I spent the day updating my blog and figuring out how to start the next draft of storyboards. Sometimes people look at the painstaking detail that goes into putting together a film and wonder if it is really worth it. People wonder why a film needs to be storyboarded over and over again. If only they knew how many more times the story had been written out in notes and thumbnail sketches before even reaching that point. This process is very necessary, and you actually save a lot of time and trouble by putting in the work up front in the planning stages.Last year, before I had music, puppets and backgrounds, I took the detailed notes and script that I had assembled for the film and storyboarded it to a rough recording of myself reading the poetry slowly in Urdu. I had to guess at timing and imagine that with music it would be better. It was a long process, with a lot of revisions, but that formed the basis for recording music with the correct timing and mood, based on each scene as well as determining which props and backgrounds needed to be created.Now that I have puppets, music, several backgrounds and a bit of a stage setup, it is time to storyboard the film taking advantage of the flow of the music as well as the flexibility that the stage setup allows. I have worked hard to open things up to allow “Risalo” to break out of the single vantage point view of a stage performance, to strike a balance between that tradition and a more cinematic experience. Today, I began taking photos and mocking up camera movement and staging to create a final set of storyboards based upon which we can shoot this film. This is where I can hopefully work out issues of timing and flow to make the best film possible.I ironed another background and started playing with how I position it in relation to the stage, puppet and camera. I’m off to a start at least. Let’s see how much I can do before heading to Multan to audition and rehearse puppeteers in the coming weeks.