Inside Star Citizen: Editorial Territorial | Summer 2021

Transcript — every row opens the video at that moment

1. 00:00:00

   Hi all, me again. As we continue our journey towards Digital CitizenCon on October 9th with the juiciest updates being saved to hit you all at once like a MOAB from a Hercules A2, we're once again taking the opportunity provided to us here at ISC to learn more about the people here at CIG outside of the normal design, art, and programming disciplines. And this week, we turn the camera inward and learn about the person who's shepherded ATV and ISC through the highs and lows since 2015. Yes, the one person who manages to to pull it all together week after week and does so with an infectious energy loved by everyone that works with him. So, sit back, relax, grab a beverage, and enjoy our next origin story.

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   All right, then that was me and people want to see how these videos get edited. Well, it starts with a brief from marketing or production. Cut in that epic game play footage. Choose the music. And we all know the title. So, I grew up in this small town where nothing ever really happened. And if you didn't want to be in sports or you didn't want to be a doctor, a firefighter, or police officer, there really wasn't anything for you. And I think that's what led me to movies, to plays, to books. It was a way for me to escape. And I still remember when my mom bought me Jurassic Park. I'm Costa Rican, so I thought this was real. This took place

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   off the Gulf of Costa Rica. These people sent this video because they need help. And shame on my parents for letting me think that for so long. But it wasn't until they bought me the making of Jurassic Park that I realized people did this for a living. And it was in that moment that I realized there was nothing else for me. Did I think it was going to lead me to games? No. But, that's the great thing about my job is you really get to live so many different lifetimes. I still remember to this day when I got this job at Cloud Imperium. The first person I met was Chris Roberts. He was coming out of the office over at 3rd Street Promenade in LA. And I was like, "Hey Chris." And I'd known Chris from his film background, but never a game background. So, it kind of was this moment of just like, "That was cool."

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   And then I get into this conference room. It has Ben, Alexis, Jared, and a bunch of the other video production team at that time. And I was feeling pretty confident, you know? So, I I headed out and I will never forget Jared chasing after me out the door, waving me down like your favorite rom-com movie. I You probably tell this story differently, but I remember. He chased me down. He's like, "Hey, watch ATV episode 54 and I will call you tomorrow." Could have been 45. I don't know. It was a long time ago. And it was in that moment that I was like, "Ah, I got this." Uh let's see. Justin, what's going on with you? How was How was editing a brand new ATV? I feel like I learned how we used to do it and then we changed everything. So,

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   it really does feel like day one all over again. Some of the more eagle-eyed viewers may have noticed that in our hangar lighting improvements, sneak peek, hangar was spelled hangar, not hangar. No, no. I'm I'm the captain of that ship. I have to take responsibility for the members of my crew. So, that was Justin's fault. A day in editorial is no joke. I can come to work and on Monday I'm a programmer and by Friday I'm a designer. I'll come in in the morning. I'll do the editorial kickoff. Amanda, what did you get up to last night? Uh I played some video games last night, so it was pretty fun. Ooh, nice. Ryan, what'd you get up to? I grilled up some burgers and dogs. alone has been being planned for months. You have Jill, Jared, they're looking at the road map, they're putting together

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   briefs on the best way to present these features to the community. And then once they go out and they get the interviews, they bring those into editorial. I saw they sent over the footage for ISC, Ryan, did you get that? Uh yeah, the footage is downloaded and I replied to the handover, and then I have the A segment project prep for you, Justin, and the B segment for Amanda. Okay, cool. Amanda, after I finish the A segment narrative, I'm going to hand that over to you cuz I'm going to move on to a trailer. Cool, and then I'll cut the B segment and then set an in-session on the calendar for Thursday before we sign off the narrative cut. And we find the story there. And then once we have the story, we're doing B-roll capture, music, to just present the feature to you guys in ISC in the best light. Then we have things like trailers, with Ship Showdown. So yeah, let's zoom into that section

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   right there where the graphic is. And yeah, is back and turn that off. You know what? Change this to Cool. And even things that are coming further down the pipeline, like the IE. I'm telling you we're going to have so much fun with Jax this year. But what I'm really excited about is CitizenCon, because the idea of doing something you've never done before, a completely digital event, and wrapping your head around how to just bring this epic convention to your living room is just what makes this job so awesome. It's amazing to kind of look back and

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   see how much the company has grown, but also how you've grown throughout the process. And when you've been somewhere for so long like I've been at Cloud Imperium, you can't help but change. Tyler's going to be the question reader. Go ahead. You want to try, Tyler? All right. Take over the show. The number one question I get asked is how to get into editing for games. And honestly, a lot of people focus their attention on the wrong things, in my opinion. They focus on the tips and tricks like jump cut your talent to edit what they're saying or for effect or the fade down, the fade up, or the wipe. You can learn all those things. What you can't learn is POV. That's point of view, and everybody has one. And if you

