Before the winter break ends (and I have to go back to school), I did a small, scene study from the movie, "The Last Samurai". It was fun going back to this movie--it was a movie that's haunted me for a while, mainly because of the war scenes.
This scene is where Tom Cruise--er, I mean, Algren, is attempting to make his last stand before the head samurai realizes Algren is the "White Tiger", the symbol he had seen in his vision earlier in the movie.
This scene was interesting to analyze. I never realized how much the director/cinematographer utilized the environment (trees, ferns, plants) to create frames within frames. It was also cool to realize how quick the cuts were--they reminded me of the same timing like when a tiger attacks/swipes its paws. Lastly, triangular compositions dominated the scene, as well as circles. To me, they helped establish the main subject of the shot, as well as the hierarchy of who was in the frame. This is especially noticeable in the scenes with the head samurai--when the focus is not on Algren, the head samurai dominates every shot he's in.
And here's the shots blown up (if you'd like to flip through the boards instead). I tried to get the main story image of each shot, so things like camera movement/push-ins are not shown in these boards. The main importance of the exercise was to study the composition/importance of each shot.
Also, after about half-way through this study, I went on the hunt for new storyboard brushes I could use. That's when I stumbled across J.P. Vine's brush set--if you're like me and you're looking for something a little more natural in terms of "story brushes", I'd give his set a whirl. They're fantastic!!!
http://jpvine.com/2012/07/09/free-photoshop-storyboarding-brushes/
Ciao for now!
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