Here are some storyboards I was asked to do for season 5’s finale of Burn Notice. I was on a feature at Dreamworks at the time so I was able to offer a couple hours a night after work as well as weekends.
The workload was ridiculous and these were done directly with no preliminary sketches (clearly).
To see all of the boards click here:
Storyboards used to be and in many cases still are done using traditional media- paper, pencils, ink pens and markers. These things are easy to carry around and are inexpensive to purchase. They are both basic and fundamental. These basic supplies should be in the kit of any storyboard artist.
They are essential for situations where an artist is needed in an emergency situation, on location. One example was on a film called Five Days of War, directed my Renny Harlin. I was on location with the crew in a small town called Tsalka, in the Republic of Georgia. There was a huge exodus scene involving hundreds of local extras, thousands of blanks, pyrotechnics, animals, two Georgian attack helicopters and a camera helicopter. The pilots were Georgian military and didn’t speak English. Renny was running into language barriers and had to be sure the pilot understood how he wanted the scene shot.
I got the call where I was working in a trailer back at base camp. I ran about 4 village blocks, trudging through thick muddy roads to the shooting location and was told what I needed to sketch. I drew up a few shots in a Moleskine notebook which was quickly handed off to Renny. Drawing is a universal language, if you can draw, you can communicate with anyone who can see. Below are a couple of the on-the-fly boards, done in a matter of minutes for the Georgian helicopter pilot.
[Five Days of War storyboards by Jonathan Gesinski]
For the most part these days, I do work digitally though. There’s no shame to be had in it. Using technology to better your product, provide a better and more useful tool for your client and to work more efficiently is only wise.
Storyboarding or any form of commercial artwork is not fine art. It is impossible to cheat. You do whatever you need to to get your client, be it a director or whomever, something that will help them and ideally make them look as awesome and creative as you can. Using computers to create and manipulate images is an extremely efficient and effective tool. With computers, working digitally, an artist can reuse images already created, easily combine elements into new images, repair and adjust sketches, all in ways not possible when working on actual paper. Again, the aim is to get your client what he needs as fast and accurate as possible. Your job is to convey his idea, to duplicate it so that others can sync up with and work toward making his vision a reality.
[Five Days of War storyboards by Jonathan Gesinski]
Adobe Photoshop is a great program. I probably don’t even need to mention it. The program I use for all of my commercial, digital artwork is Corel Painter 11. It does have problems, glitches and needs to have plenty of kinks worked out but what makes it worth it is Painter’s brush engine. The brushes in Painter are awesome and often times, work created in Painter can be difficult to tell apart from work created in traditional media. Many clients still don’t like a very “digital” look. This is another situation where Painter comes in handy. You can work digitally and a client who doesn’t like a digital look will be happy with what you turn in.
[The Darkest Hour storyboards by Jonathan Gesinski]
Using draw on-screen tablets such as the Wacom Cintiq or tablet computers such as the Axiotron Modbook is also a very natural feeling way to go. Back in the Republic of Georgia, pretty much all of my work was done on a Modbook.
You can see more storyboards and illustration here.
Ideally, being proficient with traditional media is the way to go. Having that tool in your belt, explore going about the same thing using digital tools. See what works best. But ultimately, regardless of how you get there- tell your stories as best you can pull the viewer in and don’t let him go. Draw and draw a lot. Have fun!
Allow me to introduce you to my buddy and roommate (cellmate) for the past year over at Dreamworks. Actually, if either of us needs an introduction it would be me- he’s been at this art game for some time. His solid work will undoubtedly speak for that.
He is a double-threat. A talented 3D modeler, who as far as I’m concerned, and from what I’ve seen, can build a model of just about anything. He can also draw and paint your head off. He has an impressive range, from animation to realistic people, environments- exterior concepts to interiors, oh, and by the way, he thrives on tech.
Checkout his Homepage here:
http://www.jimmartindesign.com/
For more current and up to date work check out his Blog:
http://martinconceptart.blogspot.com/
Jim is a proud family man, a great friend and a wildly talented artist. Not to mention, he is also witty and does some great impersonations. This is just a bonus, but trust me, it really helps getting through the day on the job!
At the time, the Pogo Sketch and the Dagi Stylus were both still very new to the scene. They were the best options available.