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   want to get into editing for games or filmmaking in general, you have to find yours, and you have to grow it. And the only way that's going to happen is by doing. So, my advice I give to anybody wanting to edit for video games or just edit in general is to cut. That's who we were talking about? Show's running long. Let's get to the sprint report. Last week, we showed you a look inside three of the new hospitals coming online for Alpha 3.15. And eagle-eyed viewers might have noticed a fourth snuck in there along with the upcoming space clinics. But the team in Montreal is also working on additional hospitals for other landing zones, such as this white box tour of Maria Pure of Heart in Loreville. And even in its early state, you can see

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    the influence of Loreville's architecture and severe style that's likely to set it just a little bit apart from its fellow facilities. You can see here a first look at its lobby and of the ward rooms further in. Now, as we've mentioned, hospitals are the forebearers of new player healing mechanics and all the changes they will bring to life in the persistent universe and the first major contribution from our expanding team in Montreal. And if you want to know even more about that team, be sure you check out last week's Star Citizen Live available now on YouTube for your first chance to meet several of the folks blending new locations and gameplay throughout the Stanton system and beyond. Work also continues concepting the shape

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    and style of hacking ports soon to be found throughout the persistent universe. Now, previous thoughts leaned heavily on the the squared foldout box you can see here, but the team wanted to see if they could make them maybe a little less intrusive and more compatible with the variety of areas one might find them in. So, this second round of work focused on a recessed design that can pop out of not just the wall, but any floor as well, opening up far more places that they can be found. The team is also exploring iconography that will help players identify these particular panels when on their travels, as well as further refining the variety of hacking chips players may need depending on the task at hand, complete with little carabiner hooks. Give me a key ring I can wear on my belt,

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    character team. Ultimately, hacking aims to provide more complexity and a variety of options in how they tackle a situation and we'll be learning more about the gameplay and how players will interact with these terminals next quarter. Up next, let's jump back to the Nyx system with a look at some of the flora being developed for the various services we showcased several weeks ago, starting with this agave succulent that's broken into smaller component stages starting with ground scatter to base plant and then flowering stock. Now, as with ships, this is the white box stage for these plants, used to validate proportions, silhouettes, and such things like potential variants. We also have these aloe plants, which

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    should come in super handy because of of the sunscreen you'll need. Because of the dying star. And that's Pyro. It's not Nyx. That joke doesn't make any sense. And Justin is clearly spending his time overseeing the edit of his own segment, or he would have cut this. Moving along, underneath those plants a sprint was recently completed on some of the new geology assets that will be sprinkled across the surface of Nyx 1, such as these smooth layered plateaus. What you're seeing here are several different class sizes from small to large straight out of the Houdini software suite. Now, once they're properly integrated in the game engine, systemic features like terrain color pickup and biome accumulation will alter the assets, further blending them into

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    whatever area of the planet we happen to find them There's also these sexy modeling shots here. I'm going to call this one Bam Bam. This one Barney Rubble. And you can be Fred Flintstone. You can complain, but these jokes are my bedrock. All right, let's move on up to a pterodactyl eye view and take a look at continuing development of Nyx 1 height maps. Now, for those of you familiar with the lore, this particular planetoid is supposed to be heavily mined for its valuable resources. So, the environment team began creating additional height maps for some of the the older, more heavily affected areas throughout its history. Now, these are first pass explorations in Substance Designer, but they'll continue to evolve before eventually being incorporated in a some of those amazing ones you saw in

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    previous weeks. Moving along to ship and vehicle updates, the Drake Vulture continues to progress through its white box stage with these early looks at the upcoming salvage ship. And in vehicle interfaces, let's check out these updated concepts for a potential Drake specific heads-up display. Now, there are multiple artists making multiple pitches, and this is just one of them. But the group responded pretty well to the overall aesthetic shown here, and it reminded several folks of old Russian military helicopters. Whether this or a different concept goes forward remains to be seen, but it's always exciting to peek behind the curtain and see what's going on in the land of user interfaces. And then, of course, we're heading into

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    the biggest ship event of the year, and preparations are already underway for the Intergalactic Aerospace Expo 2951 with these looks at potential logos for this year's event. I like the one with the swoosh. Finally, before we let you go, we have two Crusader based updates to share this week. The first being the continuing development of atmospheric pressure damage for vehicles and people. You can see here the basics of the system at play. As the player character moves forward, the pressure increases. And then, the same here with vehicles. Now, these are just the designer effects at the moment, but now that it's working, it'll move to VFX in a few weeks when they have schedule before making its way into the persistent

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    universe proper. And lastly, because it's been too long since I previously mentioned space whales, the character team has been exploring these these micro concepts, exploring what gameplay might look like for players when the mighty Stormwalls make their way to the clouds across Crusader. So, what did we learn this week? Well, we learned that Drake is well on its way to making a big splash with its new salvage ship and fancy UI. That new career opportunities are coming for those who who want to work space with a lot of fresh air and squishy whale blubber under their feet. And that I've worked with Justin Chambers for 6 years, and if I'm lucky, I've got another 6 years ahead of us. So, don't forget the first round of ship showdown is happening right now. Check out the robertsspaceindustries.com

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    website for details, as well as the the next iteration of XenoThreat. It's happening right now in the persistent universe. So, jump in there and give those jerks from Pyro the business. For Inside Star Citizen, I'm Jared Huckaby. We'll see you all next week.