"It's All About Maximizing Your Game's Assets" cont.
Make certain you give us discrete elements of
the game’s audio. One of the most important things to remember
is to turn off the music during the screen capture. The music may sound great
behind the game, but it needs to be removed before we cut the video into small
bits and edit it. If you don’t, we need to remove it, which will also
eliminate all of your great sound effects. So turn the music off and leave the
effects on. And give us separate recordings of your in-game music and recorded
voices. You’ve already paid to create it; let’s use it.
Don’t forget the “pre-roll.” As you’re
laying down the shots, start recording as many as 10 seconds early before the
action begins. This “pre-roll” will enable our machines to roll
prior to the action.
Create the best performance possible. The finished video will
only be as good as the game player’s performance. The person playing the
game being recorded must be extremely knowledgeable about the game and great
at playing it. Keep in mind that we are counting on him or her to be a good
actor and sometimes a good cameraman.
If he keeps walking the characters into walls, if he does a fly-thru of the
environment and it’s not a smooth, steady shot, he’s not showing
off the game at its best. Be sure you use your most skilled game player or tester
when recording because he will make the game look really cool. Have him show
off the extras, like the CG or full-motion video (FMV). Gamers have a tendency
to skip this stuff, but we need it. Remember, it’s not about high score,
it’s about the performance.
Where’s your hero? Give us great hero shots. We know
you want to show him off, but if he appears tiny in the game, or if it’s
a first-person shooter and you rarely see him, we can’t feature him. Let’s
put him center stage!
There are many more suggestions we could make about taking advantage of what
any game has to offer and utilizing the assets to their best advantage. Following
this wish list will start you at a good place for getting great media done.
Shane Francis is president of the San Francisco-based Shane
Francis Co. which produces video for games, TV, and film. He can be reached
at shane@shanefrancis.com.