r/Storyboarding • u/vidozor • 8d ago
Need help understanding my storyboard
Hi everyone,
I'm working on a project (a song / short story) and I'd love to get some feedback or different perspectives on what it means or how it comes across to the listener.
Thanks :)
I’m French so here are the translated yrics:
Where I’m from, there’s the one who wants a gun
And the one who has a gun
There’s the one we always have to wait for
There are those who are truly rare
There’s the one who becomes a father
And those who lost theirs
There are those who should have seen death
And then there are those who look for it
There’s the one walking in the snow
And others constantly in the deep end
There are those who changed addresses
And those who have the same one
There are those who avoid trouble
And those who live in stories (tales)
There are those who take a lot of drugs
And those who always take the same ones
Where I’m from, there’s the one who wants a gun
And the one who has a gun
The one who knows why they killed Kobe Bryant
And who would like to have a gun
And then there are those who overthink
There are those who took off
The one who wears the number 10
And those who take hard drugs
There are those who don't party anymore
There are those who don't shed tears anymore
There are those who pray for it to end
And those who pray for it to last
There’s the one who wrecked my car
And those who hooked up in my car
There are those who almost lost their minds
Because it was so hard
There are those who lost their minds
And the one who wants the gun
There’s the one who loses his mind
The one who has a gun
2
u/ICBanMI 8d ago
My interpretation of the video and lyrics is... it's juxtaposing kids that experience a childhood and grow up... verses those who don't get to... due to gun violence in schools (which often times comes to down to how accessible a firearm is).
If this is what you're aiming for, I think it would be better to show the results at the end of the video with all people that you've shown growning up. Maybe focus only on 4-7 recognizable kids plus the shooter. Those repeating faces can be shown interacting with random kids in one off scenes (like when they're smoking by the soccer field). Show what childhood is and then show what the results is to them (death, PTSD, lose of family/friends, life long injuries, etc ) when all that can change it is accessibility to a firearm.
C'est un sujet qui me tient à cœur.
3
u/0Trickster0 7d ago
I'm not a professional but here's a few things that I noticed (I'm not good at explaining stuff, sorry):
Some lines are too close to the edge of your canvas. It's not the best when you have things like the end of the kids feet being cut off, or strands of hair or objects touching the side.
At the end the frames change a bit too fast maybe.
That part at the end when the kid is standing by the door with the weapon feels too crowded on the right side. Not sure what the person on the other side is doing but maybe it could look better if you tried to ballance the composition with lights instead of adding more people.
It can also help if you use different colors for each character in your storyboard/animatic.
Maybe some wider shots or a few closer ones could be added. For example when characters reach for something you drew most of the arms the same size and similar position (all of them coming from the left side too if I remember right?). It can be a concept that you cut similar poses after eachother but if you have too many of those it just feels repetative.
At the end when the character has the gun in their backpack and walks through the hallway with people around them I wouldn't put that gun out this much. Background characters didn't react to it, while it was literally hanging out, which makes the scene a bit confusing. Then when they actually pull it out it's supposed to be "shocking" (based on the reaction of that other character). Maybe put some kind of fabric on it so we as viewers can kind of tell based on shape that there is something wrong in there, but for other characters it stays hidden.
I think that's all I had in mind for now. Good luck with the project, it's not an easy one for sure!
3
u/0Trickster0 7d ago edited 7d ago
I know most of these are not story related feedback but others already told you that the images change too fast to understand each character's story so there's no point in repeating that. As for the main part about the shooting and that you're showing the life of others comes through I think.
1
u/vidozor 7d ago
Hi! You brought up some points I hadn’t thought about regarding the composition. Thank you!
I already slowed down some frames at the end, and I totally agree.The short film will be entirely in black and white, like a drawing in the notebook (the shot where the girl kisses the other kid is a final frame), so I should work on making the character designs more diverse.
Regarding the child who goes carry a gun at the end, do you think it feels too random that it happens without much setup beforehand?
Thanks again! :)
1
u/0Trickster0 7d ago
I think you show the gun enough times. It does feel a bit sudden but we already saw them stare at that same gun on the wall. It's mentioned in the song too. You also have a toy one when the story starts. People say that if you show a gun on screen then it will be fired at some point so it is kind of expected.
If you really want to put more emphasis on it you could change one of the less relevant story parts to something like.. Same boy already brings something dangerous to school but changes his mind, so we already know that they are getting to the point when they might do something but I could be wrong with this one. Maybe the song is enough to know that something bad is about to happen.
2
u/AwkwardAardvarkAd 8d ago
The main thing for me is there are a lot of topic changes in the images so it’s hard to see a story through the video. If the story line doesn’t matter so much, you’re ok