Preproduction

preproduction

Purpose

Decide what the film means and what it needs. Every hour here saves days of rework. Produce the contracts that 3D will execute: logline, beats, world bible, boards, animatic, previs, motion ref, shot list.

Scope

D01 Story & Script [SIT], D02 Worldbuilding [SIT], D09 Storyboard [SIT], D10 Animatics [SIT], D11 Previs [SIT], D12 Motion Reference [SIT]. World visual build is environment. Character look is character-design. 2D drawing craft is grease-pencil.

Activation Conditions

• User asks for story, script, beats, world rules, boards, animatic, previs, motion reference, shot list
• Orchestrator fires pre-production stages
• Use preproduction

Non-Activation Conditions

• Single looping turntable with no narrative (micro-story only; do not over-write)
• Pure visual design of a character (→ character-design)
• Building the 3D city (→ environment)
• Final editing of rendered shots (→ production-finishing)

Instructions

1. Write the one-sentence premise (subject + action + setting + mood) and 3 emotional goals.
2. If duration > a loop: write beats (each beat = 1–3 shots). A 2-min film needs ~30–60 seconds of story beats, not a novel.
3. Write a 1–3 page world bible (templates/world-bible.md). Distill into design constraints.
4. Do not design bodies here — hand personality to character-design.
5. Board every beat with camera notation (size/angle/move). Prefer Grease Pencil (grease-pencil) or imported images.
6. Cut an animatic to audio in VSE. If it's boring here, 3D will not save it. Lock the animatic.
7. Previs: cameras + primitive stand-ins. Verify the camera can see the action.
8. Motion ref: film the actions; 60 fps+; matching angles.
9. Emit shot list → asset list → pipeline plan (D14, hand to blender-foundations).
10. Commit fps, resolution, engine, naming. Run checklists/preproduction-handoff.md.

Procedures

Story → Structure → Beat → Shot → Moment

Beat → emotional change → action required → camera distance (D106) → duration → staging → animation intensity → edit rhythm.

The Beat node: smallest unit of story change. 1 beat ≈ 1–3 s for loops, 5–15 s for narrative shorts. Board every beat.

World bible → visual consequences

A rainy city demands cloaks, wet surfaces, puddles, reflections, moody lighting, dripping sounds. Surface one rule per scene; show don't tell. Magic needs explicit limits or stakes die.

Animatic as contract

The animatic sets shot count, duration, and therefore the asset list and the budget. Lock it before expensive modeling.

Previs

Place cameras from boards; blocks for characters; cubes for sets; GP strokes for camera paths; Workbench/EEVEE viewport captures; cut in VSE.

Decision Logic

• No story needed for a pure turntable — write a micro-story (setup→action→payoff) only.
• Skip boards for a single looping shot if staging is obvious; never skip animatic on a multi-shot film.
• Pick ONE frame rate (24 film / 25 PAL / 30–60 web/game) before any animation.
• Delegate shot grammar details to cinematography (Ch 21) when boarding.

Inputs

• Idea / logline / duration / medium
• Style (or request decision 5.1)
• Optional existing script or boards

Outputs

• Logline, emotional goals, beat list
• World bible
• Shot list with camera notation and durations
• Asset list derived from shots
• Animatic status (locked?)
• Previs notes
• Motion-ref list
• Committed fps / resolution / engine / naming
• Handoff checklist result
• Updates to shared state: story, world, shots

Tools

Blender VSE, Grease Pencil, phone camera for motion ref, PureRef for boards (external). Knowledge: Ch 1, Depth 38, Depth 27.

Constraints

Do not over-write. Do not polish the animatic. Do not previs at final quality. Do not board the "nice" shot instead of the story shot.

Edge Cases

• Dialogue-heavy → also plan D62 lip sync and Ch 23 sound early.
• Experimental/abstract → skip character stages; keep beat structure for pacing.
• Game cutscene → boards/animatic partial; reuse game cameras/assets.

Failure Modes & Fixes

Dependencies

• character-design consumes world constraints and story roles
• cinematography consumes boards
• blender-foundations consumes shot/asset list
• grease-pencil for boarding inside Blender
• decision-engine 5.1 if style unset

Related Skills

bakg-orchestrator, character-design, grease-pencil, cinematography, environment, production-finishing (editing/sound)

Delegation Rules

• Character look → character-design
• Shot grammar tables → cinematography
• Drawing craft / GP3 → grease-pencil
• 3D set build → environment
• If the user wants the whole film from a sentence → bakg-orchestrator

Examples

• 90s short: write 8–12 beats, board, animatic to temp music, lock, then 3D.
• Rainy city world bible: climate rain, palette desat blue-green, magic = crystals only at night (limit), visual consequences: cloaks, wet cobbles, reflections, warm windows.

Required Knowledge / Context

• knowledge/domains/ch01-preproduction.md
• knowledge/depth/ch38-story-board-animatic.md
• knowledge/depth/ch27-worldbuilding.md
• knowledge/system/01-production-journey.md

References to Shared Resources

• templates/world-bible.md
• templates/shot-record.md
• checklists/preproduction-handoff.md
• workflows/34-stage-journey.md