trailer-shot

trailer-shot — Loud, Confident, 5-10 Seconds of Punch

A trailer shot is not a cutscene and not a loop. It is a single, deliberately-composed beat designed to live inside an edit — Steam capsule video, social cut, pitch-deck reel, Discord teaser, Twitter promo. Every shot has to earn its slot in 5 seconds or less because viewer attention drops past that. This skill produces those shots one at a time, with strong composition references and trailer-grade prompting, then hands the user off to a non-linear editor (DaVinci Resolve, Premiere, CapCut) to chain them. Studio doesn't ship a video editor — generation is the part this skill owns; the cutting is yours.

If the user is generating a non-interactive narrative beat with dialogue, that's video/cinematic-cutscene. If they want a seamless background loop for a splash screen, that's video/animated-loop. This skill is for the punchy stuff — the kind of shot that ends up on the Steam page or in the first 10 seconds of a launch trailer.

When to use

• "Generate a slow-mo combat shot for the trailer."
• "I need a hero shot of the boss for the Steam capsule."
• "Dramatic establishing shot of the kingdom for the pitch deck."
• "Make a splash-screen video for the title menu."
• "Some B-roll of the swamp environment."
• "Money shot — wide low-angle of the dragon roaring at sunset."

When NOT to use

• Multi-shot story sequence with dialogue — video/cinematic-cutscene.
• Seamless looping background — video/animated-loop.
• Static marketing key art — 2d-assets/concept-art then 2d-assets/character-portrait.
• Animated GIF of UI — that's a screen recording, not a generated video.
• A literal Steam trailer (the assembled cut) — generate the shots here, then take them to your NLE.

Steps

1. Pick the shot

Trailer shots fall into a small number of archetypes. Pick one before prompting:

Archetype	Composition	When
Hero close-up	Tight on the protagonist or boss, low angle	Reveal a character
Slow-mo combat	Mid shot, time dilation, frozen impact	Action sells
Establishing wide	Wide landscape, slow dolly-in	Sell a world
Dolly-in on detail	Push toward a key prop or face	Build tension
Whip pan reveal	Fast pan, lands on a beat	Reveal a turn
Low-angle hero	Looking up at the subject, sky framing	Make the subject feel large
Splash card	Static composition, atmospheric motion only	Title cards, logos

State the archetype and composition out loud before generating: "I'll do a low-angle hero shot of the boss, slow tilt-up, golden hour. OK?"

2. Lock the look with a reference image (when subject identity matters)

For shots featuring a specific character, weapon, or environment, generate a reference still first and pass it as imageUrl. Without it, the boss in your trailer looks different from the boss in the game.

summer_generate_image(
  prompt="<subject>, <archetype-driven framing>, cinematic, dramatic lighting, film still",
  model="nano-banana-2",
  options={ image_size: "landscape_16_9" }
)

For pure environment / abstract / VFX shots, you can skip this and prompt text-to-video directly.

3. Pick the model

Model	Cost	Speed	When
kling	~$0.50	2-4 min	Default for trailer hero shots — best motion + composition
kling-turbo	~$0.30	1-2 min	Same look as kling, faster, slight quality dip
veo3	~$1.00	3-5 min	Pitch deck for investors, the one shot that has to be perfect, premium social ad
ltx	~$0.10	~30s	B-roll, throwaway tests, blocking the composition before committing
minimax	~$0.40	2-3 min	Anime / stylized trailer looks

Default: ltx first to block the composition, then kling for the final. For the one hero shot that drives the Steam page, escalate to veo3 only if kling failed twice.

4. Generate the shot

summer_generate_video(
  prompt="<archetype framing>, <subject>, <action>, <camera move>, <lighting>, <film grain / lens / stylistic anchor>",
  model="kling",
  imageUrl="<optional reference URL from step 2>",
  duration=5,
  aspectRatio="16:9"
)

For vertical social (TikTok, Reels, Shorts): aspectRatio="9:16" and frame the subject vertically in your reference image.

For square (Instagram feed): aspectRatio="1:1".

5. Review against trailer logic

Show the user the result and ask the trailer-specific questions:

Shot delivered. Three checks:

1. Does it read in 2 seconds with the sound off? (Trailer viewers are scrubbing.)
2. Is the subject in the frame's golden zone or buried in noise?
3. Would this shot survive being preceded by a hard cut and followed by a hard cut?

Land or regenerate?

If "regenerate", revise one axis (camera move, lighting, or framing) — don't rewrite the whole prompt. Iteration converges.

6. Import for archive (optional)

Trailer footage usually lives on the user's local disk and goes straight into the NLE. But for shots that double as in-engine splash content, import:

summer_import_from_url(url="<fileUrl>", path="assets/video/trailers/hero_boss_reveal.mp4")

For pure trailer use (DaVinci / Premiere), the user can grab the fileUrl and download directly.

7. Hand off to the NLE

Studio does not ship a video editor. After all the shots land, tell the user:

All 6 shots are at these URLs. Studio doesn't cut video. Drop these into DaVinci Resolve (free), Premiere, or CapCut. Recommended order based on what we generated:

1. Establishing wide (cold open)
2. Hero close-up (subject reveal) 3-5. Action beats (slow-mo combat, environmental destruction)
3. Money shot (low-angle hero, ends on logo card)

Score it with the music from audio/music-track. Add SFX hits on the cuts with audio/sound-effect.

Reference card — prompts that work

Pattern: <archetype framing> + <subject> + <action verb> + <camera move> + <lighting / time of day> + <stylistic anchor>. Keep under 50 words. Anchor with a reference image whenever a specific character or asset appears.

