Pre-Production Boardmatic and Storyboard

This was a boardmatic for a story I came up with for my Prethesis project based on the following brief:-

The Finding Place.
A place where lost things go to have a chance at being found.
‘Knowledge can only advance if we are prepared to give serious attention to accounts of the past or present put forward from
different points of view.’ - Andre Beteille

**Keywords :**
1. Rediscovering: “life within things.” that are forgotten and lost
2. Redeeming: (spaces/memories/people) that have been left behind
3. Journey : of losing something / letting go and heading into the unknown in order to find and discover something new.
4. Self discovery : an adventure of finding inspiration and purpose through the process

We all feel lost at some point of our lives. Unsure of our set direction, unable to pick up the trails assigned to us. Forgetting where
we come from, mourning the time lost and places forgotten. The lone ant running in circles, having lost his line.
Afraid of the unknown. We struggle , sink and drown. When we reach the bottom and our feet touch the floor, we only hope we can push ouselves up with one last great big leap and slowly move upwards towards the surface. Finding your way up is even harder, its full of self-doubt and panic. Voices that grab your legs and want to drag you deeper into the darkness. But you kick and go up faster. Its getting brighter near the surface and you feel light and hopeful.
Finally breaking the surface and filling your lungs with a big hungry breath of pure triumph.
This is the true joy of finding. The completion of the journey and discovery that its only the first breath. But each new one brings
promise and purpose.

Given that the brief was pretty open ended, I started my process by creating some concept art based on one of the key words - journey. After this I undertook a project of writing 20 whole stories that revolved around this theme in 1 week and then took my favourite pick. A structure that I usually stick to when I need to write a story is

1. A logline for the story(the story in one line)

2. Who is my character?

3. What does my character want? (usually something that is very unexpected from their personality)

4. What did they do about it?

5. Why did it not work?(An obstacle/plot twist to add interest and suspense in the story)

6. How does it end?

A minor tip I keep in mind is that an audience should get the ending they want, it is how you get to that ending which can be exciting.

A primary inspiration for this story was a quote from a TedXIHE Paris talk by Elena Herdieckerhoff called " The gentle power of highly sensitive people". The quote goes like this - "As a society, we have come to think of sensitivity as a flaw, an unfortunate emotional Achilles Heel that tampers our ability to become evermore optimised, detached, and robotic. We all too readily belittle the idealists, the dreamers and the creators"

Inspired by this quote I came up with the protagonist who has hair so unruly that it can never be contained, giving her no outlet for the desire for freedom she has; until she meets her community of similar people, in the form of a freak circus, where her hair is finally an accessory to her happiness rather than a hinderance. While my character designs usually have multiple iterations, I felt that this first doodle I made in my book just worked the best.

One of the parts I love when coming up with a story is building a character. A professor in my college introduced me to something called a "Know your character sheet" which include questions about your character that don't necessarily come up in the story but just help you form a more realistic, complex and whole character. These questions can range from "Where did your character grow up?" and "Does your character have siblings?" to "How does character dress up" and "what are their hobbies".

I did a few of those tests and also took inspiration from four characters - WALL-E, Maria Von Trapp from Sound of Music, Maudie from the movie Maudie, Celie from The Colour Purple and Bubbles from Trailer Park Boys. All these characters are the outcasts of shows and movies that use their oddities to make something of themselves which is what I wanted for my character. More reasons for why I picked these characters specifically are scribbled on the list in the picture.

One of the initial storyboards.

Here is an excerpt from a speech I came across in my research that stuck with me -

When my soul yarn unraveled an era of confusion ensued, and finally when I got to my core an anxiety of not knowing made it worse. And, it didn't subside until I was able to name it, I was able to describe it, I was able to talk about it. And I learnt that there are others out there that are the same.

Now that I confidently know that, I can come and rewrap elements of my life in a way that makes me comfortable, in a way that makes me shine, in a way that makes me better.

And most importantly, in a way that does not choke my core.