Why I Don’t Like Storyboards (But Use Them Anyway)
When I was little, I drew my own version of a Calvin and Hobbes comic strip. It was about Calvin getting hold of a giant water balloon. He struggles to fill it until it’s so big he has to hold it above his head and can’t put it down. Hobbes tries to help, but his claws pop it, drenching Calvin.
I think it was the first time I tried telling a story through pictures in that way. And maybe that’s the root of it: I’ve never really been into comics, but I’ve always admired them. Storyboards, though, have always felt slightly off to me, because there’s no tempo and no pacing.
Krzysztof Kieślowski: I'm So-So... (2001)
Film is a time-based medium. How long you hold a shot for changes its meaning completely. I once watched a documentary on Kieślowski where he talked about filming a sugar cube dissolving in a cup of coffee. He said if you hold the shot for five seconds, it means nothing. Hold it for 45, and it means everything. They spent days testing sugar cubes to get the right dissolving time. If it was too long it made the viewer feel like it was more important than it was. Too short and you miss it.
And maybe that’s why storyboards feel like only part of the picture. They’re useful for plotting out action and composition. But they don’t give you any sense of flow and timing.
That said, of course I still use them. Sometimes because I have to, sometimes because I want to.
Making Common Maps
For The Cowgirl I worked with Plume Films early on to sketch out the story. It was a practical way to talk about composition and movement. We had a lot of conversations around animation and performance, and the boards gave us a clear visual language to talk. When you’re working in virtual production, you have no choice; storyboards are vital. You’re lighting in a virtual space. You’re building real-world props to match digital backdrops. Everyone from the DoP to the CG team needs to know what you’re building, and why. So the boards act like a common map.
But I still move to animatics as soon as I can. I always cut them myself. There’s something about putting images on a timeline that immediately tells me what’s missing… what’s too long, what’s too short, what is missing. I’ll often go back and change the storyboard after seeing the animatic.
The Lighthouse disappeared behind an Evil Cloud
When we began The Cowgirl, the lighthouse was the core of it. It was the image that sparked the whole story: a girl in a cowboy hat, sitting beside a lighthouse, with a dark cloud behind her. For a while, it was the anchor for the entire film.
Then the Evil Cloud arrived. And the lighthouse quietly disappeared.
It’s strange how that happens. The lighthouse felt like the heart of the metaphor at first. But as the story grew, it became a distraction. The emotion was in the cloud, and the lighthouse became confusing. Letting go of the lighthouse was a little bit painful. But that’s the process. What feels central early on often vanishes once the film finds its own meaning.
Even though the lighthouse never made it to screen, the image shaped the script. Its ghost haunts the film, even if it’s not in the final edit.
Begin Anywhere
One of my favourite quotes about creativity comes from John Cage: “Begin anywhere. Not knowing where to begin is the most common form of paralysis.”
That sums up a lot of film making for me. It’s really hard to start and honestly I have no idea where the ideas come from. Or whether they’ll ever turn into something else.
Storyboards have their place. Some filmmakers swear by them, and that’s completely fair enough. For me, they’re just the first step on a road that leads somewhere else. They help get the team aligned, and they give the idea a place to start from.
But film lives in time. And that’s the only place I can see if a film works.
If you’re working out how to move from sketches to screen,
have a look at what we’ve been making— or say hello
