Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1010570
There is a two-panel storyboard from the helicopter sequence that will forever inspire excellence in me. It took seconds for me to compose the shot with a 4H pencil, and an hour to ink it in and clean it up in Photoshop. Yes, I am still an old school pencil and ink storyboard artist. Months later, Christopher McQuarrie sent me iPhone footage of him exiting a helicopter within a steep gorge in New Zealand, then boarding a high-speed camera boat as it races upriver to set up for the shot. With cameras rolling, the boat then speeds forward as two helicopters dive into the river gorge and scream past fifteen feet overheard. The lead helicopter was piloted by Tom Cruise and the second featured Henry Cavil hanging out the side while firing his SAW machine gun. The epic shot was a near-perfect representation of the storyboard, but that is not what really hit home. All too often the storyboard artist never gets to go on set to see how his or her work is interpreted by the director and crew. It was so illuminating to see all of the immense resources, skilled filmmakers and gutsy stunt teams brought to bare to film something that took me seconds to conceive. So, I often think back to those two frames as I work on other projects. Every single storyboard frame has a cost of time, energy, resources, money and skilled labor behind it and it inspires me to make sure that the drawing serves the story and is as accurate to the director's vision as it can possibly be. Working with my friend Chris McQuarrie is a real life adventure and his cinematic missions are always ones that I readily choose to accept. ADG A. HELICOPTER CHASE SCENE FROM FILM. ONE FEELS A SENSE OF SUPREME ACCOMPLISHMENT WHEN THE FINAL FILM MATCHES A STORYBOARD DONE MANY MONTHS PRIOR. PHOTO BY DAVID JAMES. B. THE TWO PANEL BOARDS DEPICTING THE SHOT ABOVE. ORIGINALLY THIS SEQUENCE WAS PLANNED TO SHOOT IN IMAX, BUT IN THE END, THE EQUIPMENT WAS TOO HEAVY FOR THE AIRCRAFT. WIDE REVERSE PURSUIT CAM ETHAN EVADES WALKER FIRES (VFX TRACER AND IMPACTS) WIDE FROM BOAT PUSH IN TILT WITH ETHAN AS HE PULLS OUT OF CORKSCREW DIVE AND PULLS UP AS HE ENTERS SHOTOVER CANYON SIDE MOUNT WALKER OPENS FIRE WIDE FRONTAL PURSUIT THROUGH CANYON OR BOAT CAM RACERS AND BULLET HITS (VFX) A B C D