How Historical Footage Adds to Personal Video Biographies

If you have visited this blog before, or our website, then you know that we integrate footage from historical events to put the subject's story into the context of his or her times.

Thanks to sites like the Internet Archive, more and more material is available online. Much of it is in the public domain and free for us to use in our productions.

Here is an example I recently ran across. It was a speech President Richard Nixon made from the Oval Office April 30, 1973 about "what has come to be known as the Watergate affair."



Anyone who was above childhood age at that time will probably have some memory about Watergate. It was certainly the signature event in the mid-1070s in the United States and may shed some light on the culture of that time in a video biography subject's life.

It's great for children and grandchildren to see how their relative's life coincided with events they might have seen only in history books or on television somewhere. Including it in a life story video demonstrates to those descendants the history through which the subject lived.

From a pure production standpoint, it adds another visual element that enlivens the story as it enriches the audience.

Of course, to use historical footage, you have to know history as well as where to look for clips that fit in with the subject's life story. Examples of our work should show that we know how to weave a historical perspective into a personal documentary that will help future viewers see the subject's time in history and, perhaps, his or her part in it.