For the third season of the Cosmos series, I was asked by Ann Druyan and her team to produce pre visualizations of the opening and closing sequences of the first episode - and subsequently also the closing sequence of the final episode.
I almost always do pre visualizations for my own productions, so I had a good process for it which I could easily apply here. But I found it quite an odd experience doing it for someone else, and delivering something which essentially is not completed, as a product.
Whatever I do in the previsualization, I am used to being able to build upon it and mold it later into what eventually becomes the final production. But here I only had control over this very first stage - so I had to be careful to make sure that every action, composition and shot clearly spelled out exactly what I wanted it to do right from the beginning. No room for any of those blank patches of “I’ll sort that out later...” that usually sticks around in the first few versions.
Nevertheless, it was a remarkable experience for me to be working for Ann Druyan - and I was greatly pleased with the creative freedom I got to develop these sequences. When I finally saw the completed productions in the show, I was both surprised and happy to notice the great extent to which most parts followed my initial guidance from the previsualisations.
I can’t share the final production sequences here, but if you can disregard the sketchy and temporary appearance of the visuals (since they are indeed previsualisations), here are videos of two of the sequences I made - together with a chart of still frames comparing a few compositions from the previsualizations with how they appear in the show.
I almost always do pre visualizations for my own productions, so I had a good process for it which I could easily apply here. But I found it quite an odd experience doing it for someone else, and delivering something which essentially is not completed, as a product.
Whatever I do in the previsualization, I am used to being able to build upon it and mold it later into what eventually becomes the final production. But here I only had control over this very first stage - so I had to be careful to make sure that every action, composition and shot clearly spelled out exactly what I wanted it to do right from the beginning. No room for any of those blank patches of “I’ll sort that out later...” that usually sticks around in the first few versions.
Nevertheless, it was a remarkable experience for me to be working for Ann Druyan - and I was greatly pleased with the creative freedom I got to develop these sequences. When I finally saw the completed productions in the show, I was both surprised and happy to notice the great extent to which most parts followed my initial guidance from the previsualisations.
I can’t share the final production sequences here, but if you can disregard the sketchy and temporary appearance of the visuals (since they are indeed previsualisations), here are videos of two of the sequences I made - together with a chart of still frames comparing a few compositions from the previsualizations with how they appear in the show.
Episode 1 - Opening Sequence: "The Open Road"
Episode 1 - Closing Sequence: "Starshot"
