Alan Gilsenan is the acclaimed Irish documentary director whose work includes The Asylum, The Hospice and I See a Darkness. Last week in The Irish Times he listed the 10 most important rules he adheres to when making documentaries.

While it’s aimed at documentary makers and other media heads, it’s an appealing and humorous read with  some good life lessons in there for everyone!

1. OPEN YOUR EYES AND EARS

Call me old-fashioned, but you don’t make documentaries sitting at your desk. You’ve really got to get out of the house or the office or the pub. But once you manage to finally shrug off your inherent apathy and venture out into the wild blue yonder, you need to look and listen.

Really look and really listen. Listen to people. To their stories. To what is said and what remains unsaid. Listen to the sounds of the wilderness and the hum of the city. See what is actually there before your eyes, not what you imagined was there or what you had hoped would be there. See the beauty in the ugliness and the ugliness in the beauty.

Then ask yourself what is all this really telling me? What is this not telling me? And when you realise that you don’t understand any of it, that none of this makes any sense at all, but yet you still instinctively feel that it may have some inherent importance, then record it.

Document it. Preserve it. You can sort it out later and maybe even begin to understand it (this is called editing and it is a dark and secret art).

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