'Secret of the Amazon Queen' Storyboard Images, Etc

Today I had another session with artist Yanis Zambeis and we moved the storyboard along further. With this afternoon's work, we brought the opening of the movie to the point where the main characters are introduced and the drama starts...

These are not necessarily in order...

As we progress, the storyboard images will take on a more simplistic style as the action increases, especially in scenes with several shots (the exciting stuff!). I decided that the first shot of each new scene will be in the current style you've seen thus far, but the following shots will be simpler. Remember, a storyboard is a tool for me and my camera operator and the editor. As long as we understand it, no one else needs to...

Hopefully we'll be progressing with production design soon and I'll be able to start posting those images. Production and costume design art are supposed to be detailed and look nice and 'arty'. As a director, I'm very involved with the look of my film, so it will be a true collaboration between my production designer and me...

I made some decisions early on regarding the visual style of the film. My philosophy is to make budget limitations serve style. That is why we're actually not using much CGI at all. Low budget CGI looks crappy, like a bad SyFy movie. Our use of this MUCH overused tool will be limited to mere enhancement of physical visuals, i.e. we'll put slight digital touches to the actual location to make the jungle thicker; we'll sprinkle some digital glitz to certain establishing shots of the Amazon city; basically only use it to make the physical better instead of using it to substitute for something physical. What this means is that some other decisions have also been made that I think you will enjoy and be impressed with when you see the final film. Believe it or not, we are actually able to afford our chosen style over CGI on our low budget...

Also, as soon as I'm finished with a documentary project for our producer and we start meeting with and signing talent, I will post images of them in costume and 'scenes'. One actress we are already moving toward a photo shoot for promo graphics fairly soon...

It has been slow getting to this point but we are moving now!

More to follow...