Speaker 1
So understanding
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that there's a big variety from director to director, can you talk to us about some of the higher stress timelines that you've been under? And beyond that, I'm curious about some numbers. For example, how many boards can you draw up in an hour? I
Speaker 1
had a deadline. I was on the Devil's Own, Harrison Ford, Brad Pitt. And there was one day that they needed something to shoot the next day I went home and I sketched out this tire scene overnight went to the office at whatever eight o'clock whatever handed them in and went to sleep in the casting office so that was a pretty tight deadline. When I worked on Die Hard with a Vengeance, I worked with Terry Leonard and there's a car chase on the Sawmill Parkway. I remember I got a call or an email. We need to have the storyboards for the parkway. I'm like, what? And no one had told me this. And I find out they already started filming. So I whipped up like 70 frames overnight and again, went to them very often. I was very tired. Hey, then I was there with Terry, the second unit director. And Terry, if you don't know, is also one of the all-time great stuntmen. He was Indiana Jones that went under the trucking raiders of the Lost Ark. So that was Terry Leonard. I'll often have a lot of time, but as far as how many frames, if it's just sketchy, wow. In an hour, can maybe get 15 20 super loose thumbnails but you'd have to sit the director down and say this is what's going on because it will look insane you will not tell you don't want to do anything in an hour right yeah okay that's uh by and large maybe eat but anything else you don't want to do in an hour. Right. So we usually get time, but every so often we have it where we got to have this thing overnight because it's being shot in the morning because the schedule changed or for whatever reason. And then you just got to get your sleep, grab some five hour intake, take care of it. On
Speaker 2
like a big budget movie that you're on, and sometimes there's a department, there's multiple artists. Yes. How many boards are you guys making on a movie? We're talking thousands of shots in
Speaker 1
a movie. There were four of us on Tokyo Drift. So the end book was about a couple of inches of storyboards in a notebook, or like three inches of storyboards in a notebook that four of us did. Wow. On Too Fast, Too Furious, there was, I think, a total of five of us. It's like one of the few movies where I was the main person because John and I had that relationship. But there were like five of us.
Speaker 2
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access to the largest catalog of ad-free top podcasts included with your Prime membership. To start listening, download the Amazon Music app for free or go to Amazon.com/ad-free podcast. That's Amazon.com/ad-free podcast to catch up on the latest episodes without the ads. With Credit Karma, finding the right credit card for you is easy. Our app analyzes user profiles to suggest personalized recommendations. Visit CreditKarma.com today to explore cards tailored to your needs. Credit Karma, simplifying your financial choices. Today, the LGBTQ plus community is at a crossroads with our loved ones and hard won rights increasingly under attack. For decades, the human rights campaign has been at the forefront of the fight for equality in the face of discrimination and harassment. With the support of people like you, HRC fights for a world where lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer people can live openly and thrive free from fear. If you're ready to support the fight for equality, to donate today, visit hrc.org/give. That's hrc.org/g-i Okay,
Speaker 2
so you mentioned like you don't want to crank through a bunch in an hour, right? Because you mentioned in the book, it's about the balance between detail and making sure that the audience's eye can seamlessly travel across all of the images and understand the story, right? So as an artist, can you share some tricks of the trade? Like what makes a good storyboard to the layperson? Can you help walk us through that
Speaker 1
balance? One of the main things for if you're starting out, always keep the line of direction. If you have character A pointing to the right of screen, character B pointing to the left, don't suddenly have character A pointing to the right and then B pointing to the right. Then it looks like if you cut from one shot to the other, person A became person B. So always remember what is the line of direction. You don't want to repeat the same kind of shot, wide shot, wide shot, wide shot, wide shot, or just tight shots, unless it's the dialogue scene, fine. But even with a dialogue scene, you want to break things up with the wide angle shot just to break it up. Same thing goes with an action scene. The other part is know how much time you have, because if you get into this really needling detail and you're, oh, look at me, I've just drawn the most immaculate painting ever, but you've got 90 frames to go and you ran out of time to add it in. You're screwed. You want to be able to work really loose to get everything done and then show the director or the DP or whomever it is that you're working with. You want to be able to work fast enough to show them the sketches first. And once they give you the notes, then you can go back and add detail. But if you have other scenes coming up, once again, don't be too precious with the work. Some people can do great detail in a short amount of time. Others cannot. Another mistake, making things flat. This is where you started off, but you were saying foreground, medium ground, and background. Have different planes in your storyboards. If you look at Spielberg, for example, he's a master of it. Saving Private Ryan could have something going on really close, something in the middle, and then you find, oh, what's going on in the background?