MEET THE ANIMATIC

When George Lucas dreamed up the space battle at the end of Star Wars, he needed to somehow convey his vision to the special effects crew. So he edited together footage of WWII dogfights, which gave the team an idea of the proper pacing and movement for the scene. By the time Empire Strikes Back rolled around, Industrial Light + Magic (George's effects company) was taking this idea one step further by creating pencil-drawn animation of effects that had yet to be completed, like this:

These clips were christened "animatics." They helped the production crew know what to shoot on location and gave the post-production crew an idea of shot design and pacing. For Star Wars Episode One, ILM created its most elaborate animatics yet, like this:

MOTION PICTURES

Some Puppet To Watch Over Me's rooftop scene was crying out for an animatic. Besides potentially being fun to do, it would help me and my Milwaukee Film Corps crew envision how the scene would turn out, and what logistical challenges we would encounter in making it happen.

In a blur of scissors, construction paper, and markers, Karen and I spent a fun-filled evening cutting out miniature representations of Pudding, Jammies, Merrill, and the scene's other elements.

Then, we executed each storyboarded shot with our cardboard creations.

After spending a Saturday editing, I emerged with my very first animatic, complete with soundtrack, background music (from a music library), and even a few digital effects filling in for shots I thought up after the shoot. Already, the animatic was informing and altering my ideas about the scene. George would be proud.

Click here to experience the magic for yourself, through a series of still frames from the animatic. I thought of posting a Quicktime movie of the whole clip, but I don't want to give away ALL my tricks!

The technical aspects are well in hand; now it's time to do some casting. Next time: Meet Merrill.

Bye for now,

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Copyright Kenneth J. Schellin.