---
title: 'How We Made ''Keep Off the Graph'' with Previs'
source: 'https://youtube.com/watch?v=CjYNv_axvuY'
video_id: 'CjYNv_axvuY'
date: 2026-09-09
duration_sec: 814
channel: 'RocketJump Film School'
---

# How We Made 'Keep Off the Graph' with Previs

> Source: [How We Made 'Keep Off the Graph' with Previs](https://youtube.com/watch?v=CjYNv_axvuY)

## Summary

The creators of 'Keep Off the Graph' discuss their extensive pre-visualization process for the short film. They explain how they planned every shot, rig, and camera angle to manage the complex green screen production. The conversation highlights the importance of previs in solving creative and logistical challenges.

### Key Points

- **Origin of the Core Gag** [00:17] — The idea for the 'grab and lift' gag came from a friend named Tyler in Georgia, which became the seed for the entire short.
- **Decision to Previs Heavily** [00:41] — The team knew early on that the video would be heavily green screen, so they decided to do extensive pre-visualization, more than any previous project.
- **Rig Organization** [01:34] — Every shot was organized by rig type (horizontal, swivel, traveling) because resetting a rig took ten minutes, so they had to group shots by rig.
- **Choreographing the Fight** [03:03] — The previs was used to figure out the initial acceleration and the chaotic middle section of the fight, with input from a choreographer named Young Lee.
- **Detailed Previs Breakdowns** [04:13] — The previs included detailed breakdowns of each section, camera position, and rig type, which was used on set as a reference.
- **Movement is Relative** [04:49] — The team realized that movement could be simulated by moving the camera instead of the actor, so not every rig needed to be a traveling rig.
- **Cut Scene: Upside-Down Water Drinking** [05:13] — A scene where Clint drinks water upside down was filmed but cut because it didn't fit the pacing of the short.
- **Late Addition of Airplane Sequence** [06:02] — The airplane sequence was a late addition, and the idea of Clint being horizontal on the wing came from watching his physicality during previs.
- **Using Cheap Props in Previs** [06:55] — The previs used cheap props like a fan for a plane engine and a roller chair for movement, proving that the goal was to establish camera angles, not visual fidelity.
- **Flopping the Plane Sequence** [07:46] — The plane sequence was flopped in post because they only had a plane with an engine on one side, so they shot it that direction and flipped it.
- **Symmetry for Flopping** [07:58] — The team asked wardrobe to make the actors as symmetrical as possible to allow for flopping the image in post without noticeable differences.
- **Finding Gaps in the Action** [08:40] — The previs helped identify gaps in the action, like the need for a 'glue' shot to transition between scenes, which they might have missed otherwise.
- **Adding the Bird Fake-Out** [10:00] — The bird fake-out moment was added to provide a slowdown in the action before the characters sit down to eat, improving pacing.
- **Planning the Dream Sequence** [10:44] — The dream sequence was a planned part of the short, and the team knew they wouldn't bring the character back from it.