Now though, I’ll tell you sternly- don’t waste your money on these two. Apple still sells the Pogo, their employees can be found with them clipped to their uniforms. Sometimes when signing for your purchase, they will hand you one to use. All of this may feel quite official, almost an endorsement of the Pogo. I’m here to give you a few options which you can pull out and use with better results next time you’re at an Apple Store or just want to take a note or doodle a sketch.
As these things come out they generally improve. As these new and improved styluses come out, we buy and use them.
Here is an updated offering of our opinions on some of today’s more popular and best styluses. We will focus on three styluses in particular.
When we first got our hands on the Alupen from JustMobile it was love at first site. This thing has a substantial but user friendly weight to it. It is the perfect length and width and feels great in your hand. It is extremely well designed and done so to match and compliment the iPad itself. Aside from the minimalist (and appreciated) branding stamped on it, the Alupen would be the easiest stylus to pass of as an official Apple iPen.
Out of the box it works beautifully. The soft rubber tip glides of the screen and requires little pressure to interact with the device.
The problem with the Alupen is the lifespan of the tip. They seem to have the lifespan of your common goldfish when it comes to quality functionality. Our first one developed a small slit in the side of the tip which made it difficult to use. After emailing JustMobile about five times and giving ample time for them to reply, we went ahead and called Taiwan (I think it was) directly and after a language challenged phone call, a replacement was on the way.
The replacement was the same out of the box- worked great. After about a week of use tho the tip again went bad. This time it was the smoothness of it which just seemed to wear off. When new, the tips have this velvety finish to them. With a little use though, this appears to wear off and the rubber tip ends up being sticky when sliding over the screen. This makes distraction free drawing, painting and writing on the iPad more difficult than it’s worth and you’ll quickly revert back to your finger.
A third Alupen was tried and again, the tip went bad. With a good tip, this would be the best stylus available. Until then, its just not worth the money.
The Alupen is available here: http://www.xtand.net/alupen.html for about $20.00
I think we came across this Stylus in a blog somewhere. After finding the official site for it:
http://iFaraday.com we picked up a couple.
Currently there are a few different versions of the iFaraday Stylus available on www.iFaraday.com. There is a basic stylus that comes in a few different colors.
There are also three different versions which are called the Artist Pack. The tip material used is the most capacitive material we’ve experienced yet. These are the most responsive and user friendly styluses we’ve found yet and only expect the innovation and materials to improve over time.
The bodies of the styluses are not mass-produced in a factory in China or some such place as are most others. They appear to be hand crafted, one at a time- likely out of a garage somewhere. Considering this though, they are very well made and easily worth the money.
If we could recommend one stylus for your iPad- this would be the one.
They sell for about $10.00 a piece (absolute steal!) on www.iFaraday.com
There are several different brands all selling very similar styluses right now. By all appearances, these are all manufactured by the same people- our guess, either in Taiwan or China. Then, these different American companies buy them in bulk and brand them as their own.
This stylus (regardless of what name you call it by) is actually a quite descent one. Probably our second favorite. A bubble-like, black, rubber tip that is very responsive and lasting. The tip is much like those found on the Alupen from JustMobile, with one main difference- they last longer than a week. In fact, we haven’t had one fail yet.
We prefer the Targus out of the different brands, simply because the Targus stylus is left plain. They decided against having their brand and logo printed on the body of the pen, probably to save money. If branding doesn’t bother you at all you can get whichever is cheapest or most convenient.
The Targus has a simple metal body with a matte black finish. They have a chrome, end cap with a hoop on the back end which enables the use of a small clip or lanyard. Some brands ship the pen with such an extra. We don’t care much for them though so it’s not a make or break deal whether or not they do or not.
They also come with a chrome clip for securing to a shirt pocket, pants pocket or whatever you like. We however DO NOT LIKE the clip and feel that it would be best without it. Or, having the clip be removable would be a great feature.
This stylus is a little bit on the short side. It’s just long enough to hold normally, but holding it further back to get any distance from the screen becomes more difficult. Who knows, maybe the guy who designed it was a munchkin.
They retail for about $15.00 and can be found at these sites:
http://www.boxwave.com/products/capacitivestylus/index.htm
http://www.amazon.com/Acase-Apple-Capacitive-Stylus-Black/dp/B003ULE6GU
http://www.targus.com/us/productdetail.aspx?sku=AMM01US
The Targus can also be picked up in-store at Best Buy stores.
There is a “second generation” version of this general type of stylus, which brands are starting to sell as well. Ours just came in today and we’ve played with them a little bit.
