Author: aang

Beginning a Story

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Screenwriter Michael Arndt knows that all good stories have powerful beginnings that set up the story. In Beginnings: Setting A Story in Motion, he reveals what he’s learned working for Pixar and demonstrates how to write a good beginning for Act 1 using Toy Story, Nemo and The Incredibles as examples.

While some writers may stay away from storytelling formulas and prescriptive advice, I am always looking for ideas to strengthen my storytelling and aim to do like Picasso, “Learn the rules like a pro, so you can break them like an artist.”

I have outlined Michael Arndt’s ideas below:

  1. Establish the world your character lives in
  2. Introduce your main character doing the thing they love most (their grand passion)
  3. Establish your character’s hidden flaw that comes out of their grand passion
  4. Establish storm clouds on the horizon
  5. BABOOM–someone takes away their grand passion and changes their view of their future
  6. Add insult to injury and make the world unfair.
  7. Character comes to a fork in the road and must make a decision on how to deal with their new reality.
  8. Character makes the unhealthy choice (rather than the right choice–which is boring and leads to no story)
  9. Character’s wrong choice leads to a crisis.
  10. We transition into the 2nd act (the journey) and 3rd act (to fix their flaw and to hopefully get back what they lost).

I have been working on my script for my winter project, and while I know the story I want to tell, I was not sure how to structure it as a 3-Act structure. So I decided to experiment and write out my story using Arndt’s ideas for Act 1.

I am happy to say that following this exercise made me focus my ideas, define my character and set up my story in a powerful way, so that Act 1 easily flowed into Acts 2 and 3. At first, it felt awkward to write out Act 1 in an outline form, and the whole outline seems long enough to cover Acts 1 through 3. I did two iterations but without realizing it each time, my character’s passion and flaw were too vague and general. And what was my character’s BABOOM moment–was this part even necessary? But when I finally found the BABOOM moment on the 3rd try, I knew it was worth it.

So if you are having difficulty writing a powerful story, I recommend trying Arndt’s ideas on beginning a story and see how much more powerful your Act 1–and the rest of your story–can be.

 

A Powerful Little Story

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Graham Annable’s The Last Duet on Earth is a simple but powerful story that uses a haunting soundtrack, gory sound effects, well-timed sequences, humor and a surprise ending.

The story is about a pair of musicians who are trying to survive and not be eaten by green monsters that now rule Earth. The musicians love to play music.

The post-apocalyptic setting is effectively established with haunting music, gory sound effects and funny visuals at 0:07 to 1:00. The main characters are introduced and the plot is revealed at 1:01. You root for the heroes are they scramble to run and hide. Will they survive? The story has humor and surprises. The resolution (3:12) is ironic and unexpected.

I appreciated the use of foreground elements from 0:29 to :40 to give depth to the scenes. The cut away used between 0:41 to 0:58 (specifically at 0:50) as a transition to another scene was effective. The animator uses a wide variety of shots–wide, overhead, medium and close-ups–and transitions quickly between them, from 1:24 to 2:42, to build tension.

One of the main takeaways for me was when I realized how long some of the key scenes were held still. For example, the scenes of the musicians being discovered between 1:01 and 1:10 and the end reveal between 3:09 and 3:12. Each scene was held for 2 seconds–and even one scene (when the musicians are first discovered) as long as 4 seconds. A scene can be made infinitely more powerful and meaningful simply by holding onto a shot just a second or two longer.

 

A Story Dissection: The Longest Way 1.0

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One of my all-time favorite videos, the Longest Way 1.0, combines my favorite subjects: epic journeys, growth and change.

Christoph Rehage’s original video inspired many other copycat beard and face timelapses. But what makes his story unique and compelling, particularly to 9.5 million other people? Let’s dissect his story.

According to Stillmotion’s Muse, a great story is comprised of a strong protagonist, conflict and six essential plot points: 1) the Hook, 2) the Ask, 3) the Acceptance, 4) Hurdles, 5) the Answer and 6) the Jab.

1. Act 1

The hook (the opening that grabs and holds our viewers’ attention): an epic journey on foot from Beijing to Germany, over mountains and scorching deserts. How enthralling is that?? And don’t forget the haunting melody. (:01)

The Ask (the challenge that our protagonist faces): Our protagonist will undertake an epic journey and walk from Beijing to Germany (:01)

Conflict (also called the unanswered question): Did our protagonist complete his journey? (:01) What did he look like after his walk? (:11) What was he missing? (:15)
The protagonist (our hero, the one we are rooting for): we get a first look at our clean-cut protagonist’s face at :40.

2. Act 2

The Acceptance (when our protagonist accepts the Ask or the challenge): our hero starts his journey, clean-shaven and beardless on November 9, 2007 at 10 am. (:46) We get a sense of the immensity of his journey as he walks through China, as we witness his beard grow, his face age and are shown glimpses of other people and places through his timelapse.

