DOING THE LAST MINUTE OVERNIGHT STORYBOARD JOB

It was Monday night at about five-thirty in the evening that I got the call.  There was a nice sounding woman on the phone saying that my good friend Danelle (lovely person and talented fellow storyboard artist) recommended me to her for doing boards.

This woman, worked for a company called THE JONES, and they had a gig where their current storyboards needed to be changed.

The previous artist had to do forty-nine frames in ten hours (a lot), and new frames needed to be drawn, while other frames had to be cleaned or altered.

As work has been extremely slow all the way around, I instantly took the gig.  I was told that I would only work “maybe three or four hours” and the rate would be good.

Well, I got to the office at seven o’clock, set up my computer and Cintiq monitor, and was given digital copies of the old storyboards that I needed to change.

First thing is that it was TWO spots that needed to be worked on.  I actually thought the first artist did a good job, given the time frame he had to work in.

I had to add new frames and keep the style someone consistent.  Well, that wasn’t much of a stretch as I had to legible scribbles just like the first artist.  Boards had to drawn, added to the old frames, re-cut into four frames per page, and then sent to the production team, who then had to type descriptions, run it by the director, then email these boards to the agency.

GOT ALL THAT????

This repeated for both spots, and as I got tired I made mistakes when it got past two o’clock in the morning.

Suffice it to say, I didn’t get home until five o’clock the next morning.  When I got home, my wife Betty had slept in the living room so she could greet me.

Yea, it was freaking hell in terms of the hours and the rushing. The production team were all nice people and very professional and I will get a nice little check in a few weeks.

But, it was one day, and I need a long-term gig. Keeping things in perspective.