The Dhaba Scene That Swapped Seats
You are boarding scene 7 of a 6-minute student short: a dhaba at lunchtime. Friend A sits on the left of a table, friend B on the right, and a waiter (C) enters through the kitchen door, which the establishing panel places at frame left. The scene runs 14 panels. In panels 5-8 you draw A looking frame-right and B looking frame-left, and the director approves all 14 with a thumbs-up. Three weeks later the editor calls: 'The cut feels wrong, the two of them seem to swap seats.' You check and find that panel 9 is a close-up of B looking frame-right, panel 12 has the waiter entering from frame right, and the teacup that sat to A's right in panel 3 is to A's left in panel 7. The film's first public screening is in four days, and only panels 9 and 12 can physically be redrawn in the time left.
1. Diagnose the screen-direction problem panel by panel and explain how you fix it with only two redraws available.
Read the worked answer
The line is established in panels 5-8: A sits frame-left and looks screen-right; B sits frame-right and looks screen-left. The camera is on one side of the A-B axis, and everything else must obey it.
Panel 9 shows B looking screen-right. For B, that means he is now looking toward A's side of the table from the opposite direction - on screen it reads as if he has moved into A's seat. That single panel is the editor's 'they swap seats' note.
Panel 12 puts C through the door at frame right, but the establishing panel put the door at frame left. The waiter now appears to arrive from the wrong side of the room - the geography, not just the direction, has flipped.
Fixes within the two-redraw limit:
- Panel 9: mirror it horizontally. A single-character close-up has no fixed screen direction other than the eyeline, so flipping it is safe and costs nothing. Then confirm panel 10 (presumably A's close-up) is A looking screen-right - if it is not, mirror that one too and count it.
- Panel 12: this one is tied to the room, so mirroring alone is not enough. Redraw it as a slightly wider shot that includes the doorframe on the left, so the audience sees where C came from. If you cannot redraw, insert a neutral cutaway (the teacup, an empty chair) between 11 and 12: a cutaway legally re-establishes the axis and you can then enter from the new side.
Then re-check every eyeline in panels 1-14 in one pass, because one mirrored panel usually has relatives.
2. Explain how the teacup ended up on the wrong side and what system stops this in future.
Read the worked answer
Prop continuity is a data problem, not a drawing problem - the cup did not move, the artist flipped something and did not re-check.
The likeliest mechanism: panel 7 was mirrored in software to improve the composition (very common when two people talk across a table). Mirroring a panel mirrors every prop in it, so the cup that was to A's right instantly becomes a cup to A's left. Nobody noticed because the panel looked better.
The system:
- A per-scene continuity sheet. Draw a simple overhead (bird's-eye) diagram of the table with a fixed arrow marked 'camera side' and 'kitchen door', and mark every prop's position on it.
- A prop state column: cup three-quarters full, handle pointing to A, steam present or gone; how many plates; who has a napkin.
- Margin notes on each panel: 'cup: A's right, handle to A, 3/4 full'. Cheap to write, impossible to argue with later.
- A character sheet alongside it: sleeves rolled or not, dupatta position, which hand holds the tray, whether C wears a cloth over the shoulder.
- The rule after any horizontal flip: re-check props, costume asymmetry and text on signs. Flipping is the single most common source of continuity errors in storyboarding.
You also need an explicit self-check pass before delivery - reading your own 14 panels in order and asking 'where is the cup?' takes four minutes and saves a screening.
3. The director approved all 14 panels. Why is that not the end of the check, and what does it tell you about the storyboard artist's own responsibility?
Read the worked answer
The director was watching story, performance and intent. Nobody in that room was watching the axis.
A storyboard is not a picture for the director; it is a technical instruction sheet for the DP, editor, animator, art department and colourist, and every one of them will follow it literally. Screen direction, eyelines, prop states and set geography are the parts of the document that the storyboard artist owns. Deferring them to the director is deferring the exact part of the job you are paid for.
It also tells you that 'approved' is a version, not a guarantee. Log which version was approved and what changed afterwards. If the editor receives the approved board and it contains an axis break, the editor will either follow it (and the cut feels wrong) or fix it silently (and you never learn).
The process fix is cheap: before a board is locked, do a two-minute flip-through checking arrows and eyelines, and get one other person - a peer, an editor, an animator - to read the sequence cold and describe who is where. A fresh reader catches a flipped close-up instantly because they have no memory of drawing it. Add that check to your own delivery checklist permanently; it costs four minutes and prevents a four-day panic.