Composition: Pre-Production

Objective:  The goals of this composition assignment are (1) to plan a project for logistical efficiency and storytelling impact, and (2) to convey meaning through intentional framing, design, and placement.  Among other criteria, this assignment’s grading privileges mise-en-scène, consistent screen direction, the rule of thirds, look space, headroom, and depth articulation.
Submit:  On behalf of your group, your director will secure the professor’s signature on a set of storyboards.  Please do not continue to this shooting phase of the Composition project without the professor’s approval of those storyboards.
Assessment:  Your group grade will be averaged with other project scores.

  • Analyze one of the following four short scripts: Affair, Espionage, Late, or Secret.  In each scene, two people meet.  Their meeting escalates to a climax.  They withdraw. 
  • Because each script offers only dialogue, you will have to specify setting, character demographics, and action. 
  • Shot size and composition should clearly indicate the scene’s moment of highest intensity or emotion.
  • Plot no more than 6 shots.  I recommend using the Storyboarder app.  Make sure the storyboard includes spoken lines and action cues, as in this example.
  • Compose in a project aspect ratio of 16:9.
  • Distinguish characters from each other using body types and colors.

FAQ

We’re Art majors; can we just draw our storyboards?  Sure.  You don’t have to use the Storyboarder app, but you can import your own drawings into it.  Pretty easy, actually.  Instructions are on the app’s front page.

Composition: Production

On behalf of your group, individuals will submit the following documentation as indicated.

  • Personal Releases – secured by your director and uploaded to this folder:
    anim-stor1.dc1.pennwest.edu >> cinema >> studio >> 03 composition >> project >> documentation>>releases>>personal
  • Location Releases – secured by your producer and uploaded to this folder:
    anim-stor1.dc1.pennwest.edu >> cinema >> studio >> 03 composition >> project >> documentation>>releases>>location
  • Lighting Plots – prepared by your gaffer and uploaded to this folder:
    anim-stor1.dc1.pennwest.edu >> cinema >> studio >> 03 composition >> project >> documentation>>plots
  • Footage Log – prepared by your camera operator and uploaded to this folder:
    anim-stor1.dc1.pennwest.edu >> cinema >> studio >> 03 composition >> project >> documentation>>logs
  • Essay – One page maximum, accounting for any differences between your storyboard and your actual footage.  Prepared by your director and uploaded to this folder:
    anim-stor1.dc1.pennwest.edu >> cinema >> studio >> 03 composition >> project >> documentation
  • Binder (D2L).  On behalf of your group, your producer will submit to D2L copies of all documentation (in the precise order of the list above) in a single .pdf binder.

On behalf of your group, members will submit the following materials as indicated.

  • Raw Footage (server) – prepared by your camera operator and uploaded to this folder:
    anim-stor1.dc1.pennwest.edu >> cinema >> studio >> 03 composition >> video
  • Completed film (server) – prepared by your editor and uploaded to this folder:
    anim-stor1.dc1.pennwest.edu >> cinema >> studio >> 03 composition >> project >> exports
    Your editor will combine the footage in a finished version of the film.  Aside from cutting clips for length, the editor may adjust the footage in no other way (brightness, color, cropping, scale, etc.).  Continuity editing, as demonstrated in this video, offers important evidence of competent composition.
  • Completed film (D2L) – prepared by your editor, uploaded to his/her Vimeo account.  URL to be uploaded to the appropriate D2L assignment folder.