London Film School, offer full-time MA Degree courses in both Film Making and Screewriting.

The Magnificent Ambersons (dir. Orson Welles, 1942)

 

Introduction

Wong Kar-wai, Jean-Luc Godard, Alfred Hitchcock, Martin Scorsese, Powell & Presssburger. Every name conjures an exact impression of a particular visual aesthetic.

Woody Allen, David Lean, Robert Bresson, Jonas Mekas, Orson Welles. Their images are powerful in very different ways, because they are all created in the service of the filmmaker’s own ideas and unique world-view.

We all carry filmic images in our heads. The task of the film director is to develop an “eye” for powerful imagery related to their vision. By developing the visual imagination in this way, each filmmaker can access the power of personal imagery.

 

Course Outline

This inspiring 4-day workshop is lead by artist and filmmaker Dylan Stone. Designed primarily for directors wishing to develop their visual imagination and refine their visual storytelling techniques, it is also ideal for aspiring storyboard artists. Both analytical and practical in nature, the course allows participants to consider the work of key artists and filmmakers before learning basic drawing skills and applying them to practical storyboarding exercises.

 

Inspiration through Analysis:

Through analysing great art - both on screen and on canvas - participants will learn how to harness the imagery of others and use it to hone and inspire their own work.

The group will examine powerful examples from key film directors, relating their images to their aesthetic. Directors and films to be considered include: David Lean (HOBSON’S CHOICE); Alfred Hitchcock (NORTH BY NORTHWEST); Martin Scorsese (RAGING BULL); Robert Bresson (A MAN ESCAPED); Jean-Luc Godard (BANDE À PART); Orson Welles (THE MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONS).

Participants will also consider a wide variety of artists. How does Rembrandt draw the viewer into his portraits? How do the Rococo painters, Boucher and Fragonard make their work so coquettish, so sexual? Artists have always manipulated and played with their viewers' emotions. How does Kathe Kollwitz bring such a sense of sadness to her black and white work, John Singer Sargent such joy, and Goya such violence in his ‘Disasters of War’?

This learning will then be applied to narrative storytelling: how each element of the frame can connote information – deft, compact, succinct. By imagining any scene as a succession of images, which themselves convey narrative, the films become predominantly visual, rather than dialogue-driven.

 

Practical Application:

By combining this analytical study with the central discipline of figure drawing, the course will enable participants to create effective and powerful storyboards of their own. All four days will begin with an intensive life model drawing class with a focus on creating figures in different situations.

The group will then apply their new drawing skills to specific work – to their own projects, if they wish. Participants will visualize chosen scenes in order to translate the storyboards ready for the camera.

All levels of drawing experience are accommodated on this workshop.

"Having never attempted life drawing before, I found this part of the course challenging and intriguing – and absolutely the best way to approach a workshop about storyboarding. I left feeling inspired, with my little breakthrough which will allow me to move on in this area.” Participant feedback, February 2011.

Figure drawings by Dylan Stone

Immersive, in-depth and highly practical, the course will leave each participant with an in-depth understanding of the storyboarding process, having explored its potential both as a creative tool for shaping their artistic vision, and as a valuable means of sharing this vision with their collaborators. They will also have experienced and internalised ways of refining their imagery and their narrative technique.

 

Dylan Stone – Tutor Profile

Dylan Stone is an artist and filmmaker. He studied for his BA in Fine Arts at the EINA School of Art and Design, Barcelona, where his teachers were some of the most prominent Catalan contemporary artists. He later completed an MA in Fine Art at the prestigious School of Visual Arts in New York City.

His first large-scale piece consisted of 26,000 photographs of lower Manhattan and was purchased by The New York Public Library for their photography collection. They created a website for the piece and it can be seen online in their digital library. Click here to view it. In ‘Barbara and David Stone´s Bookshelf’, Dylan created a life-size, 38-sheet watercolor painting that documents a portion of his parents´ private book collection. It was bought by the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston in 2007. Click here to view it.

For the past five years Dylan has been teaching BA and MA Visual Awareness for Directors at Central St. Martins School of Art and Design Drama Centre London, University of the Arts London.

Dylan was brought up in the film business. His parents founded the Gate Cinema and Cinegate, a major foreign art and film distribution company in the 1970’s and 1980’s. They were both film producers throughout the 1960’s and 1970’s and his mother continues to produce films today, most recently Joanna Hogg's first feature, UNRELATED (London Film Festival 2008 Fipresci Prize).

Dylan’s brother and sister also followed their parents into film production. His brother recently produced the Italian part of the Sofia Coppola film, SOMEWHERE (Venice Film Festival 2010 Golden Lion). His sister produced YOUNG ADAM with Tilda Swinton and Ewan MacGregor, and FRANKLYN with Ryan Phillippe and Eva Green.

Dylan himself most recently storyboarded Alicia Duffy's first feature, ALL GOOD CHILDREN (London Film Festival 2010) and CLAUSTRAFOBIA, directed by Bobby Boermans. Click here to view some of Dylan’s storyboards online.

Dylan is currently making a series of ten short films where he plays a different role in each of the films. He is also preparing another large-scale piece of ten paintings which will be shown in 2012.

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Times: 10.30am-5.30pm
Capacity: Max. 12 participants
Fee: £420

 

How to book

Online booking will be available from this page once the new dates have been confirmed.

In the meantime please register your interest by email.

 

Email us:
Carolyn Atherton:
workshops@lfs.org.uk

Telephone us:
+44 (0)20 7836 9642