8. Analysing, editing and using the film
By this stage you should have a wealth of information, but in order to communicate the salient points you need to reduce it to a manageable length and highlight the key issues. This step involves watching all unedited films of the interviews – either with another person or alone – to get an overview of what has been said. You then need to pick out the key ‘touch points’ – themes that particularly resonate, and that may have also arisen in a number of interviews – within each interview and edit each film down to a length of about 10 minutes. The next step is to identify key themes (such as ‘when you were first referred to the hospital’ or ‘making the decision about C-section’) and divide up clips into those themes, interweaving the various patients’ quotes with each other. The final video will show a title screen for each theme, such as ‘outpatients’, followed by views from a number of different patients on that topic.
You will need editing equipment and software to carry this out.
Be aware that analysing and editing the footage can be time consuming, as Andrew describes here. See whether you can find someone early on who would like to help with this.
You can choose to edit the film by theme, or by timelines (eg before the operating theatre, in the operating theatre…) Here is an example of a staff film which has the theme ‘Joy’.
And a film edited for the theme of the theatre environment:
The women’s films were also edited according to theme, with different women talking about the same topic (here, they talk about the experience in theatre)
Further key points to remember:
- Try to balance out negative comments with positive ones.
- Focus on stories that constructively explain things that need improving at clearly identifiable stages of the patient pathway.
- Your priority must be to include high-quality material, and it is important to include some quotes from everyone who was interviewed.
- Give the person filmed the final veto on what is included in the edited film. Ideally, send them a copy with all their quotes that you would like to include. Do not send them the edited film, as this would betray the confidentiality of others who were filmed. Alternatively, send them the unedited film of themselves, ask if there are any sections they would prefer not included, and make sure these are not used. Allow them time to receive and comment on these materials well before the feedback event.
Organisations like the Media Trust run courses in film making for this sort of work.
For example see: