is going to show us that the racing industry is not cruel or abusive. Therefore, we will want to honestly depict him the way he presents himself. Another regulation we must be aware of is that one of the stadiums requests that we show them the footage we film at their stadium before adding it to our film. Therefore, we must make sure we show him all the footage and not film anything that would not have been regulated. Overall, documentary is aimed to be honest and truthful and inform or educate an audience. This means that filmmakers should give our a false sense of honesty, manipulate their subjects, or misrepresent anyone in the film. We must make sure as a production company we are aware the main standards in broadcasting codes and that we follow them at a professional level.