Immersive Storytelling Using Storyboard Pro
If you're looking to create engaging storyboards that capture the emotions, personality, and direction of an animated feature, video game, commercial, or live action film, then Toon Boom's Storyboard Pro is what you've been waiting for! Storyboard Pro provides a lot of tools and features that'll take your storyboards from being presentable to outstanding and immersive.
The drawing tools in Storyboard Pro also provide a lot flexibility when it comes to visually realizing scenes. The capability to draw both vector and bitmap images provides a lot of freedom when it comes to creating various objects or elements that might be in a particular environment you're fleshing out. By choosing either a vector and bitmap layer to work on allows you to use either a Pencil, Brush, Eraser, Shape, or Paint Tools to achieve this.
By drawing on a vector layer you'll have the ability to scale images infinitely and adjust the quality of the lines after they've been applied. If you're aiming to sketch something that has a more natural media feel to it then you might try working on a bitmap layer and exploring the different brush presets that come stocked with the application. Every tool that you use can be modified in the Tool Properties View allowing you to achieve the look and feel that you intend to convey.
In addition to the drawing tools, using the Selection and Cutter tools combined with some of the editing tools provides you with the ability to make adjustments to your drawings with ease. For example you might choose to tweak a vector drawing by selecting and moving specific parts of the image around or to simply cut away certain parts of a bitmap image to be pasted onto another layer. Using these tools can save you time, speed up your workflow, and allow you to focus on being imaginative.
Storyboard Pro has a great system for laying out your entire visual narrative by making it easy to lay out panels, scenes, sequences, and acts by simply clicking on their respective buttons in the Storyboard Toolbar. When it comes to viewing to your entire storyboard layout you can choose from several workspaces to change up how you can view all of your panels.
For example, if you want to view your entire storyboard containing all of your panels more holistically in a full screen thumbnail view then you could click on the Overview Workspace in View Toolbar.
When working with a creative team on a storyboard project you'll mostly likely be making lots of edits not only to drawings but also to the pacing. Storyboard Pro makes it incredibly easy to rearrange panels, divide scenes and sequences, and create new acts.
You also have the ability to keep track of any panels that have been changed using panel tracking. This can be helpful if you're wanting to single out specific panels that have been revised. Storyboard Pro is certainly an application that was built with a collaborative workflow in mind.
Storyboard Pro's Project Management feature allows you to split up and extract parts of a project file and save them as new project files for others to work on. Alternatively, these divided parts can be rejoined back into a single project through the Project Management feature.
If you're looking to emphasize a particular action or emotion that's taking place on a drawing you can do so by creating an animatic. Storyboard Pro's Camera tool can be keyframed over time allowing you to pan and zoom around a panel.
So if you have an aerial wide shot of a city with a volcano on the horizon, you can gradually zoom into the shot to focus the viewers attention the volcano. By moving the camera around you now have the power to direct the audience's attention and evoke different emotional responses.
The ability to bring elements of a scene to life don't stop there. You can also give to life specific elements in a scene by animating individual layers associated with a panel using the First Frame and Last Frame Tools.
These are just a few of a many amazing features that this application has to offer. Using this powerful toolset will allow you to visually translate scenes that are more immersive and reinforce the final project's vision.
Storyboard Pro provides you with these tools to not only save you time when making revisions to your storyboards but also to allow your creativity to flourish so that you can craft a visual narrative that will translate effectively to your team, directors, editors, and anyone else involved a creative pipeline. You can get a more in-depth look at Storyboard Pro's immersive toolset in the Your First Day with Storyboard Pro tutorial.
Storyboard Pro's Interface
As you begin to explore the interface, you'll find it to be really user friendly and easy to customize for your own needs. There might be times when you find yourself only using a specific set of tools for a particular storyboard project. In this situation, you can free up some real-estate in the interface so that you can better focus on some panels you're sketching on by hiding tool bars and views that might be cluttering up your workspace. You can also rearrange, customize, and then save a workspace to suit your own needs.Powerful Drawing Tools
The drawing tools in Storyboard Pro also provide a lot flexibility when it comes to visually realizing scenes. The capability to draw both vector and bitmap images provides a lot of freedom when it comes to creating various objects or elements that might be in a particular environment you're fleshing out. By choosing either a vector and bitmap layer to work on allows you to use either a Pencil, Brush, Eraser, Shape, or Paint Tools to achieve this.
By drawing on a vector layer you'll have the ability to scale images infinitely and adjust the quality of the lines after they've been applied. If you're aiming to sketch something that has a more natural media feel to it then you might try working on a bitmap layer and exploring the different brush presets that come stocked with the application. Every tool that you use can be modified in the Tool Properties View allowing you to achieve the look and feel that you intend to convey.
Intuitive Editing Tools
In addition to the drawing tools, using the Selection and Cutter tools combined with some of the editing tools provides you with the ability to make adjustments to your drawings with ease. For example you might choose to tweak a vector drawing by selecting and moving specific parts of the image around or to simply cut away certain parts of a bitmap image to be pasted onto another layer. Using these tools can save you time, speed up your workflow, and allow you to focus on being imaginative.
A Visual Narrative
Storyboard Pro has a great system for laying out your entire visual narrative by making it easy to lay out panels, scenes, sequences, and acts by simply clicking on their respective buttons in the Storyboard Toolbar. When it comes to viewing to your entire storyboard layout you can choose from several workspaces to change up how you can view all of your panels.
For example, if you want to view your entire storyboard containing all of your panels more holistically in a full screen thumbnail view then you could click on the Overview Workspace in View Toolbar.
When working with a creative team on a storyboard project you'll mostly likely be making lots of edits not only to drawings but also to the pacing. Storyboard Pro makes it incredibly easy to rearrange panels, divide scenes and sequences, and create new acts.
You also have the ability to keep track of any panels that have been changed using panel tracking. This can be helpful if you're wanting to single out specific panels that have been revised. Storyboard Pro is certainly an application that was built with a collaborative workflow in mind.
Easy Project Management
Storyboard Pro's Project Management feature allows you to split up and extract parts of a project file and save them as new project files for others to work on. Alternatively, these divided parts can be rejoined back into a single project through the Project Management feature.
Create Animatics
If you're looking to emphasize a particular action or emotion that's taking place on a drawing you can do so by creating an animatic. Storyboard Pro's Camera tool can be keyframed over time allowing you to pan and zoom around a panel.
So if you have an aerial wide shot of a city with a volcano on the horizon, you can gradually zoom into the shot to focus the viewers attention the volcano. By moving the camera around you now have the power to direct the audience's attention and evoke different emotional responses.
Animate Individual Layers
The ability to bring elements of a scene to life don't stop there. You can also give to life specific elements in a scene by animating individual layers associated with a panel using the First Frame and Last Frame Tools.
These are just a few of a many amazing features that this application has to offer. Using this powerful toolset will allow you to visually translate scenes that are more immersive and reinforce the final project's vision.
Storyboard Pro provides you with these tools to not only save you time when making revisions to your storyboards but also to allow your creativity to flourish so that you can craft a visual narrative that will translate effectively to your team, directors, editors, and anyone else involved a creative pipeline. You can get a more in-depth look at Storyboard Pro's immersive toolset in the Your First Day with Storyboard Pro tutorial.
