The color script of a film serves multiple purposes. It’s an overview and a map of the color, lighting, emotion and moods of a film.
Here are some color scripts from Pixar:
As I make this animated web series, I want to document what I did right and what I did wrong to help others avoid making the same mistakes as they create their projects. I documented some early lessons and mistakes at this post.
My latest mistake and therefore lesson learned is that I should have done a color script for the entire series instead of making things up as I got to them. For example, the color choices I made for the lizards, their planet, the flying eye and the Repairwoman’s lizard suit all blend together too much:
If I had known to make a color script at the beginning of this project, I would have known that these choices weren’t sufficiently distinct and I would have made different choices.
At this point I’m stuck with the choices I made; changing them would be too time-consuming.
But I NOW know for future projects, not only do I need a completed storyboard but I also need to determine the color and lighting BEFORE I start to ensure that all of the scenes work together and that the viewer can clearly see the differences among the foreground, middle ground background and the characters.
I made this mistake so you don’t have to!