The thickness of the stylus is the same, but the tip is significantly smaller and helps with accuracy. The smaller tip though seems to require a little bit more pressure.
This new and updated model also has a significantly longer barrel. It also has a clip, but a different (and honestly cheaper looking) type. The end cap is slightly different the same as the previous and more common versions- but seriously, who cares. This stylus looks and feels more ideal. Unfortunately though, it is slightly less responsive than its earlier incarnation.
You can find this newer version of these styluses at these sites:
Here is a very workable little setup which is what we are currently doing. We are using both the iFaraday and the Targus styluses. But we are also using a chalk holder as well. Let us explain.
The iFaraday stylus comes with a clip which can be removed quite easily.
The Targus/Boxwave stylus’ clip however is not so easy to get off. We use a Dremel!
Once your styluses are free of their stupid clips, you’ll want to have picked up a Caran d’Ache Fixpencil crayon holder for a decent art supply store or just get one online somewhere. They aren’t cheap but are very nice.
They are meant to hold crayons made by the same company, but we aren’t talking about crayons here. They also happen to hold the above two mentioned styluses perfectly.
Because you’re using an extender, you can determine how long you want your stylus to be! Have it shorter and hold it more like a pencil, or extend it out and use it more like a paintbrush.
You’ll also be holding the extender so you’ll have a thicker, hexagonal shaped form to hold in your hand. This is a plus for many people. This makes these styluses more comparable with the Alupen in size and design.
When not using it, simply slide the stylus out, turn it around and reinsert it tip-end first. The crayon holder becomes the perfect bodyguard for your stylus- holding the tip deep inside, safe from potential harm.
If you’ve gotten this far, might as well leave a comment! If you’re commenting to help with SEO for your site or blog- that’s cool, we can dig it. Just do us a favor and say something with a touch of relevant thought in it. Simply saying something generic like, “I liked your post. Good topic.” isn’t going to cut it.
If you’ve found any cool styluses or stylus solutions for the iPad or digital sketching in general- tell us about it!
Thanks for reading!
Apple iPad or Axiotron Modbook – an Artists’ Perspective
As professional artists in the entertainment industry we’ve been using computers for at least parts of our work since we first were introduced to computers back in the 90’s. We didn’t start using computers because we wanted to surf the web. It wasn’t email that peeked our interest in computers. Instead, it was the potential that they had as being valuable tools in our work that did it. Surfing the web came after, being an additional tool for finding reference and whatnot. Email also came after, this was in the heyday of Earthlink, and became a new and fast way of communicating with clients and delivering work.
Our first computer was one of the original iMacs, followed by a blue clamshell iBook. Since these early days, we’ve purchased and used nothing but Macs- several Macbooks, a few Powerbooks, 10 or so iPod Touches and iPhones. We also use Cintiqs as well as a Modbook, which is an Apple Macbook, modified into a true tablet computer. Our latest Apple product was purchased just this afternoon, a beautiful 27” iMac.
When you get your first computer and it’s state of the art, it’s a dream come true. They get faster and faster and you upgrade every seven minutes as things go, but as technology advances, so do your hopes for it and what may come.
One device we’ve been looking forward to for years now is an official tablet made by Apple. As of now, one has been announced- the iPad!
No camera so far, no multi-tasking, no Flash… none of these are deal-breakers for us. You hear people saying the same things over and over, “It’s just a big iPhone” or just simply making fun of the name, referencing feminine hygiene products. One should not expect anything different from cynics and perverts. When we first heard the name, we thought of the iPod line, and it fit perfectly. We then thought of pads of paper, note pads and of course- sketchpads! The description “over sized iPhone” or “oversized iPod Touch” doesn’t sound like a bad thing to us at all! The iPhone and iPod Touch have proven to be groundbreaking, standard setting, extremely fun and indispensable work and play tools.
We use them every day. If anything, the only complaint would be the occasional, “I just wish the screen were bigger”. Obviously, having a phone the size of an iPad just wouldn’t work, but having a larger version of the same type of device in addition to a smaller phone version is beyond appealing.
Honestly, the iPad looks amazing. From what we’ve seen of it so far, we’re blown away, very excited. The email app looks great, really can’t wait to try that out. From browsing the web, to maps, to iBooks- the iPad looks better than what we were hoping for- perfect! The upset here with us is the lack of serious support for pen based functions- sketching, painting and handwriting.
