Directing the Story: Professional Storytelling and Storyboarding Techniques for Live Action and Animation

I'm in my final year of studying Animation and am planning to try and go into storyboarding once I'm done. I spent years perfecting my art, sketching every day, watching movies to figure out how they set up scenes and yet things never quite fell into place. My storyboards were good but never great. Then I got this book and read it cover to cover. It's not a hardship either, you don't have to labour through it, it's interesting, engaging and at times even really funny. And it was as if a fog in my brain had lifted. He explains so clearly, brings home every single point so well! Yesterday I presented my first storyboard after finishing the book. My tutors were amazed and told me I'd just earned myself a First. If that's not proof that this book is spectacular, I'm not sure what is :)

I own this book for a couple of years and at the beginning it was my main source to learn about storyboarding and creating the perfect visual story. Best part is that it's not filling you with unnecessary technical note, it tells the whole storyboarding process and fundamentals with the most fun way; with a story! I learned a lot about structuring your story step by step and create the most accurate way to tell it visually. On the other hand, the Author Francis Glebas is an acknowledged industry guru and he is sharing his whole years of experience in Disney in a honest way.Now that's a priceless thing for me when i choose book. Now, Directing the Story is one of my favorite book on my shelf when I'm stuck at writing and storyboarding.

Years of developing my storyboard skills and studying film language, yet this wonderful book has helped and inspired me to put it all together better than ever before. I'll probably go back through this great book again every year. Thank you so much Francis.

It is one of the best resources I've encountered on story development and storyboarding. As much as I loved the book, I am not happy how vulnerable it is. Wish it had at least as thick cover as paperback Animator's Survival Kit.

I love cartooning and I'm trying animation, so this book has been invaluable in terms of helping cut to the chase of a story.

I have read quite a few books about storyboarding but this one put them all to shame. Amazing. A must read.

Note the title is about directing the story, not directing the movie, and the emphasis is on the story. The goal of this book is to help you get your audience "lost in the story" of your movie. It details a lot of professional directing techniques and principles to help aid storytelling. The writing is clear and Francis Glebas even storyboarded a whole short story to serve as an example, in addition to the many examples already provided. Using storyboards as a primary tool, he goes through the various storytelling techniques used in films , like ways to pace/cut scenes, introducing themes and story structure subtly, directing the audience's eyes, creating characters people can related to, etc. Francis Glebas then breaks down these high level concepts into many smaller easy-to-understand points to focus in depth. One particular point to note is the version of "One Thousand and One Arabian Nights" Francis Glebas has storyboarded to provided as an example throughout the book. All the techniques he teaches are used in the storyboard for that story. It ends with cliffhangers in every chapter. The story is absorbing even though it's done in sketches. Goes to show that story is still king. This book is for anyone who wants to direct professional stories. It should be made compulsory reading in film schools. Two enthusiastic thumbs up from me. For more reading, I would recommend Ideas for the Animated Short, which goes even further in depth with storytelling techniques. Bad stories shouldn't have excuses. There are more pictures of the book on my blog. Just visit my Amazon profile for the link.

"Directing the Story" is an awesome book. I have recently got interested in film making and after acquiring the new Canon 7D, I have been buying books and reading up on film making. This book is the best I have read so far in terms of making one understand how to tell a story visually. Even though it is a little heavy on the storyboarding aspect of the process, it is littered with tons of useful anecdotes, examples and practical tips on how to tell a story visually and be good at it. I would throughly recommend this book!