The Teacher Foundation stands to educate teachers and promote school improvement through empowerment of the teaching force alongside providing tech-associated training and support to education institutions throughout India. Shifft Films took up the role of introducing TTF and their work to the public through powerful AVs. The definitive goal of this project was to pass on Maya Menon’s (Founder of TTF) vision to various prospective stakeholders like collaborators, schools, investors, teachers and educational ecosystems through visual content that would eventually bring them in, in support of TTF, with the common goal to make a significant change in present-day teaching and education.
The project involved making of five montage-rich documentaries capturing 4 stellar Teacher Training Programmes by TTF- Teacher Accelerator Program, Inclusive Education, Safe and sensitive schools, Coaching for School Success and highlighting their objective and Impact on a child’s education. A film was also made to celebrate teachers in a more generic way. The challenge in this project was to meet the expectations of the client who particularly wanted every capture to be in line with the specific programme showcased in the video. Addressing this, Deepti Tarakanath says, “When you start a project, the director has a visualisation and so does the client. Hence, it’s important to sit down and see eye to eye, right from the word go. The effort would definitely be more but it is worth it. As a director, my interest would be to showcase my skills but not disregard the client’s needs.”
The shooting involved, 10 to 15 days in a variety of schools- from the very urban setups in Bangalore and Mumbai to Government schools in Doddaballapur to low income schools in the slums of Mumbai- providing very rich images to piece a highly evocative montage. This intense filming was met with equal co-operation from the schools and the excitement of the children to be in front of the camera. We got some really exclusive shots of teacher-student interaction, candid- shots of the children and some interesting cutaways.
“As filmmakers, we put in a lot of thought into our shots. If we fall short of them either creatively or in terms of options, the outcome would certainly suffer. This guerrilla style of film making, where we are at the location for the very first time with our entire crew, involves a combination of sticking to the script and shooting spontaneously. Organising a detailed edit roster will be key to make sure some outstanding rolls don’t get missed out. Some demanding factors to overcome and factor in while shooting so that schedules don’t get affected- Outdoor and street shoots, locations that have not been recce-ed, budget constraints, unfamiliar territories and languages, permissions from city corporations. The fun part of shooting like this is the surprise element. At the end of the day when we go through the rushes we feel immensely satisfied to see such incredible stories generated through that day’s shot list” recounts Deepti Tarakanath. The other aspect of the film was the music. Beautifully composed by Hriday Goswami who gave a score that brought in a rousing feeling. “I wanted something inspirational, energetic, pensive with a human touch sans lyrics ”. All of this came through.
The written script, gave the film a backbone and because there were two versions one with a Voice-over and one without, this helped the montage style of filming.
Teachers need to be recognised as India’s heroes much the same way as doctors and soldiers. Children carry what they are taught at a young age throughout the rest of their lives and it is the teacher who plays a prime role in this journey. The Teacher Foundation believes that every teacher needs to be more enabled and more inspired. We have developed a clutch of films that celebrate teachers and talk about teacher-empowering professional development programs.
These videos are being used extensively to raise funds.