Storyboarding

Been a while. I promised to go into the actual making of the film this time, but I forgot to talk about storyboards. But that goes hand in hand with filming the movie so it works.

Here's a question, to storyboard or not to storyboard? Now most will tell you to storyboard. But most are people with no skill and regurgitate what they read in Directing 101.

Some say they can't draw or some shit like that. To quote Dov for the fourteenth time "If you can't direct a pencil, you can't direct a camera".

On the other hand, Werner Herzog is against storyboarding. ""Coincidences always happen if you keep your mind open, while storyboards remain the instruments of cowards who do not trust in their own imagination and who are slaves of a matrix... If you get used to planning your shots based solely on aesthetics, you are never that far from kitsch. -Werner Herzog

And if you're wondering what kitsch is, it's not good.

So you make your own decision. I'm with Herzog, but I don't have enough experience to recommend anything.

Everyone thinks they know what each scene will look like, but until you draw it out you don't realize how much you don't.

If you're a person who likes the characters to explore their space and just be natural, than you'll probably do alright without storyboards.

If your very particular about what you want, like Kubrick or the Coen brothers, than of course you'll want to storyboard. Don't worry about how great the drawings are. The more time you spend animating the longer it takes. Draw some stick figures in the position and shot you want and move on.

Even though I'm with Herzog on coincidence and exploring what happens, I was starring in the film so I needed to get across what I wanted. So I drew about 40 pages of storyboards, and it was exhausting.

I learned a lot about directing from doing that. Go ahead and draw some storyboards and see how well you do.

Robert Rodriguez used to draw comic strips when he was a kid, which helped him a lot with his directing skills.

So what I'm trying to say is there is no answer. And that goes beyond storyboarding. Not to sound cliche but find works for you.

Next time I'll go into the first day of shooting and give you an update on post production.