For mobile journalists new to working with video, storyboarding – or visually drawing out scenes on paper or a whiteboard – can be an excellent technique to guide how you film your videos. Here are some reasons why you should use storyboarding in your process:
- Building a storyboard in blocks makes it easier to carry out on camera. Knowing what you’re going to film and in what order helps structure your story before you even start shooting.
- Storyboarding allows your video editor to know what to cut from raw footage, making a more streamlined video and reducing the work for your editor – which might be you!
- Storyboarding allows you to think visually. With mobile journalism being a visual medium, storyboarding begins this process of thinking about how shots will look, what visual elements you’ll be speaking to, and other filming techniques from the start.
- Having storyboarding centered in your creative process helps you stay more organized and prepared in the long run, helping you manage your time and resources more effectively.
IJNet's parent organization, ICFJ, partnered with the Meta Journalism Project and Seen on its Facebook Video Storytellers-Africa program.