Previsualization

The finished shot.
Slightly different from the concept.

Last week a few of us from Blackburn Camera Club had a walk out in to Blackburn Town Centre for a night shoot.  I told the lads that there was a particular alley that I would like to do something with.  So we wandered over and had a look.  It would seem that we were all quite inspired by it and came away with some shots that we were happy with.

In the pub afterwards we were talking about the shoot and one of the lads said something like ‘You knew where you wanted to go and what you wanted to shoot.’  The truth is I did.  In fact I had been thinking about it for a few days.

Previsualization sketch from
my notebook.

Normally, if I had had the time I would have gone out and made a reccy during the day taking some reference shots with either a compact or my phone.  As it turned out I didn’t have time to do this so I had to work from memory.  And it was a long time since I had been from that location.

I’m not sure about how many other photographers do this but I tend to keep a photographers notebook.  In there are the ideas for my projects, shots that have inspired me, recipes for chemistry, developing info for different films and shoot sketches.

I have to admit that it is not often I draw sketches.  I tend to only do this if I’m doing any shots with lighting in them.  It allows me to see where the flash units go.  Of course the practicalities on site often mean that I deviate from the plan but at least I have some idea of what to shot and how to shoot it.

This is called Previsualization and although used more in movie making its origins stem from photography.

So what is previsualization?  The great oracle of information, Wikipedia, sums previsualization as;

‘Previsualization (also known as pre-rendering, preview or wireframe windows) is a function to visualize complex scenes in a movie before filming. It is also a concept in still photography. Previsualization is applied to techniques such as storyboarding, either in the form of charcoal drawn sketches or in digital technology in the planning and conceptualization of movie scenery make up.’

Ansel Adams (see video below) wrote extensively about visualising photographs before actually going out.  The term Previsualization is attributed to Minor White who divided up visualization up in to sections.  Previsualization was seeing the image before shoot; visualization was studying the subject while shooting; and post-visualization was remembering the subject while printing.  White determined his process of visualization as a ‘psychological concept’.  However, he admitted that he had learned the idea from both Adams and Edward Weston.

Visualization has been used in cinema from the very beginning firstly starting with storyboards.

Walt Disney would photograph the storyboard and edited them together in what was called the Leica Reel and add soundtracks to them as a way of determining the finished animated film.

George Lucas would push the visualization method further with his Star Wars series of films.  The Speeder Bike sequence from Return of the Jedi was planned using models with lip-stick cameras attached.

Later, Lucas’ company Industrial Light and Magic would develop 3D visualization techniques during the filming of Spielberg’s Jurassic Park which won the company an Oscar.  As an interesting side note it was an ILM employee, John Knoll that was behind the creation of Photoshop.

Software for visualization is now readily available should you want to go to that extent. 

However, for me the secret to previsualizing a photograph is to know how light affects a subject, do your research and use your imagination.