My journey becoming a Unity game developer: Game Over Cutscene-Cinematic cut & Dolly Track setup

Objective: Create a cut between the Full Shot and Overhead Shot. Plus, create a Dolly Track and position it to go around the security guard.

Dolly Track positioned with the Full Shot camera setup.

Start by clicking on the Game Over Cutscene and drag the Main Camera down to the Timeline. When the menu pops up, select Add Cinemachine Track. Because the Cinemachine Brain is attached to the Main Camera, we don’t need to create one to use in Timeline.

Added Cinemachine Track with the Cinemachine Brain attached to the Main Camera.

Right-click in the empty slot next to the Main Camera in Timeline, and select Add Cinemachine Slot. In the Inspector come down to Virtual Camera under Cinemachine Shot, then drag the CM Full Shot virtual camera into its slot.

Back in the Timeline, place the Timeline pointer to the position where Darren’s hands are about to touch his head. Once it’s set we need to drag the CM Full Shot camera’s endpoint to that position in the Timeline.

Cinemachine Shot created with Full Shot camera added to Virtual Camera.

Right-click next to CM Full Shot in Timeline and create another Cinemachine Shot. Drag the CM Overhead Shot into the Virtual Camera slot under Cinemachine Shot component in the Inspector. This time we need to drag the CM Overhead Shot endpoint the length of the Captured Animation ending. If we scrub the Timeline or press Play in the editor, we should see the animation play with the virtual cameras settings applied.

Cinemachine Overhead shot created to complete the cutcscene.

The Director’s notes wants us to track around the security guard, and track toward the ceiling as the game fades to black. To do this we will use a Dolly Track. The Dolly Track is basically a set of waypoints creating a path to track an object through an fixed course to position or animate a virtual camera.

Director’s notes wanting the 2 scenes to be tracked.

Click on Cinemachine from the menu, then select Create Dolly Camera with Track. Since we already have cameras setup, we can delete the virtual camera that comes with the Dolly Track. Also, make sure the Transform positions and rotations are set to zero. Change the name of the game object to Dolly Track. Then place the Dolly Track inside the Game Over Cutscene object.

Dolly Track created for the Game Over Cutscene.

According to the Director’s notes we must have the camera pan from behind the 1st security guard’s position. Therefore, we need to position waypoint 0 to be behind the guard and off to the left of the guard. Find the Dolly Track using “F” for focus to find it in the Scene View. Place the Dolly Track behind the guard. Make sure the Dolly Track is on the floor, and use the arrows to adjust the length of the track.

Dolly Track moved into the starting position for the Full Shot.

In the Inspector under Waypoints, click the “+” to create another waypoint. Use the arrows to bend the Dolly Track around the guard until it reaches almost across from Darren.

Dolly Track positioned to pan around the guard.

Click on CM Full Shot and head over to the Body setting. Change its setting to Tracked Dolly, then drag the Dolly Track into the Path slot.

Dolly Track added to the Full Shot virtual camera.

Finally, we can click on Solo under Status: Live and use the waypoint’s element numbers to see the virtual camera positions on the track.

Going through each waypoint camera’s view.

Once we animate the virtual cameras using the Dolly Track, we will get cinematic shots that will make the scene more dramatic.