The last pieces of the puzzle.

 In order to complete a decent video, you will need to see the finished product in some way before you commit to the work.  This means: ◦ Planning, planning, planning.  There are several ways to plan for a video.

 Every story must have a beginning, middle, and end, but more importantly it should have… ◦ Introduction (Characters, plot, setting) ◦ Conflict (The driving force of the story) ◦ Climax (Result of the story’s goal) ◦ Falling Action (The result of the climax’s action) ◦ Resolution (Happily or unhappily ever after)  Your videos should follow some sort of storytelling logic in which the characters and ideas are introduced, their situation is explained, a change occurs, and it explores that change over time.

 Committee writing essentially involves the entire creative team kicking ideas around until a story begins to form.  As you begin to figure out what your story is, someone will go “wouldn’t it be awesome if” and “Dude it would be so funny if…”  Write down all of these ideas and then slowly rework and modify these ideas until a story forms

 Storyboarding is the way to now interpret your plan as a series of visual stepping stones to completion.  If that doesn’t make any sense, imagine this.  Every comic book you’ve ever read or seen is a detailed storyboard to a movie that could be made from it.

 The two ways this class can do storyboarding is as follows: ◦ Traditional  You will be given a sheet of paper with 12 panels on it, and draw out the major “keyframes” in sequence so that you have a guide to how the story should flow AND how the shots should look. These drawings serve as reference to where and who should be in these scenes and what types of shots they should be. Due to the limited nature of drawing, you must elaborate in writing what’s going on in each panel. ◦ Digital  You will be given an InDesign file where the 12 panels are able to be manipulated. You will seek out locations and place your actors in the positions you think they should be in, and take a photo. These photos serve as reference to where and who should be in these scenes and what types of shots they should be.

 The four most crucial bits of data in a description for a storyboards are:  SCENE # and SHOT #  LOCATION  ACTION  DIALOG

 With your story decided and your storyboards laid out, now we create a SHOT LIST.  Video production thrives on efficiency, and a shot list makes your videos as efficient as possible. Your story may have flashbacks, flash forwards, or return to a scene at a later time.  You do not need to film in the story’s chronological order, you film by convenience of either getting all the scenes in one area done, or all the scenes by

 The exact terminology varies between production environments but the basic principles are the same.  Most of the following screenshots come from critical darling Community, a sitcom and previous work of Dan Harmon, also the co-creator of Rick and Morty.

 The view is so far from the subject that he isn't even visible. Often used as an establishing shot.

 The subject is visible (barely), but the emphasis is still on placing him in his environment.

 The subject takes up the full frame, or at least as much as comfortably possible. ◦ AKA: long shot, full shot.

 Shows some part of the subject in more detail while still giving an impression of the whole subject.  Usually framed from waist to head.

 Half way between a Mid Shot and a Close Up.

 A certain feature or part of the subject takes up the whole frame.

 The ECU gets right in and shows extreme detail. ◦ Sometimes called a choker.

 A shot of something other than the subject.

 A shot of two people, framed similarly to a mid shot.

 Looking from behind a person at the subject.

 B-Roll is a filler shot of the subject doing something related to the subject he’s talking about. ◦ Example: He talks about playing guitar so you cut to B-Roll footage of him playing guitar while he’s still speaking.