Dev Blog 13 - Storyboarding (Also Greg's Carwash Pt4 WIP)

Hello everyone and welcome back to another Dev Blog.

I've noticed on my longer animations, that I usually only have a vague idea of what I want to draw and it makes the production slower at times, if I already have some completed scenes but don't know how to continue them or how to connect two scenes.

Also, for next year I'm planning some very story driven animations and for that I want to practice a bit storyboarding now, before I jump into deep water. 

First, here are some online tutorials for you, just to get started and what to be careful about:

Toniko Pantoja - How to Storyboard Smarter (Found very useful and good summarized)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AyDbN1hpFzA

Videomaker - 5 Tips for more useful Storyboards (More about working in a team)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kRV50AMJJfE

The Media Insider - How to draw Grade A Storyboards (Traditional Storyboarding)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NPrkxj2MyZI

The gist of it, that I also experienced is:
- You draw your storyboards as you want to, make your panels for your convenience, there is no fix method
- You add only the bare minimum of details/lines to stay fast
- Add notes, add basic shading if the lighting is important (even if just a fill)
- The Storyboard should be able to transmit the story to the viewers
- As always: practice is the best teacher

I already made a mistake in my storyboard at the beginning and had to redraw a few panels, because I tried to make a fully detailed sketch for each of them. After that I tried to stick to a bare minimum of lines and just correct them if it was really not clear what they represent.

I did this storyboard in Clip Studio, just to see the capabilities, but just like with the previous animation with Richard, Clip Studio is simply not built for such things. 

It is possible to make a storyboard in Clip Studio, and if you don't want it to move on a timeline, you can easily make panels and sketch on them. But if I want to check the timing and add the panels to an animation timeline, the huge hoard of unnecessary layers makes the whole work too messy.

Here is a list of current Storyboarding apps, some of them are even free:
https://conceptartempire.com/storyboard-software/