Goal	Model	Prompt	Cost	Duration
Hero boss reveal	kling	low-angle hero shot of an armored dragon turning toward camera, slow tilt-up, volcanic backlight, embers in air, cinematic, anamorphic flare, 16mm grain	$0.50	5s
Slow-mo combat impact	kling	mid shot of a swordsman striking a parry, sparks fly, time-dilation slow motion, dust and motion blur, dramatic side-light, cinematic	$0.50	5s
Establishing kingdom wide	kling	wide aerial of a clifftop fortress at golden hour, slow dolly forward, low sun raking the towers, cinematic, anamorphic, faint heat haze	$0.50	5s
Splash screen card	kling	static composition of a lone hooded figure on a windswept ridge, only the cloak and grass moving, dusk, painterly cinematic, room for title text upper third	$0.50	5s
Whip pan reveal	kling	whip pan from left to right across a battlefield at night, lands on the protagonist standing alone among bodies, torches flickering, cinematic	$0.50	5s
Detail dolly-in	kling	slow dolly-in on a glowing rune-etched sword embedded in stone, motes of magic rising, blue-cold key light, shallow depth of field, cinematic	$0.50	5s
Vertical social hero	kling	vertical close-up of a young witch raising hands, magical wind, hair flowing, candle-warm key, cinematic, framed for 9:16	$0.50	5s
Pitch-deck premium shot	veo3	wide cinematic of a fleet of airships emerging through cloud cover at dawn, slow truck forward, golden god-rays, soaring orchestral cinematic	$1.00	5s
Cheap B-roll iteration	ltx	mid shot of a knight walking through fog, slow truck backward, dawn light, cinematic	$0.10	5s
Anime style hero	minimax	anime-style hero girl draws a katana in slow motion, sakura petals swirling, dramatic side-light, dynamic camera, Ghibli painterly	$0.40	5s

Bad prompts and why

Bad	Why it fails
epic trailer shot of the boss	No framing, no action, no camera. Returns a generic montage.
the camera flies through the entire battlefield, sees the king, then the dragon, then the hero	Three shots in one prompt. The model picks one badly. Generate three shots.
cool cinematic with lots of explosions and combat	Adjective stew. Pick one beat: "wide shot of a barricade exploding, debris arc into camera, slow-mo, side-lit".
realistic 4k 60fps trending on artstation	Trash modifiers. The model knows "cinematic" already; the rest is noise.
the dragon roars at the hero and the hero strikes back	Two characters interacting reliably fails — the model loses identity on the second one. Generate them in separate shots and intercut.

Anti-patterns

• Trying to chain shots inside one video generation. Each clip is one beat. The cut between shots is the editor's job, not the model's. A 10s prompt with three actions returns mush.
• Skipping the reference image for the hero shot. The boss in the Steam capsule must look like the boss in the game. Always lock identity with imageUrl.
• Using veo3 for B-roll. Burn $0.10 on ltx for blocking and B-roll; reserve veo3 for the one shot that has to be perfect.
• Generating shots without composing the trailer first. Make a 6-shot list before generating shot 1. Otherwise you'll generate shots that don't intercut.
• Using aspectRatio="16:9" for vertical social. TikTok / Reels / Shorts are 9:16. Pillarboxed 16:9 reads as a desktop YouTube embed and gets demoted by the algorithm.
• Forgetting that Studio doesn't cut video. The user has to take the shots into an NLE. Tell them, don't pretend Studio can stitch.
• Asking for "the camera does X then Y then Z". Pick one camera move per shot.

Edge cases

• Steam capsule animated header (Steam asset). Steam wants .webm at 616x353 or 1920x1080, ≤6s, 30fps, no audio, ≤4MB. Generate at 16:9, transcode in DaVinci, export .webm with VP9. The video model gives you the source; format conversion is on you.
• Pitch deck for investors. One shot, veo3, money composition (low-angle hero or wide establishing). Worth the $1.00.
• Vertical for TikTok / Shorts. aspectRatio="9:16", reference image at portrait, frame the subject in the upper-middle so titles can sit at the bottom.
• Subject is a UGC environment the player built. Take a screenshot of the in-engine view, run it through summer_generate_image as referenceImageUrl to "upgrade" the look, then use that as the video reference. The model can stylize a screenshot; it can't invent the user's level.
• Logo splash with motion graphics. Generate a static logo card in summer_generate_image (or use the user's existing logo PNG), then prompt video as static composition of <logo>, only background particles drifting, cinematic, room for title text — keep the foreground motionless.

Fallback (no MCP)

If the Studio MCP server isn't running, route the user to the Studio web dashboard:

1. Image tab → generate the reference still.
2. Video tab → image-to-video with the reference URL, model kling, duration 5s, aspect ratio per platform.
3. Download the .mp4 directly into the user's editing project (DaVinci / Premiere / CapCut).

Print the exact prompt + model + duration + aspect ratio so the user can paste it into the dashboard verbatim.

Handoff

Once the shots are generated:

Generated 6 shots, ready for the cut. Next:

• Take them into DaVinci Resolve (free) or Premiere. Studio doesn't cut video.
• Score the trailer with audio/music-track — a 60-second trailer cue with a swell and a cold ending.
• Add hit SFX on the cuts with audio/sound-effect (impact whooshes between shots).
• For the title-card splash that ships in-engine, hand off to video/animated-loop with the established palette.
• For a narrative beat inside the trailer (a 10s "story" segment), hand off to video/cinematic-cutscene.

See also

• video/cinematic-cutscene — narrative beats with dialogue.
• video/animated-loop — seamless background clips for splash screens / title menus.
• audio/music-track — trailer score.
• audio/sound-effect — cut SFX (whooshes, impacts, stingers).
• 2d-assets/concept-art — generate the reference image axis when no asset exists yet.
• references/mcp-tools-reference.md — summer_generate_video parameter schema and error codes.