## Transcript

Welcome everybody. We are here sitting today to talk about the previs of Keep Off the Graph. I'm joined by John Salmon, Director of Photography, Extraordinaire Co-Director, Matt Arnold, a man who can sell you anything, and Clinton Jones, co-everything, I guess.
You and I came up with the original gag that's been accelerated into Keep Off the Graph. It's actually my friend Tyler in Georgia who came up with the idea for grabbing the next and both lifting each other up. I love your special thanks to Tyler.
That was, yeah. The seed that grew this weird tree. Yeah, that was the first thing. So we knew right away from the beginning also that this was going to be a big green screen,
fakey, you know, thing. And so we were like, okay, we need to super pre-vis. I think we pre-vis this out harder than any video we've ever done. Well, we also, we shot the pre-vis and raised it out of the parking lot.
I didn't get the card, so I lost it. Oh, you didn't miss that? Okay. Yeah. Yeah. I didn't either. So now we have to do the whole pre-mix. But it's good because we found the diverge sequence. Yeah. So the diverge sequence came from the search up and down.
It was a micro thing. If you do it again, maybe you'll find something new. Exactly. Well, we don't do a lot of pre-mix or storyboards. Also because we don't use it at the time or ability to do it. And we can't draw. And we can't draw. But for this one, we knew that it was going to be a lot of green screen,
all green screen other than the beginning. And also that then when talking to some guys, we realized like every single time you guys are up in the table, it's actually a different rig. So we have to like organize all the shots into like horizontal rigs or double person rigs or whatever it is
We had to make sure we knew every shot. It was specifically What rig we're in because that takes ten minutes to reset us into a different one So that was a swivel rig which was just on our hips or a regular harness which was hitting our legs as well
But we can't turn up around. Yeah, and also which rigs are we on to travel moving left and right Yeah, so this one's kind of flying big party. That's a traveling rig So like all the shots that could be a traveling rig we have to make them all at the same time
And so everything was shot out of order. But we would get down granular to the point of like, okay, well, this shot we need to be horizontal rig for Freddie, traveling swivel rig for Quint, and it's going to be in this orientation, and then we're going to flop it because we're going to do that again,
but for the other direction. So the edit was ridiculous when we did the pre-biz. But the pre-biz was essentially, we weren't thinking about that. We had to see all the puzzle pieces and then shoot it. So we could probably start going through it.
Yeah, we should. So what we have here is the pre-biz on the left side, Which is just, John, we were just running around with the C100, wherever. Up. More or less the same. And grab.
And even the previous version, we were like, okay, this will be hilarious. So then it was like, okay, how do I get up? And we're here. So one thing that actually changed in that one was the direction of the turn change based on the swivel rig.
But essentially the same idea of legs coming up and over. Well, this was again, this was to follow the list. So what we were doing here in the pre-vis was most trying to figure out the initial, once the fight starts, it's one thing, but the initial, like, how do they just start accelerating upward?
Like, what were those things? I remember we were discussing a lot, like, how do you get from here up? Yeah. How do you get from that? And we shot more than what you see in pre-vis. We shot a lot of different versions and, like, or we didn't shoot it. We just, like, looked into the camera and see what worked.
And you know I think this is probably the part that changes the most from the pre especially later when we start accelerating climbing Because the idea was that in that middle part was chaos It yeah the chaos of just hitting and pulling on each other and we even and we for a big part of that too we talked to uh young lee young money young
who had done choreography uh for us on uh the the kings and video um london brawling and he took he went out and he was over in canada he put together a little thing and some of those ideas we also
incorporated. Yeah, definitely in the beginning part. So this is him, some of these pieces here, you know, they get the hat, the hand, the grab, the metal grab, stuff like that.
The fake smush and everything. But the idea with this section was just chaos. Right. The only thing we want to see, oh sorry, go on then, is that you see, pretty actually breaks down on the bottom of the corner, this is what we used on set, and this is actually breaking down where the camera is,
and what rig it is. You actually see, like, on standard, that means standard rig. Yeah, so section, now section D, so we broke down each of the fight sections into sections. There's a setup number one, and that setup number one
would encompass a number of different shots, and it's a shot four and setup one. So you got to this level of complexity, and also for all the reference of where the green screens are and where the camera was relative to where we were. So once we get up here, we're at the height
of where we're going to be, and then we start following, following from there. This is pretty identical now for a lot of them. Almost shot for shot. The choreography of this is figured out. The spin.
There's so much stuff where somebody's supposed to be flying and instead of moving that person, you just move the camera. Yeah. That's their position. Yeah, that was important to realize also when we were shooting that. Yeah, movement is relative. But the purpose would be still, not every rig had to be a traveling rig.
You move the camera and make it still as I go. Yeah. The vomit swallowing. I think we figured it out. Yeah, we were messing around. How do we film that? That's okay.
Oh, even before the roller coaster thing. That's a good moment, and we actually did film that, and we can put that in the end, and see us point drinking water. Upside down. Upside down. And we literally hung you upside down. Yeah. Right. And you drink water. The water would get up.
It's funny, and you're really good at it. It just became one. It's just short and very long. It just became like a pacing thing, where it's like one thing to do. Right. You need to break so many times. Yeah. I think it was really smart of you guys to cut that. Right.
Even though that moment was great, you guys still cut it because it was just the best thing for the short and we hung you don't you worry and we hung you up and down for like 30 minutes it was the most uncomfortable thing you ever had to shoot we watched it and we were like
eh no we just cut it you didn't even do it so glad that you did so good so Quinn comes up he swivels around hit so this part where I'd fall on the airplane
was that was that was a late edition wasn't it yeah the airplane wasn't always there there was a thought like the early draft of the script was we fell on the wing and then we cut inside the plane and you had someone
