Visual Storytelling is an important factor when it comes to telling a story through your film. Instead of going down the lazy route and using a voice over or narration to explain the plot, try using visual storytelling instead. For example, in Alfred Hitchcock’s film ‘Vertigo’ we see the character John, an Ex-police officer chasing someone up some stairs. Hitchcock shows how John suffers from vertigo by using the very first example of a dolly zoom, the camera dolly back and we zoom in to create an effect of vertigo. Now how affective would this sequence have been if we had John say ‘Stop, I’m scared of heights!’. But, this is just an example of a camera effect. There are plenty of examples of visual storytelling, where we see what is happening. For example, in BBC’s Sherlock we see Sherlock shooting his gun at the wall to show that he is bored. We could very easily have Sherlock say that he is bored, or tell the viewer through a narration, but would that really be as creative? It’s the classic saying ’Show don’t tell’ or ‘A picture is worth a thousand words’. Now this last saying is true, but only if the picture is important. For example if I showed you this shot you would have no idea what is going on. However, if you look at this shot I’m sure you could write almost a whole paragraph about it.
One visual storytelling technique is called ‘Hitchcock’s rule’. Originally created by Alfred Hitchcock, it is the basic practise that the bigger something is in the frame, the more important it is. For example; this shot from The Martian we see astronaut Mark Watney growing food for the first time on Mars. We emphasise how important this is to the film’s plot by showing the first plant with an extreme close up.
Another visual storytelling technique is art direction. Factors like character, costume, location, props, etc. For instance, if you wanted to portray somebody as being poor, you would present them with cheep and dirty looking clothes. For location you could have a small, badly looked after flat or maybe a rundown shack.
If you want to see a scene I made of Visual Storytelling, you can watch it in the video.
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Elliot
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