We have always told stories, even before language. We enjoy stories (films, books, comics etc) that take us out of our existence and place us somewhere else. This is what we thought about at the beginning of the seminar. However, a successful story needs to start with a storyboard. The seminar was about how to storyboard, with some good examples given.
Step 1 of storyboarding is introducing a character. Step 2 is exploring the human condition and step 3 is realising the impossible followed by the final step, to suspend disbelief. These seem like very abstract sounding concepts but they are crucial to a story, as in a story there is no boundaries. We first looked at a famous storyboard, the Hollywood Formula.
https://www.marsdd.com/news-and-insights/what-hollywood-can-teach-entrepreneurs-about-a-great-pitch/
Following on from the previous lecture that focused on plot and essential assets to a story, we can see that this formula is a linear approach to a plot. An example of this plot is an animation called The Lighthouse by Martin Jonmark. This follows a pattern similar to the Hollywood formula as there is a crisis which is resolved but interrupted by another crisis which is also resolved and followed by a plot twist that may be described as ambiguous as I was unsure whether the lighthouse sank or whether it only appeared to sink. Nevertheless, the man in the end is playing his violin, alive. This is the resolution of the story.
http://www.martenjonmark.com/short/short.html
The actual plot for The Lighthouse is this:
Act 1: the lighthouse keeper is living in the lighthouse playing the violin > The light on the lighthouse goes off
Act 2: He looks out to see a boat heading straight for the lighthouse > He panics and finds a light > Did he survive? Is the problem resolved?
Act 3: The lighthouse is restored > Is the lighthouse under the sea? Did the boat impact?
(Ambiguous ending).
We were also given the example of the Nolan's Chedder Extra Strong cheese advert:
This advertisement is an example of a good story line as there is a crisis that is resolved. The mouse doesn't die and gets the cheese in the end, following this storyline:
1)Mouse eating cheese on track, happily 2) Trap gets mouse 3) Mouse lifts the trap as if it were lifting weights. This is a plot twist as we expected the mouse to die and not revive. It also reinforces the fact that it is 'extra strong' cheddar which is an intelligent way of incorporating the message in the advertisement.
For an example that followed a more graphic design point of view, we looked at the 'I'm bored' book which was a story in a brand guide line as there is a conversation between the black and white type. The branding guidelines were for First Direct and it is a very effective way to deal with branding.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/dingridsystem/sets/72157631015878602/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/dingridsystem/7758535722
For the next part of the seminar, we were given the task to create our own storyboard on our proposal. This meant planning which part would go where and what would be in each section. Based on what I had already done, I planned this:
This task was helpful as I could visualise what my project would look like (roughly) and what it would include. I like the idea of planning things in this way as it helps me to get an idea of where to go next as well as being an effective way of organising my work. Storyboarding is essential to design as we need to know where the design is going and what we want it to achieve. I enjoyed the seminar for this reason and thought it was helpful.
