Super Smash Bros. Director Details How The CG Trailers Are Made
Posted on July 13 2019 by Charles Xavier
The last two entries in the Super Smash Bros. series have had some impressive CG trailers. If you’ve ever wondered how those trailers are made, Super Smash Bros. Director Masahiro Sakurai detailed their creation in his latest Famitsu column.
Sakurai begins by laying out the planning stages that lead up to the CG development of character reveal trailers:
“In the first stage, I write the plot, by which I mean a basic scenario with a few extra ideas thrown in. At this time I also start to form a kind of concrete image of how things are going to be. Then I start noting down where all the cuts are going to be, plus a few other bits and pieces. Also, if there’s going to be any dialogue we’ll decide on that, as well as the music. At this stage we don’t really decide on what will happen in the game engine section, except to write ‘insert game engine part here’.” — Sakurai
Next, he explains the creation of the CG aspects in collaboration with Digital Frontier, which begins with brainstorming ideas that will lead to a still image storyboard. Once that is complete, the actual CG aspects begin to get worked on:
“Once that’s all done we rebuild the character models. We also rebuild all the environments needed from scratch. Just having them as they are in the game would not transition well into CG, so we have to rebuild each part. That incurs quite a high cost, but there’s no getting around it. Then the publisher and I both check them over. That’s when development of the video really gets underway. In contrast to the storyboard, there are various different phases of video development. It’s not like the final product emerges from the initial plan just like that. There are stages for designing motion and camera angles, stages for rendering, stages for inserting things like movement of clothes and hair, motion blur, as well as allotted time for adding other post-effects. Those things are given strenuous and regular checks. As progress continues with each respective scene cut, we get a grasp of what will and won’t work. Then we proceed from there.” — Sakurai
It’s amazing how much effort is put into a trailer that can be watched in merely a few minutes, and it makes me appreciate those trailers even more.
Do you enjoy the Super Smash Bros. trailers? Which one has been your favorite, and which one do you think had the best quality? Sound off in the comments below!
Source: Famitsu (via Nintendo Everything)
Charles is a Senior Editor at Zelda Dungeon. He is a Visual Development artist focused on enviroments and pitch paintings. Check out his Instagram and Twitter to see his latest artworks, a lot of which is Zelda fan art! His favorite candy is Skittles – he feels the world should know this.
