Pre-rendered backgrounds for games

Support Lighting and Rendering
#1

Hi, I’ve been making a few simple scenes for a pre-rendered background style game, a la Resident Evil 1/2/3

http://i.imgur.com/fEkD2P5.png
fEkD2P5.png647×730
for example

The only problem I am having is the camera position and settings (using cycles). I cannot ever fit what I want into the shot. I was wondering if anyone more experience could give me some advice on lens settings and camera positioning which could give me similar results to the above. I’m assuming sensor and focal length are what I should edit?

I find I have to place my camera behind walls out of the scene to get what I want in, especially If I want to use a 16:9 resolution (I’m happy using 4:3 ones though), and changing the lens settings too much ruins the look.

#2

I’m not sure what your process is right now, but a good way to go about it is to build your sets for the shots, rather than trying to place the camera after building the room. Start with sketches of what you want each shot to look like (even if it’s just a quick doodle with blobs for the objects), and then place the camera and block out your set with simple shapes, so you can make sure everything fits and is lined up right before you finalize anything. The strongest advantage of a fixed camera position is the amount of control you have over composition, so it’s in your best interest to take advantage of that.

#3

That is good advice, will follow for the future parts of the world I create. Thanks. I’ve started using the collision models as visible models to chose camera angles in game for now since a large part is the world is already made, easier when I can see the player walking round.

Do you reckon I’d be able to get a closer look to the above with blender-render, cycles, or either - just how I set it up?

Anyway thanks for the reply.