Hurdles (obstacles blocking our protagonist’s goal): Our protagonist counts off the kilometers he’s walked–1,000 km (1:04), 2,000 km (1:44), 3,000 km (2:14), 4,000 km (3:03)–each thousand kilometer a testament to his determination and adventurous spirit.

3. Act 3

The Answer (the resolution to the Ask): Our protagonist completes his journey on November 13, 2008 at 4,646 km (3:32), a changed man. He is grateful to love “for saving” him. (4:35)

The Jab (the purpose of the story): “Who was this person? Was it really me?” (3:36) Our hero was deeply changed–not just physically–after his journey.

In the end, our protagonist’s journey transformed him, as all great journeys, stories–and timelapses–should.

A Story Dissection: The Girl Effect

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The video above is one of my greatest inspirations. I wanted to share it with the class, because it has strongly influenced me–and, I would say, close to 2 million other people that have viewed it since 2010. It wasn’t until I saw this video a few years ago that I realized the possibility of combining my passions so powerfully: to make a difference in the world through motion graphic animation.

However, in years since, I’ve also come to realize that technical skills are nothing without a powerful story to drive the plot and touch people’s hearts.

So I began to study storytelling, including enrolling in Stillmotion’s Muse course, which has been immensely helpful to me in understanding what drives a great story and how to structure stories.

According to Muse, a powerful story is comprised of a strong protagonist, conflict and six essential plot points: 1) the Hook, 2) the Ask, 3) the Acceptance, 4) Hurdles, 5) the Answer and 6) the Jab. The Girl Effect is powerful because it has all these ingredients.

I will attempt to dissect the Girl Effect’s story and explain the plot points with examples. I hope this exercise will prove to be just as useful for you.

1. Act One

The Hook (the opening that grabs and holds our viewers’ attention): “We have a situation on our hands” (:05) and “the clock is ticking” (:10) We immediately think, ‘Uh-oh. What’s going on?’

Our protagonist: a 12-year old girl (:24). She is the one we root for as she goes through struggles to her “inevitable” fate. Though she represents the millions of girls in poverty, she is the one we are rooting for her throughout the story.

The Ask (the challenge that our protagonist faces): She lives in poverty and her future is out of her control. (:31)

Conflict (also called the unanswered question): Can our protagonist escape the cycle of poverty? Will she? (:32)

2. Act Two

Hurdles (obstacles blocking our protagonist’s goal): being married off and becoming pregnant when she is barely a teen, surviving childbirth, selling her body to support her family and contracting and spreading HIV. (:42)

The Acceptance (when our protagonist accepts the Ask or the challenge): she grows up “happy and healthy,” “she sees a doctor regularly,” “she stays in school where she’s safe,” she “uses her education to earn a living” and now she is the one in control of her life. (1:24)

3. Act Three

The Answer (the resolution to the Ask): “she can avoid HIV”, “she can marry and have children when she’s ready”, and her children will be healthy like she is, and this can continue from generation to generation. (2:01)

The Jab (the purpose of the story and your call to action): “50 million girls in poverty equals 50 million solutions. This is the power of the girl effect. An effect that starts with 18 and impacts the world” (purpose) (2:37) “The clock is ticking. girleffect.org” (call to action) (2:57)

What an a-hole!

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Have you ever been cut off by a driver, or been the unwilling “victim” of a rude/mean/patronizing/(fill in the blank) individual and you immediately think, “What an a–hole!”? Most people’s automatic response would be to take it personally and judge the person, rather than to give them the benefit of the doubt–that perhaps the driver just didn’t see them […]

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On the Kolpa River

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“On the Kolpa River” is a nostalgic and timeless story told (with captions and using reconstructed 10-year old footage) by Aljaz Tepina, as he recalls and observes his family on a river trip. The story is a fitting example of a Story without Words project.

Tepina shoots this nostalgic piece from a first-person witness point of view. His shaky camera and crooked shots add to the immediacy and nostalgic feel of the piece, together with the great use of background sounds, light and color editing (the film is graded to look like old film to complement the nostalgic mood of the piece) to tell the story. His humorous insights into each of his family members evoke emotion—and similar sentiments within our own families—and further cements the story’s sense of timelessness.

Tepina makes use of good compositions and motivated camera movements, including showing his father and brother’s relationship at :38-:42, showing the start of their journey and view of his father and the paddle as it slices through the water at 1:02-1:07, his dad’s personality at 1:55-1:59 and his mom’s quirks at 1:59-2:0. He relies on simple cuts, which works beautifully to move the story along.

Finally, the simple but effective reveal at 2:11-2:16, “we don’t go on Sunday trips anymore,” brings the viewer to the heart-wrenching present moment, where we, together with Tepina, wistfully long for the past and for lost moments all too often taken for granted.