Story and Beat boards

These links are a small collection of storyboard artists and their portfolios. I felt this would be good to look at, so I have a better understanding of the type of work I should be producing as a pre production artist:

JP Vine Studio
http://jpvine.com/2012/07/15/pirates-band-of-misfits-storyboards/
http://jpvine.com/2009/12/16/feature-beat-board/

Game storyboards:
http://jpvine.com/2009/12/20/game-cinematic-storyboard/

Scott Weiser - character animator
http://scottwiser.blogspot.co.uk/p/storyboarding-portfolio.html

RIDLEY SCOTT
I came across this interview with director, Ridley Scott who created films such as Alien and Blade runner. One of the first things he mentions when looking at a scene, he will notice the lighting first (another confirmation of the power and importance of lighting when negotiating a scene).


http://www.openculture.com/2012/05/ridley_scott_demystifies_the_art_of_storyboarding.html

He describes a method he uses, when starting to storyboard a scene. His technique is to create the look, mood, form etc. in a detailed drawing, then use thumbnails to depict the action or how the scene plays out. In this way the storyboard becomes more of a sophisticated 'comic'.

I had a look at some of the storyboards he created for the film ALIEN. You can see from the drawings how he has planned the scene. Using shading to show light and dark areas of the scene. Also, as it is storyboards for film, he notes a lot of camera angles and actions.

Another technique he suggested is to add abstraction to the design of his shots he will create an image in the storyboard, combining shapes and patterns into the scene.

This image is a recreation of the abstract example Scott uses to explain
how he uses this technique in his storyboards.

In this example, you can see how the abstract  design of the image
can be transferred through in cinematography

  images from: http://aliensarchive.tripod.com/aliens/production/storyboardlisting.html



LOU ROMANO
Lou Romano is an art director for Pixar studios, his work is published in  http://www.louromano.com/bio.html Originally published in 1904, Kwaidan was the culminating life work of Lafcadio Hearn (1850-1904) a writer of Greek/Irish descent who devoted the last 14 years of his life to living and working in Japan, writing books about the culture and translating into English the Kwaidan tales.
These images show the process Romano goes through







 http://louromano.blogspot.co.uk/2011/03/kwaidan.html

Another Technique I learnt when it comes to creating storyboards is from the advice of an animation workshop I attended, at the Barbican centre in London. Some key points they made are as follows:

• Most storyboards will be made in sequential order
• Important to note - how the images are arranged will inform the audience how they associated together
• Every scene should contain these four elements - character, scene, object and a value change e.g. lost to found, positive to negative etc.
• When writing a scene, remember - setup (establishing character and scene), action then resolve (value change)