J Todd Anderson Interview Notes (unedited)

Occasionally I write articles about art /film /storyboarding for the Dutch website Submarine Channel. Recently they published an article by me about 5 great examples of storyboards used for classic live-action films. While researching this article I got the awesome chance to speak to J Todd Anderson who has storyboarded every film by the Coen Brothers since Raising Arizona. 

I absolutely adore the Coen brothers, and for them storyboarding is an essential part of their process, so to get to speak with the guy that has been doing these boards was an insane honor. The format of the articles I write for Submarine is a top 5 and requires pretty short texts. 

Since I spent almost an hour talking to Mister Anderson there is some stuff that didn’t make it into the article. I’m not sure if anybody is interested in my full notes but since I have them and I think there is some cool stuff in there that I couldn’t use in my article I thought I’d share them here. 

Please note that these are my rough and unedited notes, that I made immediately after finishing my conversation with Mister Anderson. There are actually a bunch of really great interviews with J Todd Anderson to be found online. (look em up!) I tried to focus on stuff I hadn’t heard about in his other interviews.  

Digital?
Used to work entirely traditional. These days also on the iPad Pro with Procreate. But paper is often still faster because of the immediacy of pencil on paper.

It’s not about pretty pictures, it’s about conveying the shot. 

You always want to stay ahead of the director. Don’t hesitate, try to get his idea on paper. I like to start with extremes and then we work to something more in the middle. A picture will top a word every time. 

The idea of storyboarding is bringing the idea to everybody. Making sure that everybody understands it. Something that I like to say is that a picture will top a word every time. That’s why I like to ask people who are not woking on the film if they can see what’s happening in the storyboards, if they understand it I’m doing my job. 

Interpretative vs creative. 
Storyboarding is not creative. It is not about my images. Movies all work the same way, they go from words to pictures. What the storyboard artist has to do is ask the right questions and draw what is in the director’s head. Your job is to get them what they want.

That’s why I don’t really read the script before we start. I’ll glaze over it to understand what it’s about and what is happening in the story, but if I spend to much time on it I’ll begin to have my own ideas and they can get in the way if they differ from what the director wants. 

Reference is important. But sometimes directors want me to look at all those films and I don’t really think that’s necessary. You will always have these things in your head but you don’t have to revisit everything. You don’t need to take everything literally.

What gets me going is the next shot. It’s always about the next shot. 

On Improvisation & the Coens
Do the Coens already know exactly what they want, when they begin boarding? 

They are still waxing over it at that time. We work very conditional, step by step. I usually do 3-4 passes. And what happens is that sometimes when they see my drawings it leads to new ideas. They get all inspired to take it one step further. With them it really is a team effort all the way. 

When the boards get drawn, what happens, is that a lot of information is being made public to the people working on the show. I have this rule that they can’t take the boards out of my office when I’m still working on them, but they can look at them in my office. And so people from different departments will come in and try to find out if I know in what direction the brothers are going. Like costumes: ‘are they talking raincoats here or something else?’ And sometimes I know and other times I have to tell ‘em: you’ll have to wait on that a bit longer. 

But for instance, there was this vacuum cleaner in Hail Caesar and they mentioned it, that it was going to be a Kirby vacuum cleaner, and so they found that out because the brothers mentioned it during the storyboarding. 

When the boards are done they’ll make them into a book and everybody can have it on the set and look at it. So everybody knows what we’re going to do, which set-ups there’ll be and such.

What the Coens do is, they don’t go from script to camera, they go from script to storyboard. What we do is we board every set-up. I don’t go back and do multiple drawings for when we go back to a previous set-up, unless there are visual effects in the shot. If say the room is on fire and things are disappearing I’ll do multiple versions of the panel. 

And that’s why, storyboards are not for everybody. You have to work, the way we work, is really with set-ups. People have to understand the set-ups. Using set-ups, and boarding out your set-ups is the best way to get you movie drawn. Now, my boards are pretty basic, even when I’ve done my final pass they won’t look like comic books but everything will be there: eye lines, and angles. It’s about information. People can look at the boards and go, ah so that’s how you guys want it. 

You can save all the usual problems ahead of shooting by working with a good artist and a floor plan. 

If I can I’ll be on the set, because these are some of my best friends so I love to be there, but I don’t want to get in the way. With the Coens I don’t have to do any more drawing once we get on the set. They’ll be past that at that point. But I have worked for other directors where they did want me on set to do quick sketches. 

Most Important Skills
Listening skill. And transforming what you pick up into action. You have to solve that problem for them (the director) Get them what they want. 

It can get challenging if a director wants to do something that hasn’t been done before. Then it is harder to get them what they want. 

I’ll draw about 25-30 panels per day but the rough thumbnails are even faster. It’s not about pretty drawing. 

I can neither confirm nor deny that I’m working on The Ballad of Buster Scruggs.