We are professional, working artists in the entertainment industry. We do storyboards, conceptual artwork and all kinds of illustration for feature films, gaming, music videos and advertising. To date, we have only and continue to strictly use Apple products and stand by Apple 100%. Probably about 90% of our peers, from what we know, also only use Apple products in their digital work. Walk into any major art studio, production house or advertising agency and you will probably find nothing but Macs. There is a reason for this. Apple has catered to artists and creative types for years now, while PC companies have tended to cater more toward your generic businessman, Joe Blow or Mary Sue. Apple makes aesthetic products, which perform like no other. The iPad is begging to be a note pad, a digital canvas and sketchbook. There are some very ‘neat’ art applications made for the iPhone and iPod Touch such as Brushes, Sketchbook Mobile and Layers as well as a bunch of goofy, trivial ones not even worth mentioning. On the iPad, pressure sensitivity is clearly just not an option, but this alone does not disqualify it as a potential artist’s dream machine. What kills the iPad so far as a serious art tool is the lack of a simple yet workable stylus as an optional accessory.
Reportedly, Steve Jobs doesn’t like pens. Well, Steve should know a couple of things. Artists and creatives, as niche as we may be, make up much of Apple’s base. We are less in numbers but are still influential and extremely loyal. We also love pens, pencils and paintbrushes. In watching the keynote address introducing the iPad to the world, it was funny to see the part that covered the Brushes app for the iPad. In bringing out Steve Sprang, Scott Forstall talked a bit about Brushes, saying that artists all over the world use it to create amazing works of art using just their fingertips. Seriously? The top artists in the top fields of digital art tend to use primarily Apple computers. Are they telling us to buy this so we can do our serious work using just our fingertips! This is insulting! Just as Apple has spent years, countless hours laboring over the design of this product, bringing it into being, as serious as they are about it, for them to tell the entirety of professional artists out there to purchase this machine so that they can do “professional finger paintings”, they must know how reducing that must feel in that the iPad is being referred to as a “toy” by many. Stings, doesn’t it, Apple?
Why build something that is so close to being exactly what an entire group of people have been waiting for only do deprive them of a tiny part that reduces it from being an essential artist’s tool to something more trivial.
OK, before any comments are left, we’ll say it- there are some touch capacitive styluses on the market. The Pogo stylus is one, probably the best one, hands down.
We’ve purchased just under a dozen of different iPhone compatible styluses and the Pogo is clearly the best to be found. It works pretty well for tapping buttons, icons and for scrolling. It does not work so well for artwork tho. It has a fat tip, as does every other compatible stylus we’ve found. It’s basically a fingertip on a stick and while you may hold it like a pen, you’re still going to end up finger painting. What is needed is a fine tipped stylus that works for the iPad. We suppose that there is still a chance a third party company will finally make a decent stylus, one which works for serious artwork, tho enough time has passed and they are all quite bad so far. As of right now, until someone comes and saves the day, all hope lies in the Pogo Sketch stylus (lord help us) because so far, this is the best thing being offered as of yet. It’s pretty much the same as the regular Pogo stylus (shown above at about actual size) except it comes with a clip and is longer- more like a regular pen. The tip is still made of this strange black foam which squishes when you press down with it and is the same size. Using one of these styluses gives you about the same amount of accuracy as you get when using a dull crayon or a piece of school room chalk.
The Modbook on the other hand is a clear favorite with us; out of the machines we own and use to date.
It’s a surefire, all-round perfect artist’s companion, except for one main problem- its weight and size. For taking on location it’s perfect, so long as you have a desk or surface of some kind to rest it on, as well as a stand to prop it up with and it’s a bit of a drag to use without a keyboard, for shortcuts and whatnot. Oh, can’t forget to mention the power source- using applications such asPhotoshop and Painter, it really can tend to chug juice- as does any computer. As a ‘slip it out and quickly sketch that over there really quick’ device, it fails. The Modbook works wonderfully as a mobile, take anywhere digital workstation. The days of lugging around a scanner, a ton of paper and grip of pens, pencils and whatever else is gone. One single machine holds all of the tools an artist can dream of it all and works beautifully.
