When you’re acting out a scene that’s meant to be outdoors, using a scenic backdrop is a great way to help bring the outside scenery into the theater. There are an endless number of layouts you could make, but first of all, you need to think about what your game really needs. There’s no point in having a forest as a backdrop if your work never goes near a forest, right? You have to think about what your game needs and what would go well.
Colors are very important here as they will decide what kind of atmosphere your game will be rendered in. Lots of gray and black and people will start to assume the play is going to be dark and gloomy, lots of bright colors, and people are going to think it’s going to be a fun and creative production.
You have to think about the real image you want to have. If your work takes place inside an abandoned house, could you have an image of the house and its surroundings? Or maybe you want to have your backdrop just like inside the real house. Or maybe you want the house to not even be in sight, but merely a speck on the horizon. The possibilities are endless and it’s up to you to decide what to do with them. If your production takes place next to a lake, design a beautiful lake as a scenic backdrop.
Think of nature. Things like grass and flowers, even wild cows and horses. Will they appear in your backdrop? Could you use the weather to enhance your scenic backdrop? Could you have a snowy background? Or maybe a cold spring day with leaves scattered on the ground. The actual possibilities of the image are limitless and you can do whatever you want.
Think about how your backdrop will look in terms of contrast. When you’re rendering the weather in a background, it’s easy to mess up the colors a bit and make things brighter than they should be. When you’re making your backdrop, make sure you take regular breaks to look at what you’ve done so far and make sure you’re happy with it. Get a second opinion. Is your cast happy with him? Sound engineers, even cleaners, get everyone’s opinion.
As you can see, there’s a lot to think about when building a scenic backdrop, but the most important thing to remember is to make sure it’s relevant to your production. Use whatever image you think will look good, try it out, if it doesn’t work out you can always get rid of it. Do some research on your game; make sure you know what area is being acted upon so you can apply the relevant backdrop. And finally make sure you don’t overcrowd it. Too little rather than too much is better, because you can always add more if you need to.