Hi there! I'm hoping to one day storyboard for a transformers show of some kind myself one day. I'm going into my senior year of highschool, and i'm not quite sure where to really begin in terms of figuring out the path. If you can share a bit of advice as a storyboarder in the industry, i'd really appreciate it big time! Thanks in advance!
Happy to!
I think there are 2 really important things you can do at your age, and luckily they're both really fun!
First, DRAW. A LOT. The more you draw, the better you'll get.
And don't just draw from your head, make sure to do studies. Half of drawing is knowledge. You can't draw a cat if you don't know what a cat looks like, right? So whenever you sit down to draw, take 30 min to do some warmup studies before drawing from your imagination. Either study what you plan to draw, or study what gave you trouble last time. I literally do this to this day.
One exercise I'll do is copy something once, then I'll compare my drawing to the original and try to understand what I didn't quite get right. Then I'll either do a second drawing of it, or I'll do a few drawings on the side practicing the area I got wrong, and try to understand how to do it better.
Another great exercise is to take an artist you want to draw like and trace their drawings. The loose/rough drawings are best, because those show you how the artist THINKS. So trace each line, and in your head ask questions like why did the artist make this line, and what is it communicating? The goal is to learn how to THINK like the artists you admire, so that you can make the same choices in your own work.
Second, WATCH MOVIES (and TV). A LOT. Study classics, for sure, but also watch the stuff that inspires you. Watch the stuff that makes you want to be a filmmaker, and just absorb as much as you humanly can.
It's so important because when you become a storyboard artist, you'll have to problem solve how to approach story beats, and all those movies you watch become your library, and they'll give you ideas on how different filmmakers have approached similar problems in the past.
It allows you to stand on the shoulders of giants, instead of struggling to reinvent the wheel.
Also listen to director commentaries and interviews, and watch video essays that dissect film. Like the tip about doing studies, it's all about learning how they THINK.