Saturday 1st November - Storyboarding and Interim Crit

Storyboarding is an essential part of pre-production for any media, whether animated or otherwise, so I was glad of the chance to hone my abilities in the area and learn to create a communicative yet succinct storyboard. We began by brainstorming concepts and ideas to use, based around the theme of stereotypes and putting a twist on them. I looked back to my Photoshop poster and the Lord of the Sky and Giants concept I have on the backburner and decided initially to try and work with that. With the setting in mind - a pre-medieval village in a grassy valley - I began to consider how the project theme would fit into my story world. Giants are typically villainous, evil characters, eating, attacking or generally antagonising humanity in most portrayals, so I decided to invert the common hero/ villain relationship and have a kindly giant attacked by a 'hero' who saw nothing but a monster.

A still from Attack on Titan, a popular modern interpretation of the typical evil giant versus underdog human story. The historical setting and verdant fields were useful reference points for building my own setting.

Once I had solidified my concept, I began working on my storyboard, which unfortunately I did not finish in time for the crit meeting in the afternoon. However, I had enough to present and talk about, and the response from the class was generally positive. Some useful suggestions were made to help me streamline and finalise my storyboard, which I planned to continue at home and in class on Tuesday.

I enjoyed seeing everyone else's ideas as well, and contributing to the discussion to help improve their work. It was interesting seeing the different approaches people took when coming up with story worlds, and every angle was explored - from the horrific to the comedic to the philosophical. Seeing so many well-thought out concepts was a boost, and some ideas even inspired me to change some of my own work for the better.