Development of Scene Storyboarding
Storyboarding — tool that saves money. One day artist storyboarding work prevents week of rework by animators and technical artists. This is not metaphor: without storyboard team starts production with vague understanding of final result, discovers mismatches mid-work and remakes.
Types of storyboarding for game scenes
Not every game scene requires same storyboarding type. Different tasks — different formats:
Thumbnail storyboard. Fastest option: small sketches (5×8 cm), schematic figures, only key moments. Used for initial concept agreement. Done in hours, allows evaluating flow and rhythm of scene before detailed work.
Rough storyboard. Frames A5-A4 format, understandable poses and character expressions, camera movement indicators (arrows). Sufficient for animatic — sequence of static frames with time code showing timing. Most production decisions made at rough storyboard stage.
Clean storyboard. Finalized frames with details, captions, time codes. Used as official documentation for complex productions with large teams or outsourcing — when document without double interpretation is needed.
What good storyboarding shows
Each storyboard frame contains three information layers:
Visual composition. Character positioning in frame, horizon line, foreground/background separation. Bad storyboarding — characters center every frame, no rule of thirds work, no depth. Good — each frame reads as independent composition and fits into flow.
Movement. Camera movement arrows (pan, tilt, dolly, crane) and character movements. Without arrows storyboarding shows "from" and "to", but not "how". Typical information loss: camera movement 30 degrees left looks same on paper as 90 degrees — without explicit angle indication.
Staging. Characters must read as silhouettes. If two characters blend in frame — this is staging problem. At storyboarding stage this is visible and easy to fix. In finished animation — hours of rework.
Specifics of storyboarding for in-engine scenes
For cutscenes rendered in engine (Timeline + Cinemachine), storyboarding contains additional technical layers:
Camera lens notes. Approximate Field of View for each angle. Wide angle (FOV 70–90°) for scale and dynamics, telephoto (FOV 30–50°) for space compression and character isolation. Affects Cinemachine Virtual Camera setup.
Depth of field indicator. Mark whether foreground is sharp, background, or both — for Post-processing Depth of Field setup. Shallow DOF for emotional close-ups, deep — for action and environment shots.
Transition type. Between each frame pair: hard cut / dissolve / wipe. In Timeline this is CinemachineBlend setting.
VFX marks. Marks where in frame effects particles, shader effects, light interactions should be.
How work is structured
Work starts with briefing: literary screenplay or scene description, style references, technical constraints (platform, engine capabilities). Further — thumbnail pass for overall flow agreement, then rough storyboard for each frame approval, then clean pass if needed.
Important stage — review with animators. Animator looks at storyboard and says: "this pose is physically impossible for this character" or "there's not enough time between these two frames for transition" — need to know before animation starts.
Storyboard is approved before any production starts. Changes after production start — these are remakes, and they cost a lot.
| Type and Volume | Timeline |
|---|---|
| Thumbnail storyboard (1–2 min scene) | 1–2 days |
| Rough storyboard (1–2 min) | 3–5 days |
| Clean storyboard with technical notes (1–2 min) | 5–10 days |
| Full package (several scenes, 5–10 min content) | 3–5 weeks |
Cost is determined by scene volume, detail level, and number of revisions.