Film Studies and Cinematography-Project 3-Final
Film Studies and Cinematography
Project 3-Final
29/11/2025 - 31/12/2025 (Week9 - Week14)
Project Brief & Task Requirements
This project is part of Project 3 for the course
PVT60104 – Film Studies & Cinematography.
The main objective of this assignment was to transform a written
story concept into a visual narrative through a complete
storyboard and animatic.
According to the task requirements, students were expected to:
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Develop clear thumbnail drawings to visualize the story flow
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Create well-structured storyboard panels with clear shot descriptions
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Demonstrate effective use of depth, layers, and black-and-white tones
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Produce an animatic with appropriate pacing, continuity, transitions, and sound integration
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Document the entire creative process clearly in the e-portfolio
This project emphasized visual storytelling, timing, and cinematic thinking rather than dialogue. The final outcome needed to show how a narrative can be communicated through images, rhythm, and sound.
Project Workflow Overview
To complete this project, I followed a clear and structured workflow:
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Story concept development
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Thumbnail drawing based on key scenes
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Storyboard planning and shot organization
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Full illustration production
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Animatic editing and sound design
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Final polish and submission
Each stage built upon the previous one, allowing the story to gradually evolve from abstract ideas into a complete animatic.
Story Introduction-Story Overview
Sand Veins tells the story of an explorer named Li Ze who travels alone through a vast desert and accidentally falls into an ancient tomb. Inside the tomb, he encounters hidden mechanisms, danger, and a mysterious guardian. By the end of the story, Li Ze escapes safely and becomes a symbolic guardian of cultural heritage.
The story focuses on themes of exploration, danger, responsibility, and legacy. Instead of relying on dialogue, the narrative is driven by visual composition, character movement, and environmental storytelling.
Thumbnail & Drawing Process
The production process began with thumbnail drawings.
At this stage, my main focus was not on details, but on
visualizing the overall story structure.
I created thumbnails based on the main scenes and key actions, such as:
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Desert walking and isolation
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Falling into the tomb
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Triggering hidden mechanisms
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Escaping danger
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Final resolution
These thumbnails helped me experiment with camera angles, composition, and pacing. By working with small and simple sketches, I was able to quickly adjust the rhythm of the story and test how each scene connected to the next.
This stage was essential for understanding how the story would flow visually before moving into more detailed storyboard planning.
Storyboard Development
Based on the thumbnail drawings, I then developed a complete storyboard.
Using the thumbnails as a guide, I organized the story into
14 main storyboard shots, each representing a key narrative moment.
For each shot, I considered:
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Camera distance (wide, medium, close-up)
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Character position and movement
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Emotional focus of the scene
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Approximate duration for the animatic
I also created a storyboard table that clearly listed each shot in sequence. This table helped me ensure narrative continuity and made it easier to transition into the animatic stage.
Through this process, I learned how to simplify a large number of drawings into a manageable number of cinematic shots while still maintaining storytelling clarity.
Full Illustration Production (Frame-by-Frame Drawing)
After finalizing the storyboard, I began the full illustration stage.
Using Procreate,
I created
83 individual drawings
to visually express the story in a frame-by-frame manner.
Each illustration was drawn according to the storyboard
structure, ensuring consistency in composition, lighting, and
character design.
The illustrations focused on:
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Clear silhouettes and contrast
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Strong black-and-white tonal layers to create depth
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Environmental details to enhance atmosphere
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Smooth visual progression between frames
This stage required careful attention to continuity, especially in character movement and spatial relationships. By following the storyboard closely, I was able to maintain a clear narrative direction while adding visual detail and emotional weight.
Animatic Editing Process
After completing all the illustrations, I imported the images into Adobe Premiere Pro to create the animatic. All frames were arranged strictly according to the storyboard sequence to maintain narrative clarity and continuity. I then adjusted the duration of each shot to control pacing and emotional rhythm, ensuring that tense moments such as the trap activation and escape felt urgent, while calmer scenes were given enough time to breathe. To enhance visual flow, I refined transitions between shots and added subtle effects where necessary so that the movement between frames appeared natural and smooth.
In addition to visual editing, sound design was integrated during the editing process to strengthen the storytelling experience. I sourced background music and sound effects from Pixabay, selecting audio that supported the atmosphere without distracting from the visuals. I first applied an overall background music track that matched the tone of the story, and then added specific sound effects for key actions, such as stepping on the hidden mechanism, falling into the tomb, encountering snakes, doors closing, and switching on the flashlight. Each sound effect was carefully synchronized with the on-screen action to enhance realism and immersion. To ensure cohesion, I applied audio fades and transitions so that the sound design flowed smoothly throughout the animatic. Finally, I added opening and ending titles, introducing the project title and my name at the beginning and a short acknowledgment at the end, completing the animatic as a polished and cohesive cinematic piece.
Final Submission
Thumbnail & Drawing
Storyboard Development
The instructor suggested focusing more on visual clarity and pacing when translating the story into thumbnails and storyboards. Attention was advised on camera angles, shot transitions, and how movement could be suggested through composition rather than dialogue.
During this week, I focused on refining the animatic independently by applying the feedback received in earlier weeks. This included final adjustments to pacing, sound integration, transitions, and overall presentation quality before submission.
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