Unlike bulky film cameras, digital versions attract little attention, and they proved less intimidating to the young Mongolians she interviewed. But digital didn't work for everything. Woodworth shot half her documentary on 16mm film. The dramatic Mongolian landscape, with its sharply angled mountains and barren, flat desert, paled on video. The image is not as strong.
Film is still superior, richer.
Four decades ago, documentarians were burdened with cumbersome sound equipment that worked best indoors. They fill a shoe box next to one of his giant monitors. A handful of tapes are scattered in a trail from the shoe box to the camera that he uses like a VCR to play tapes and dump footage onto the computer. His voice is raw and clipped as he discards tape after tape searching for the right one. He glances at his watch often.