like sipping tea in there right it was a quicker moment yeah it was a quicker moment I think when we were here playing around I think it just became because Clint's so physical that like just like watching him do stuff I think the idea of like him horizontal just became so funny
and then we just started working on that and I forget but I think during the previews is when the wallet thing yeah I think that all that stuff came like a lot of the choreography came up when we were previewing the thing yeah so the airplane was going
standing up using using a fan here as the um look at how close it is actually yeah feet yeah we We knew we wanted to do that for a shot
Drone. One thing you have to notice is like in terms of like direction and like creating movement, like obviously this is like people flying through the air.
In a preview it doesn't matter. You can use a roller chair for somebody moving. big moving, you can use a fan for an engine and like, you know, it's a couch, it doesn't matter, you didn't even know that Clint for example. Because ultimately it's not about, you'll see that the camera angles match, well this
is a back place that probably has the camera angle matching, but the point is that you're essentially setting up like what those angles actually are and then you just use whatever, like that's the, this preview on the left is like the cheapest looking thing. And the thing that we found here was we're flipping the line where we are on this because
when we got to the plane, right, oh it makes more sense to be on this side. Right, yeah. Actually, I think all the plane stuff is actually flopped because we only had that plane that we shot on didn't have an engine on the other side. We wanted to, we only had the engine on the other side.
And it would have been a pain to turn at 180 to hit the sun at the right point, so we just shot it that direction and flopped the whole thing. I remember that was one of the first things I said to Lane actually with Wardrobe because it was like, you've got to make them as symmetrical as possible.
And she was just kind of like, why? And I was like, you've got to understand, like, it's going to get so disoriented when we get on that green screen. there's going to be a little bit of place where you have to flop here and there, like you have to make them look the same on both sides. And we do here and there, there's definitely moments where we're like, ah, we're supposed to have to go to the other side.
Yeah, you can't have a Park Service badge or anything. That was a good move. Keys, post-dodge, pulling stuff, a couple of shots that didn't end up making it, but it's actually the same thing here. The idea of the wall into the engine and the engine blowing up.
I think we came up with that glue. I think we didn't have that glue in the previous. And that's one that... and sometimes it's not about having the right thing on the previous. Sometimes the previous lets you see gaps after you... so there's even multiple...
Right. And the previous is like, oh that's a gap and we're on 7. You make sure to shoot this. Yeah. And it's like, oh we need some glue. And actually I think this, like, Clint Smith in the engine came out and said actually, like, oh we need a glue. He's like, why did we jump off? Yeah.
He sees that. We have a glue like that. Yeah. And we've got a Clint catching up here. Wow. That's pretty good. That's actually pretty helpful. With the birds, he flips around.
That was an example where, because we were not horizontal, it was a mistake. When he catches me from behind, we were like, okay, and then the next shot he shows up. Oh, we didn't have the glue for that because we weren't in a rig.
And then when we shot, we were like, oh, the first night, I think we had two days of shooting. The first time we're like, oh, we don't have a clue to go from here to here. So it was very quick that the first and the next guy were to shoot the process. We had one thing on the green screen.
I think one of the things to notice, too, and I think why pre-visiting is important, especially for action stuff, but one thing that's really hard to get a sense of pacing in the script is action. So this next bird moment is, you really can't tell what I think is going to be an action scene.
And that bird moment came from, in the pre-vis, when you look at the pre-vis and you're doing it, You know what, to go from here to something like them eating, we need something, we need another moment that's kind of like a slowdown.
I don't know how the bird thing appeared or how it came up with it, but that's my favorite thing we've seen. The bird fake out Yeah We just chummy for a second We needed you guys to be chummy before you started to sit down and eat Yeah We were moving the script and it was like oh you guys just start sitting down and eating
Yeah, it was weird. I mean, but the frickin' bird thing is weird. It felt weird. It felt weird. We knew we were going to do a dream sequence. It would be mundane. That chicken was so gross they gave it to you.
By the time it's ended, it's like, oh, it's a dream sequence. Yeah, the time is entering our minds. It's like, greasy cold in the video. Yeah. And then Clint falls asleep. Surprisingly cold.
Even the direction that I'm laying down. It goes into there, and then we punch into a dream sequence, which, you know, again, with the... We didn't bring him back. We didn't bring him back because we knew what that was going to be.
Wake up. I don't know. That's a long way to go. Yeah, that's a fair one. Here we need to transition, so we need to switch around to forward again.
And then I get up into sort of a standing position. You know, we knew again, close over the feet, close over the back, knee flying back. Yeah, we did like the punctuations in the previous, we essentially know what you're doing.
I'm gonna shoot that. Do it. Wanna do that later? Eyeball. Actually that game, even in the edit, realizing that it was gonna be a pause,
and in the pre-vision we realized we want a pause there with his eyes. This is a weird one. Because it's always not quite clear how far away Clint would be, and I think, again, because of the creation,
we could adjust the scale to where we wanted to have the picture. We'll have Mike sitting down on the couch as we're doing this pre-vision. I almost passed out during that moment. So much.
Similar things, thunder coming down. The people here obviously went along on rigs, so this is pretty easy. Yeah, I was going to add in some facts on the previs, but again, this became less important after previs because we knew it was going to be fire later.
The broom falling down is supposed to be Clint's body coming into the ground. take this and that was keep off the grass thanks for sticking
around with us as we rambled about how we made this insane short if you have not seen the short yet before the show you can check us out either on Hulu RocketJump the show or the short itself
on YouTube if you have any questions for us hit us up in the comments below tweet at us or hit up the RocketJump forum call what's your personal phone number We'll put it right here. 405-6.
There you go. Yeah. Call Clint. Call Clint at 5-7-3-4-5-6. It's our personal hotline. For real, my friend. That's for real on this phone. It gets a lot of prank calls, actually. So make sure you let him know. Yeah, don't waste the time with prank calls. No.
No more of those. Yeah. You're open for reason. Thanks for watching. Thank you. Peace out. Peace.
Thank you.