Documentary Storytelling Through Spatial Video with Blackmagic Design

18/06/2025

Documentary Storytelling Through Spatial Video with Blackmagic Design

Brie Clayton June 18, 2025

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DaVinci Resolve Studio underpins a blend of spatial video and immersive documentary storytelling.

Eighty years after World War II, a daughter uncovers her father's untold story as a D Day combat camera operator. That's the premise of D-Day: The Camera Soldier, a new documentary, produced by TARGO in collaboration with TIME Studios, for Apple Vision Pro.

Immersive documentary studio TARGO approached the film as a narrative that moves fluidly across formats, using immersive as part of an evolving storytelling toolkit. By blending 2D archival footage, spatial and immersive video, and 3D interactivity, the filmmakers sought to bring audiences closer to the film's emotional and historical truth.

We're now able to ask ourselves: Which medium is best suited to tell this specific part of the story?' said TARGO cofounder and director Chlo Rochereuil. Previously, we worked in silos-360 video, stereoscopic video, interactive scenes-each format operating independently. This project bridges those formats and allows us to choose the one that best serves the narrative.

That mindset shaped every aspect of production, from developing a compact custom camera rig to designing a unified post production pipeline. One of the first challenges we faced was finding the right equipment: something lightweight, high resolution, and robust enough to follow life as it happens without disrupting it, noted Producer and TARGO Cofounder Victor Agulhon.

Building a Spatial Rig Traditional high resolution 3D rigs are large and cumbersome, making them difficult for real world documentary work. For D-Day: The Camera Soldier, TARGO developed a miniaturized rig around two Blackmagic Micro Studio Camera 4K G2s to capture the spatial footage.

These cameras gave us the right balance: cinematic image quality with a compact, lightweight form factor, said Agulhon. They were small enough to mount on a light beam splitter, allowing us to move the system easily and stay mobile indoors, outdoors, even on beaches.

Ultimately, it came down to image quality, form factor, and sensor synchronization. The Micro Studio 4Ks were the only cameras that brought all three together in the way we needed, revealed immersive DP Mael Joanas. Likewise, the Blackmagic cameras gave us reliable genlock in a small form factor without needing AC power, a crucial factor for us.

The compact rig unlocked creative possibilities. We could film in tight spaces, between furniture, in basements, close to our subjects, noted Rochereuil. One standout example is a beautiful shot that mimics the effect of a dolly zoom, using the cameras mounted on sliders. We could only make these choices because the rig was so lightweight and compact.

Agulhon added, We wanted to fully saturate the Vision Pro's capabilities and approach real world fidelity. That priority shaped the decision to use Blackmagic equipment, providing the cinematic sharpness and depth needed to bring the immersive experience to life.

This was TARGO's first project on which it could bring the entire workflow together in DaVinci Resolve Studio. Unifying our video pipeline for edit, conform, grade, and delivery in one tool reduced the variables and centralized our process around a familiar skill set, explained Joanas.

A key advantage was DaVinci Resolve Studio's native support for stereoscopic 3D workflows. Historically, our stereo alignment pipeline would have been scattered across multiple tools, revealed Joanas. Through Resolve, we not only reduced the need for round tripping, but also improved how we collaborated.

That ability to edit stereoscopic footage using a traditional 2D workflow proved crucial. We were essentially operating in a 2D environment, using stacked left and right images that synced with a few clicks, said Joanas. It allowed us to edit stereo video using a mono display while still exporting in side by side formats for delivery.

TARGO sees the documentary as a step toward a new grammar of immersive storytelling. We are most proud of how naturally it all came together, both for the story and the viewer, concludes Rochereuil. We succeeded in unifying multiple formats while staying grounded in a profoundly human narrative.

June 23, 2025Asahi Broadcasting Nagano Uses Blackmagic Cloud WorkflowDaVinci Resolve Studio timelines shared with remote team, streamlining post production. Blackmagic Design

June 20, 2025Brooklyn Quarter's New Film Shot with URSA Mini Pro 12K OLPFShot on steps of an LA home, micro comedy Pooped also used

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Documentary Storytelling Through Spatial Video with Blackmagic Design

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