Panorama or 360-degree photos, especially combined with audio, also immerse a reader in the location of the story. Still photos used in combination with audio also highlight emotions. They’re often more dramatic and don’t go by as quickly as video. Decide what pieces of the story work best in still photos. Still photos are the best medium for emphasizing a strong emotion, for staying with an important point in a story, or to create a particular mood.Decide what pieces of the story work best in video. Video is the best medium to depict action, to take a reader to a place central to the story, or to hear and see a person central to the story.Next, divide the contents of the story among the media - video, still photos, audio, graphics and text. The home page comprises a headline, nut graph, an establishing visual (can be a background or central photograph, a slide show or a video), and links to the other parts, which are usually subtopics of the overall story. Instead of thinking “first part,” “second part”, “third part”, “fourth part”, think “this part”, “that part”, “another part”, and “yet another part”. other related issues raised by the story.profiles of the main person or people in the story.a lead or nut paragraph, essentially addressing why this story is important.The first thing to tackle is the part about the story being nonlinear.ĭivide the story into its logical, nonlinear parts, such as: So your storyboard should be put together with all those elements in mind. Figure out what medium to use for each part of the storyĪ multimedia story is some combination of video, text, still photos, audio, graphics and interactivity presented in a nonlinear format in which the information in each medium is complementary, not redundant.Define the parameters of a story within available resources and time.The rest can be filled in as you brainstorm or as you write.A storyboard is a sketch of how to organize a story and a list of its contents. Perhaps you don’t know the entire plot, but you know your character will suffer a life-changing event in chapter five (a quarter of the way into the book) and will be reunited with her true love in chapter nineteen. Now, you can see where your turning points should be, your “black moment,” and your resolution, for example. Mark each square with its chapter number, and you are already on your way to visualizing your story in book form. If you plan on writing 20 chapters, for example, you will want 20 squares. Each resulting square represents one chapter of your book. Mark it with vertical and horizontal lines until you get a checkerboard pattern. A storyboard can be drawn on a board, a piece of paper, or in a computer file. The magic of a storyboard is turning a book idea into a visual tool, which makes the story’s structure much easier to grasp and handle. (Chapter 1 cliches and overused beginnings - see them all here.)

Digital storyboard for writers