Storyboard

A storyboard is usually drawn by the director or a designer once the script is approved and before the location scout. It does not have to be pretty. Frames with stick figures, an arrow for camera movement and a note on what is said will do. For an animated spot it gets precise, because every frame is later an hour of extra work.

At the launch of a new machine we had twelve shots and two hours of access to the hall. The storyboard was printed and taped to the wall, and the crew ticked frames off it. We finished early. Without one a crew films everything just in case, which means three times the footage and days of extra editing you pay for.

The order is fixed: the creative brief becomes a script, the script becomes a storyboard, the storyboard becomes a shot list for the camera operator. You supply two things: who and what may appear on camera, and what must never be shown. A corporate storyboard takes a day or two; animation can take two weeks.

Where it gets oversold: studios like to bill a storyboard even where it makes no sense. For interviews, a conference aftermovie or documentary coverage you cannot know in advance what will happen. A drawn storyboard there only ties your hands and creates the false feeling that the film is already made.

We draw the storyboard only once the words are locked. Illustrating sentences that are still moving is wasted time. And we ask the client which three frames they would put on a poster. If the answer is none, the concept is not strong enough and we step back one stage.