The Modbook, in comparison to the Cintiq 21UX doesn’t have the same amount of degrees of pressure sensitivity, which does affect the quality of line or the feel of a brush stroke. In fact, it has about half as many degrees. Still, it has more than any other tablet on the market to date, and from our perspective, its performance when it comes to pressure sensitivity is actually better than, and feels more natural than the Cintiq- we can only offer a shrug on this one, maybe it’s the saying, “less is more”…
We use the Cintiq when in a home studio, but for any kind of in-house (on location) artwork you really can’t lug one of those things around so easily and this is where the Modbook comes in. The Modbook has made life so much easier, it’s hard to express it here in a way that we’re content with. It’s a little painful to remember the days and ways in which we worked on the move before the Modbook.
Still, having a smaller, lighter, and more simple machine to do quicker and more spontaneous artwork, in the field, with less of a workstation type set up would be ideal. This is what is missing out there. There still is Colors! made by Collecting Smiles on theNintendo DS line of portable gaming machines, which is quite amazing for what it is.
Here are a few sketches done on a Nintendo DS using Colors!
It’s a fun little program (requires modification) to use tho it has some drawbacks. It only has two brushes, one is a hard round and one is a soft round. No textured brushes at all. No undoing brush strokes (except for the iPhone and iPod Touch version). Colors! does not support layers or anything else that you might expect to have in a digital sketching or painting experience. Colors! offers a very basic and simplified painting opportunity, in a very small package. The screens offered by Nintendo are not intended for fine artwork and hence display the artwork you do a bit poorly compared to how the final image will actually look when it is transferred to a computer wherein it will display much smoother. This differential must be kept in mind when working. Overall, it works but it doesn’t, it has its place and that place is about as small as it is. Nonetheless, some quite amazing artists have been able to pull off dazzling work on this little machine.
But, the iPad would be perfect, save the fact that so far Apple has so far skimped on people like us based on its dislike for pens.
Apple, are you guys just making machines for yourselves now and not so much for the people who buy your products? With the addition of an Apple stylus for the iPad, which would work for both the iPhone and the iPod Touch lines of devices, a whole new type of person, or should we say “customer” would be not only interested but enthusiastic about this new device. It would probably cost them a buck or two to produce them, they could sell them for $20 a pop and this machine, just as it already is would become something completely new to a whole new group of people. We as artists are thrilled about the idea of being able to show up for a meeting with a director, needing only an iPad and being able to sketch out an action scene on this sweet little buddy of a device. As of right now, this doesn’t look like it will be something that will happen.
Bottom line, the iPad definitely looks like it will not be the machine of choice for digital artists on the move. The Modbook by Axiotron, as much as we were hoping Apple’s new tablet would make them obsolete with a tablet that not only catered to readers, emailers and web surfers, but artists as well, is the machine to have.
The saddest part or result of this is that for the first time, we’re looking into machines made by other companies to fill this void. We have had one PC before, had it years ago, given to us by a friend. It was pretty much unusable tho in that viruses made it so. You really couldn’t do much of anything with it before its screen was utterly filled with popup windows and crap. We had to be constantly running anti-virus programs to clean it of spy ware and junk- terms I’ve only had to use when talking about PCs, in all of our years, with all of our Macs, we’ve never had one single virus or malware related incident. Still, should a PC company make a device that can be taken around easily and run a decent mobile art application, we would consider it. Tho, we’d never let it touch the web.
Will we get an iPad? Yes. Are we insulted and disappointed in Apple as artists, as the fan boys we are and as stockholders? Yes.
As of now, what we are hoping for is stylus for the iPad- not a mechanical fingertip, but rather an actual pen. Again, we don’t see the iPad replacing a serious machine like the Modbook. Still, it would be nice to have a more portable tablet for more on the fly work. After a good few years of waiting, Apple delivers their wonder tablet. Here we are left wondering why they didn’t consider us. What we are looking forward to now, as a replacement to the so far artistically disappointing iPad, is Axiotron’s Modbook Pro! As of yet, it remains a vapor, a promise. A Modbook wholly of Axiotron’s design with the guts and soul of a Macbook Pro and boy does it look nice!
The iPad has not been released yet- we know this. This is an attempt at a loud squeak, a hope for some oil. We hope our peers will agree and speak up, comment here or elsewhere. We hope that Apple will hear us. As soon as we get our iPaws on an iPad, we will update this and give a far more thorough review of the wonder device, not only from a general user’s point of view but also and particularly from an artist’s angle.
In the meantime…
Steve, please give us an iPen!
[doodl.es, inc. is not currently sponsored by nor did we receive any type of exchange from Axiotron, Apple (clearly) or any of the above mentioned companies or entities for the writing of this opinion. All Images, Trademarks and whatever are property of their respective owners.]