Setting Up a Project
The following are a few simple organizational rules that will help you conserve space, speed your tasks, and make it easier for you to find things. This is just one way of organizing that you can adapt to suit your own particular needs and work habits. This method of organizing project folders and files attempts to take advantage of the unique capabilities of the computer desktop, and works similarly for both Macintosh and Windows-based computers. By using this method you can create your set of project folders just once, and never create them again.
Creating a Master Set of Folders
First, create a master set of folders that are generic enough, yet spe-cific enough to cover every potential type of production you will undertake in the future. You should place these folders along with the Advance Project Templates you can copy from the companion CD-ROM (see "Introducing Advanced Project Templates" on page 24) in some central location on your hard drive where you can access them easily and copy them for each new project.
The Starting Point: Outlines and Proposals
Many projects begin with a proposal and an outline (or some kind of design document). Outlines and proposals are probably the most diffi-cult documents to "pin down" for the purposes of standardized project development because they can be so free form, while they can also be very specific depending on the demands of a particular "client" or production environment. If you already work with a certain type of proposal or outline docu-ment, then we must leave you to your own devices. You can skip over the next section and continue with "Storyboarding" on page 48. If you have some flexibility in this regard, or if you are looking for a new solution for this first phase of project development, then we offer you an opportunity to integrate your first concepts from the roughest beginnings directly into the flow of all subsequent develop-ment, as described in the following section.
Project Template Workshop: Preparing Proposals and Outlines
Our Advanced Project Templates offer you an entirely new way of developing your concepts and the logistical details required to bring them to fruition. We've designed a database structure that works more like the way you think as a producer, allowing you to develop con-cepts and build up project details gradually, while printing them out in appropriate formats at various stages with the click of a button.
The Database Approach
These templates require a slightly different mindset in your approach to typing up information. In this database approach you work dynam-ically with "records" (versus the more linear approach of a word pro-cessor, for example, in which you type information down the length of a page). If you can learn the basic ground rules for working in a database, these templates can serve you effectively for years to come. To put it simply, you must begin to think of each piece of the pre-sentation (a paragraph in the script, for example, that describes a series of shots or lays out a piece of narration) as an individual "record" in the database. Once you enter these "records," you can then begin to attach additional details to these pieces of the puzzle as the project progresses. When you are ready to commit something to paper, your final output is based on what has traditionally been called a "report" in database terms. On the printed page, however, it looks like the same rough draft, or storyboard, or shot plan in its final form -- you just arrive at it in a different way.
Building a Proposal
Create your proposal as follows:
1. Enter global information for the project in the top portion of the entry form.
Enter the project name, creation date, and revision by clicking in the text box for each and typing the informa-tion.
Enter the type of document by choosing one from the pop-up menu.
(Option) Add a company logo to appear in headers and title pages by importing a file into the container labeled Company logo. For more information on importing image files into a Filemaker database, see "Importing Images" on page 55.
2. Create individual records for each section or topic of the proposal by entering information into the individual record section of the entry forma. Choose a number from the Topic number pop-up list. You can also click in the text box and type a number. The topic number determines the order in which each topic appears in the proposal when printed. For exam-ple, the topic with the number 1 appears first in the pro-posal when printed. This allows you to reorder the topics in a proposal at any time, in any way you like. Instead of copying and pasting topics around as you would in a word processor, simply renumber the topics. b. Choose a name for the section or topic from the Topic Title pop-up list. You can also click in the text box and type a name..
3. After you finish entering an entire topic as a record, press Com-mandΠ N to begin a new record or topic.
4. Repeat steps 2 and 3 for each additional section or topic in the proposal.
5. When you complete all sections of the proposal, use the buttons at the bottom of the entry form to finalize your work.
Building an Outline
The Advanced Project Templates provide great flexibility in creating outlines based on the specific needs of your project. In addition, you can build directly on the outline you create now when storyboarding and scripting later.
Storyboarding
Storyboarding creates a visual map of your program. A storyboard is a sequence of frames, each of which contains a visual representation of that moment in the program, and an accompanying caption of the spo-ken lines. You can use this tool to communicate to others (crew, cli-ents, funders, executive producers) and gain final approval for the production. Also, the process of storyboarding enables you to test whether your ideas are too vague, intellectual, or impressionistic; or whether they have found the right concrete form. For example, if you write in the script, "montage of early morning city life," do you know the kinds of shots that will work together in the context of this pro-gram?
Storyboard
Quick Storyboard Quick is an affordable previsualization tool that you can use to create storyboards. Some of its features are:
A database of built-in characters, props, and locations that you can place in a frame by pointing and clicking.
Ability to zoom in and out to resize characters, props, and loca-tions, thus creating long shots, medium shots, close-ups, and over-the-shoulder shots.
Character rotation, six angles available (front, back, two to the right, two to the left).
Characters available in five actions: standing, sitting, running, jumping, and prone.
Captioning, by typing comments into a caption window or import-ing scripts from any scripting program that supports FCF and TXT file format. When you import a FCF or TXT file, the frames are automatically created with the selected text elements in the caption windows.
Rearrangement of frames (the captions follow).
Storyboard Artist
The makers of Storyboard Quick also provide Storyboard Artist, a more expensive and feature-packed previsualization tool. Pre-drawn props, characters, and locations are integrated into the application for quick visualization.
Importing Scenes from the Outline
If you already developed an outline in the Advanced Project Tem-plates as described in "Project Template Workshop: Preparing Propos-als and Outlines" on page 34, you can enter project name, section, and subsection information automatically for each record as a starting point. Once you import the outline records you can change them, delete them, or add additional records in the Script/Storyboard tem-plates as needed.
Building the Script
To build the script:
1. Enter voice-over text into the Voice-over text box.
2. (Option) Enter an estimated words-per-second rate (WPS) for the voice-over. The duration is determined automatically based on the WPS and the content.
3. Enter any sound elements that you want to include in the script, such as music or sound effects. These only appear in the 4-column layout option when previewing and printing.
4. Choose the type of sound from the pop-up menu.