Here at Echo Video we love it when a project comes through the door and requires storyboards and pre-visualisations. If the video is scripted and requires certain set-ups to tell the story and the idea is very creative storyboards can be an essential part of the pre-production process.
Storyboards – From page to screen
Storyboards can be helpful in video production for a lot of different reasons. Firstly, and possibly most obviously it helps people to visualise what the final video will look like. When we take on a project and start discussing ideas we’ll immediately start thinking of shots that we think will look great, or cool locations to film in, these can often be difficult to portray to a client so storyboards can act as a visual aid. This can be essential for us if we’re trying to convince a client of an idea or an expense that they may feel is unnecessary.
Storyboarding can also help you work out the technical aspects of a video production. Even the most rough series of sketches can help you work out what lighting or other equipment might be required in each scene. It can also help plan out a shoot in terms of what angles will cut best which can therefore help you decide what cameras and lenses to use.
Remain flexible
I think the thing to bear in mind however is that when you come to filming the video you don’t have to try and perfectly reproduce what’s on the page. One of the things I love about video production is that it’s a collaborative and creative process from start to finish. So, once you’re at a location someone might come up with a better idea or something that’s on the page might not actually work as well as you thought it might. However, once you’ve got the basis of a narrative in the storyboards then in some ways it makes it even easier to deviate and create something unique.
Storyboards example
We recently produced a video for a client that demanded a lot of pre-production work. We only had one day to shoot the entire video and there were a number of moving parts such as the location, props, actors etc so we had to know exactly what we were doing from the minute we arrived. The fact that we had put the time and effort into producing storyboards meant that the whole day ran smoothly, the clients knew what to expect and the final video came out really well.
Below I’ve included some side-by-side comparisons of some of the storyboard panels and the final shots from the video. The storyboards were produced using the script provided by the client and drawn by the very talented Megan Sayers.
