Overcoming the challenges of filming in favelas
Filming in favelas can be unpredictable. Story Productions securely navigates these communities for our clients.
Our productions quite often take us into favelas—mainly in São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro—to film a variety of projects, from sports TV to news, from educational videos to documentaries. Most recently, we wrapped work on a Korean series about the impact of Covid-19 around the world, as well as secured footage for a remote-direction documentary about One Young World Ambassadors.
Entitled The Young Leaders: One Young World Stories, this latter project launched last year at a United Nations General Assembly event in New York—in the run-up to the COP26 climate summit.
Commissioned by US arts network Ovation TV and produced by Blue Planet Films, the piece was shot in five different countries, with the Story Productions crew capturing the footage in three different favelas in São Paulo, Brazil.
Filming in favelas offers a number of challenges, including security and access. How do you navigate unmapped regions? How is the safety of the crew and gear guaranteed?
"For anyone unfamiliar with favelas, these largely unregulated and poorly served communities are densely populated areas"
A rapport must be developed between the field crew and the local community leader—showing up with private security is a bad idea, and creates an unpleasant atmosphere. The approval of local leadership provides the necessary security for our film crew, making entry into the three favelas, including Paraisópolis—the second largest in São Paulo—possible.
Even with careful planning, a certain amount of flexibility is required for filming in favelas. Not only does the camera crew have to work with whatever scenes are available, but the close proximity of crew and gear in the tight squeeze of a favela alley means some crew—such as the production assistant or camera assistant—must stay outside the filming location to allow for the smallest crew possible in close quarters.
"Arriving at a shoot location in a favela often involves walking long distances through narrow alleys or up steep inclines…"
For anyone unfamiliar with favelas, these largely unregulated and poorly served communities are densely populated areas. With so many people living in close proximity to each other, background noise and other interferences during a film shoot are regular occurrences. When recording a documentary, this neighborhood ambiance becomes natural background noise, part of what captures the reality of the situation. However, for other types of filming, this can cause interruptions to production, as they are difficult to control or predict. Planning for the unexpected is pivotal to remaining on schedule and meeting client deadlines.
Arriving at a shoot location in a favela often involves walking long distances through narrow alleys or up steep inclines—using a van is out of the question. Equipment needs to be light-weight and easy to operate in tight quarters—a 4K Ultra HD camera is the gear of choice for both quality and compactness.
Fixers are essential to filming in favelas. They arrange local guides—making navigation through a favela’s poorly mapped and marked roads possible for non-locals—as well as obtaining approval to enter in the first place. Providing local Brazilian fixers is one of the many services Story Productions provides.
From pre- to post-production,
live streaming services and location shoots, Story Productions delivers the highest quality production standards.
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