Film Editorial Team

After a one-year break, the video editorial team returned to the blog project in 2025. This year, we explored the fundamental differences between a documentary conversation and a journalistic interview, and why that distinction is particularly important in the context of populist media dynamics.

While journalistic interviews often aim for concise statements, news value, and argumentative confrontation, the documentary conversation is based on relationships, time, and resonance. It gives participants the opportunity to express themselves in their own language, at their own pace, and according to their own logic, rather than being pushed into predefined interpretations.

Especially when working with people who are often stereotyped or reduced to simplistic narratives in public discourse, this form of listening becomes a political practice in itself. We also examined how this approach can be translated into visual storytelling: through camera angles at eye level, by avoiding visually hierarchical perspectives, and through the use of lighting, distance, and framing that do not expose but rather protect those being filmed.

In this way, the camera image does not become a tool of judgement, but a space in which people can speak freely, without fear of being appropriated, simplified, or misrepresented.

The year 2023

The video editorial team was once again part of the blog project in 2023. The team was led by Louise Schöneshöfer, who brought a journalistic perspective to the filmmaking process based on her experience as a television journalist. Together with the five participants, she set out to create films with a strong journalistic approach.

The participants came from Karlsruhe, Strasbourg, and Freiburg. During two in-person weekends in Freiburg in November, they learned the fundamentals of filmmaking and developed ideas for their own projects. We would like to take this opportunity to thank the Freiburg District Media Centre (KMZ) for its generous support. The KMZ provided the video editorial team with professional filming and editing equipment, allowing participants to gain hands-on experience and learn how to conduct interviews, what to consider during filming, and how the editing process works.

Unfortunately, due to illness, not all participants were able to attend the final meeting in December. As a result, fewer films were completed than originally planned. Nevertheless, the participants who were able to take part succeeded in producing two films that raise their voices against racism and populism.

Instructors

Louise was born in Paris and grew up bilingual in Germany. She studied sports journalism in Cologne and did her master’s in journalism in Freiburg and Strasbourg. Now she often crosses the border to work as a video journalist in France and in SWR Studio Freiburg. She is particularly interested in social issues.

The year 2022

The work in the film editorial office continued in this project 2022. Lisa Voelter took the lead, as in the past two years – this time together with Narges Kalhor, who supports the group for the first time. With their 5 participants, their goal was to try producing strong, impactful short films – which are extremely present on social networks in particular.

Social media is a tool with which anyone can become politically active directly and without much effort. This year, the focus was on the form and content of film as a visual medium – and on its impact. The students and volunteers looked at how to deal with certain issues on TikTok and Instagram, how the world today uses hashtags to spread certain messages, and how they can use them as filmmakers. 

Therefore, the Film Editorial Team met in Freiburg during two weekends in november. After getting to know each other the participants learned about the different forms of documentary film, such as the essay and experimental film, and their differences as well as similarities. 

Together they came up with film ideas on the topics of racism and populism and presented them to each other in the group. Filming options were discussed for the realization of the short films, and in the end, 5 special short films were created, each of which presents a story with a new aesthetic and form. The group followed a documentary – experimental approach.

Instructors

Lisa Voelter is an Austrian-German film maker. She works as a camerawoman, editor and film director.

Narges (*1984 in Tehran, Iran) is an Iranian film director, video artist and editor living in Germany. From 2010 to 2019 she studied film directing at the University of Television and Film in Munich in the department of Documentary Film and Television Journalism. Since then, she has made several short films and documentaries, for which Narges was also awarded a prize.

The Film Editorial Team of 2021

Once again this year, camerawoman Lisa Voelter and journalist Margitta Freund are in charge of the film editorial team – and this time they can even work all together in one room! The result: three short films produced by the participants.

Each group agrees on one term that describes (everyday)racism:

White saviourism. A “syndrome” that people from rich industrialised countries develop when they help poor people to boost their egos.

Cultural appropriation. Blues and rap suddenly make real money. But the winners are not Black people who brought this music into the world but white people, like Elvis Presley. Another example for the phenomenon of cultural appropriation: Western pharmaceutical companies patent old, traditional remedies of a culture.

Microaggression: Recurring small remarks, questions, insinuations that make clear: You don’t belong here.

The videos show what it means to take the courage to experiment, improvise and explore the tools of satire. Each group is working differently: one group is having a script which, image by image and sentence by sentence, explains what happens next. Another group is improvising in front of the camera. Others are discovering unexpected forms of expression in the process of editing, resulting in three short, minimalist, poetic and engaging videos.

Last year: Film-making via Zoom

Creating videos together with participants spread all over Europe – France, Germany and even Finland. This was the challenge we had to face last year. Instead of having each participant shooting a video clip with his or her cell phone at home and compiling the clips afterwards, we invented the genre of the “ZOOM film”. The students worked in groups of two to five and shot their videos directly on a Zoom compatible device. Subsequently, they would videoconference with their groups editing the films together. This is how long-distance collaboration was made possible.

One script, one text and many drawings: There was also an anti-racist animated film. The participants could give free rein to their imagination. The result was the production of three very different films with an educational impetus and a strong statement “against racism and populism”. This was only possible thanks to the great commitment of the students, who put a lot of work into the project beyond the workshop time.

Translation Christina Braun