How to:
storyboarding
Nov 2021
2 min read
A storyboard is a sequence of drawings, typically with some directions and dialogue, representing the shots planned for an animation, film or any piece of moving content.
Even though storyboards aren’t necessarily a piece of artwork made to be shared with the outside world, they are essential to any animation process. In fact, Martin Scorsese believes, “the storyboard is the way to visualise the entire movie in advance”.
Take a look below on why storyboarding is so important and our process at The Like Minded.
Why use a
storyboard?
Storyboarding plays an important part in the initial stages of planning an animation/campaign. We begin by interpreting the script into drawings, creating a visual of how the animation will look and constructing the initial storyline. This is helpful for everyone, creatives and clients, to see a visual flow and allows collaboration at an early stage. In particular the client can see the creative’s thought process and other elements such as: What is the storyline?; Where is it set?; Who are the characters are involved?; What is the call to action?
Initial ideas
Here at The Like Minded, we usually start by grabbing a good old-fashioned pen and paper to sketch out the initial ideas. Post-it notes are often useful, when moving around and tweaking the flow and order of the story. Below is an example of when we used post-it notes for a Christmas campaign storyboard, created in collaboration with CIB for Alpha Boilers.
We then use InDesign or Photoshop to create a digital version of the storyboard that we can share with the client to discuss and develop the storyboard further. Often the storyboard will need to go through compliance, and this is the best stage to do so; amends can be made much easier now than once the animation process has started.
Drawing the
frames
This process is called ‘scamping’. Scamping is a very rough sketch where you turn your script into something visual. At this stage, you don’t need a lot of detail, it’s just to shape the frames and overarching story. From the storyboard each frame is then illustrated, and finally animated.
Things to think
about
What is the time of day?
Setting the scene at a particular time of day can influence the feel and mood of the overall narrative. For example day-time could depict optimism whilst night-time might convey a tense feeling.
Have you got staging?
Staging in a storyboard can really add to the narrative by giving extra, subtle details about a character or location. Having said this, be sure not to loose your character in a really busy frame. Your character is key and shouldn’t be outshone by any staging.
Can you do a silhouette check?
Drawing a quick silhouette of your character without any detailed line work can help you to see if the character’s action makes sense.
Have you got a variety of shots?
Having the same type of shots and camera angles, may become dull and repetitive for the audience.
Is your scene layered?
This adds depth to the images by having different ones in the foreground, background and middle ground.
Have you added camera movements?
Finally, this will make the animation more interesting to the audience. And again, think about what the camera movement can add to the overall narrative.
