I cut my teeth working in the offices of Maysles Films, Inc., the company that created seminal Direct Cinema documentaries like Grey Gardens, Gimme Shelter and Salesman. As Assistant Editor and Archivist there, I built upon my university studies of Direct Cinema and verité documentary while working with Albert Maysles on feature documentaries like The Love We Make, The Beales of Grey Gardens, Get Yer Ya-Ya’s Out, Muhammad and Larry, and The Gates. Each of these had mountains of vintage footage that needed to be combed through.

The joy of this process was letting the footage and its strengths drive the film, rather than trying to make the film fit a certain message. That’s what Maysles Films was always about: finding the soul in the footage and setting it free. It was an unforgettable experience, working with the amazing editor Ian Markiewicz, whose sense of emotional “music” left a deep impression on me, as well as his ability to find the subtle humor in every scene and strong internal compass for the film’s wholeness and cohesion. Above all, our crew at Maysles Films felt inspired and humbled to attempt to carry on the tradition of Direct Cinema that Albert and David Maysles had started five decades earlier.

I later put this into practice while editing Insha’Allah Democracy, a darkly humorous doc about former Pakistani dictator Pervez Musharraf running for president while in exile. Under the skilled direction of Mohammed Ali Naqvi, we found a balance between the soulful, introspective moments of the ex-potentate examining the criticism of his legacy, the humor as the campaign goes awry, and the historical context needed for Western audience to truly appreciate it all. Mohammed Ali Naqvi is not only a brilliantly creative director, but an intrepid and brave producer, and now nominated for multiple News and Documentary Emmys. With Mohammed at the helm we told Musharraf’s personal story in a way that was by turns sympathetic to the man for his efforts to improve the country, but held him to account for his abuses, detailing his legacy in Pakistan for good and ill.

Later I was asked by Emmy-nominated and Oscar-winning editor and director Hemal Trivedi to come on board her film Battleground as editor. As with Insha’Allah Democracy, Battleground started with one simple concept, morphed into something else, came back around to the original concept in a new light, and evolved into something more nuanced and sophisticated by the end. Battleground was a wry exploration of politics in Pennsylvania, originally investigating why the state went to Donald Trump in the 2016 election when earlier it had gone to Barack Obama twice. As more footage was shot, as the political activists and operatives revealed their real frustrations and concerns, the film refocused more on the dysfunction of the American electoral process, how large outside donors frequently interfere in local elections with impunity, backing uninspiring centrist primary candidates to knock out candidates that have much more grassroots support but could threaten the status quo. The film dives into these pervasive issues, told through the personal journeys of two political operatives, one on either side of the aisle, who finally come together in the end. In the end we attempted to address the question of our time—as the country becomes more politically polarized, how can compromise be reached?

In a word, the process is iterative. The editor scours through the footage to find the scenes, find the real heat in the story, consulting with the director on their vision. In documentary editing, it’s always a balancing act between telling the story and illustrating the real-world context for why the story matters. This is on top of the editorial challenges you would find in a narrative feature, balancing humor, mood, atmosphere, pacing, continuity, character development and emotion. The editor pulls the scenes together, making a rough sketch of the film, discussing with the director and producers the directions that the footage seems to want to go in. There is course correction, and some scenes need to be steered in a different direction for the film to work, others work well but later prove to be unnecessary. Rough it out, watch, revise, repeat. Keep trying until everything is balanced right.

The process of editing documentary in this way—driven by the footage rather than editing to a script and “painting by the numbers”—can take months, even years sometimes. Sometimes the original concept or style will get thrown out in favor of something better, a deeper insight that the director wants to bring forward. Often the elements that appear to be the most subtle at first become the most important to focus on. Unlike working in a simpler milieu like short-form commercial content, there are always countless creative obstacles that couldn’t be anticipated at the outset of the production. I would say documentary is the most frustrating form to edit in, but also by far the most creatively rewarding. And to impart some critical truth on a viewer, this form is the most effective: a bespoke blend of personal narratives and informational context.