Blast from the Past #646: February 2, 2005: Re: Teaser Boards

Subj: Re: Teaser Boards
Date: Wednesday, February 2, 2005 1:19:19 PM
From: Peter Laird
To:   Kevin Munroe

Kevin,

I'm generally quite pleased with these storyboards -- I think this will be a REALLY fun trailer. I have a few comments, as follows:

1.) In board 1, it would be cool if there is some movement to the clouds across the moon -- "scudding", if you will. Another thing I thought of as I was looking at this first board -- would it work if, instead of a pan DOWN from the sky, the moon and clouds we see in that first frame are actually a REFLECTION in a puddle of water on the rooftop... so we would pan UP from it to get to the rooftop setting in board 1.1? It might be a neat way to throw off the audience's expectations. A subtle vibration-induced ripple in that water might be a nice way to start the transition to the pan, and also subtly imply to the viewer that SOMETHING is on the rooftop and is causing that vibration...but WHAT??!!

2.) Another idea occurred to me when looking at this first sequence -- what if we opened with cops with flashlights and guns prowling around the rooftop, looking for... somebody. There could be flashing blue lights reflecting off some walls in the background, from their cruisers parked on the street -- tying in with the cop car at the end of the trailer. (The obvious implication is that they are looking for the Turtles. Actually, we could use Foot ninja instead of cops.) After a few seconds of this, they leave... there's a beat... and THEN we go into the bandanas appearing, the Turtles coming out of the shadows, etc..
The reason I suggest this is that it would be a fun way to show how amazingly stealthy the Turtles are, and how they can use their incredible ninja skills and training to hide even in such dire circumstances... as well as once again emphasize their "outsider" status. Just a thought.

3.) I wonder if, instead of a pan up which follows the leaping Turtle (boards 7.1 to 7.3), it would be more dramatic to have that middle Turtle (the one who leaps) run right AT the camera, briefly filling the whole frame with black. OR... as that Turtle approaches, have the camera swing around to his side, then push in towards his back as he runs past, and FOLLOW him as he leaps between rooftops, moving above him and panning down to catch that vertigo-inducing view of the distance to the ground. (I'm thinking of the scenes in the first "Spider-Man" movie when Peter Parker was feeling out his powers and leaping from building to building, with the camera moving overhead, looking straight down.)

4.) I wonder if somewhere in this sequence it would be cool to have two or more of the Turtles do some kind of "team gymnastics" type of move where the use each others' bodies to bounce off of. Not sure EXACTLY what this would be, but the simplest thing that I'm seeing is something like this: One Turtle lands in a crouch, and before he can move, another Turtle sticks a landing on the first Turtle's back and uses him to launch off of into a new jump.

5.) I love the foot in the water thing!

6.) If possible, I would love to throw in a faded logo painted on the side of a building (seen very quickly) that would read something like "Mirage _______" (could be "Studios" or "Moving" or "Warehouse"... it's the "Mirage" part that is key).

7.) In boards 19 through 20, which have the Turtles crossing those horizontal pipes between buildings, I wonder if it might be fun to have one of them -- maybe the center one -- actually sliding on his feet part way across the pipe, as if he were doing a skateboard move.

8.) The arched pipe blowing steam in boards 21 and 21.1 looks kind of goofy -- like it was made out of rubber to bend like that.

9.) Is that really a "tower clock" in the background in 21.2 and 21.3, or some kind of billboard? It's not clear to me. Actually, this might be the PERFECT place to do the "MIrage ______" thing I suggested earlier.

10.) Somewhere -- most likely between boards 26 and 27.1 -- it would be fantastic to do a brief shot of the four Turtles arranged as they were in the first page of the first TMNT comic book (a group pose I reprised in the first issue of Vol. 4 of TMNT). This could be just as they realize -- because of the sound of sirens and/or reflected light coming into the alley from the police cruiser's lights -- that the cops are coming and they have to leave. I'm thinking it would be better to do it in a slightly more three-quarters view as in the Volume 4 version, instead of the flat, more straight-on view in the original Volume 1 page. (I'm attaching a graphic showing the pages in question.) I think it would give the fans a big thrill. (And me too!)

11.) I'm a little confused by boards 30 and 31 -- I don't get the point of this particular angle.

12.) I like the push in on the manhole cover/TMNT logo thing to end this trailer -- it should get the TMNT fans up out of their chairs! We may actually have some logo designs for manhole covers which also incorporate abstract turtle shell patterns which might be appropriate.

-- Peter