“Scriptwriting is the toughest part of the whole racket…the least understood and the least noticed.” Frank Capra
Script
So now it’s time to begin. This was a part that I had been…not dreading, but I had nerves about starting my script. I have gathered so much information and have spent so much time delving deeply into the subject I was worried I wasn’t going to do what I learned justice. You can’t fit an entire doctoral dissertation into a Youtube video (well, you could but I don’t know how many people would watch that). My series outline did a lot of the heavy lifting here. For as long as I live, I will stand by the importance of starting any project with an outline. Any time I began to feel overwhelmed or hyper fixate on a minor detail, the outline helped reign me in. It was also important to me to really nail down the history I’m attempting to summarize. While the first episode mainly focuses on establishing the history, later episodes won’t be as straight forward, and I want to keep track of the timeline. My outline is like my personal assistant.
I spent a lot of the script draft trying to get my information in order. The next step is definitely figuring out my voice. Sitting there and reading off facts does not make an engaging video. While the animations will help me understand the pacing, I need to establish what kind of tone I’m going to be using and how I want to come across. As someone who also consumes a decent amount of true crime, one of my main concerns is not sounding too condescending. I want this to be a conversation, I want to explore the nature of this long-time phenomenon, making sure to show that this has always existed in society. I want to have a sense of casualness, but I don’t want to also seem unprofessional. These are all things I will have to consider when heading into recording.
Graphics
Another area I need to stay on top of being organized is graphics. Because I’m using already existing images and footage, I must make sure to keep track of where I find my sources. Youtube is pretty strict with its copyright policy, so I want to make sure I stay within the terms of posting. Creative Commons and the internet archive have been very helpful in finding fair use images and footage.
I keep images organized by subject and where I found them.
Storyboarding
Once I have all my graphics, I need a plan for what I’m going to do with them. I can’t just dive right into building animations, so I need to map out how I want things to look. That’s where storyboarding comes in. It’s mostly a rough sketch of oh how I want things to look and what order I want them to be in, but it gives me a clearer idea of what steps I need to take to build these animations. Nothing special, I just sketched out what I was thinking in my notebook. Every painting starts as a sketch and videos aren’t much different. Before I can start putting everything together, I need an idea of what I’m doing.
An example of my storyboards.
The Process
The process I use for the still images is known as the parallax treatment. I start by taking an image and separating the main subject from the background in Photoshop. Once the subject has been separated onto another layer, I use the content aware fill feature to create a solid background. Loading these layers into After Effects, I can create a sense of motion by moving the subject away from the background and placing text between the layers. Highlighting words in the text and adding particles and a texture loop also create a less 2D feeling to the image, making it feel more dynamic.
The subject
The background
Two elements of the animation process.
Production Journal
And of course, I am still keeping a production journal. As I have said before, this is a good way to measure the time I will need to complete tasks and stay on schedule. I have been pretty on schedule lately so I’m feeling confident in my production so far. I have the bulk of my research done so I can start working on the creative aspects of production.
Link to my production journal here.
I have learned a lot during this process. I am getting better at managing my time, specifically not overwhelming myself with an unrealistic number of tasks. I have also been feeling the importance of laying the groundwork of a project. In the past, I would have been overexcited and immediately dove into the creative aspect of this project, which would lead to me feeling overwhelmed later in the process. Keeping myself accountable and having a solid plan has made this journey really enjoyable.
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