Ahh finals are here!
Over the last few weeks, the class has been working on a feature film all together. We were tasked with creating a story based on a series of prompts by using two words per classmate. The main goal of this project was to be able to use a VPN and SVN and work collaboratively on one single project file.
Working on one file was a unique experience to say the least. It stressed the importance of good file management, communication, and learning how to work with one another. I would say I tried my best to stick to one file structuring format but messed up a few things along the way. I realized I should’ve placed more assets in the designated areas v. creating my own folder structures.
Using the SVN was fun at times, and other… it was also a pain! I will say I did have a few issues on my end with using it and messed a few things up along the way. It’s all part of the process learning from your mistakes and seeing how delicate you need to approach the SVN. One of the other things that did not make it difficult but certainly took some adjusting was learning to commit assets earlier in smaller increments.
We started by creating our story through Miro and dragged different words each classmate came up with to a centralized board. From there we were able to create mood boards and aesthetic choices and think about the assets we need in order to complete this project. Each classmate had 4 tasks to complete in order to work on this project. We were able to choose what we wanted to work on and given full reign.
The Story
The Tasks
After our class came up with the story, we started brainstorming on who was going to do what. I have been most interested in creating Levels in Unreal, sound effects, mo-cap, creating particle systems with Niagara, creating blueprints and materials. So, I stuck with that as my main contribution to this project. I learned a ton being able to work on all the different parts of the project. I love creating levels that is by far my favorite thing to do in Unreal. There is nothing better than getting lost in a huge world and creating something from nothing.
Level
My role for this project was creating two levels but instead I combined both levels into one. The two levels are as follows: Intergalactic space and Earth’s atmosphere.
I thought it was important to be able to add the transition from Earth to space in order to create less work for the directors but also show them how we should interact with the world.
I started the level as an empty level with nothing inside it. I then added a model of a sphere into the engine and scaled the sphere as big as Unreal Engine would allow me to. (I think it was 1,500,000). This sphere would act as our Earth. From there I was able to create Earth materials and animated the materials to make it look like the clouds were moving. Creating the Earth materials allowed me to understand the basic of creating materials and adding different textures and setting parameters.
After I was able to add earth, I then couldn’t resist by adding the rest of the galaxy. I added another sphere and made it as big again as Unreal would allow me and that sphere would act as our skybox. The skybox has an animated material of a nebula that animates in the background. I then tried creating my own static mesh hierarchal instance blueprint for the asteroids. I spent a day or so on creating the Blueprint and that includes troubleshooting but was not able to to get it fully to work unfortunately.
In this blueprint I created a series of different types of variables. Some intgers, floats, cull, and a few more.
The first series of images is the Asteroid Transform Custom Script
The next part of the blueprint I started working on was the event graph.
The final part was the construction script which contained all the information from the asteroid transformation script.
Since this blueprint failed and couldn't figures out what wasn’t working Todd sent me a BP that has an asteroid ring.
The next part was creating the landscapes on Earth. Showing the transition from Earth to outter space making it seamless as possible. I added a landscape and zeroed out the values to the landscape so it would sit inside the sphere. Once the landscape was inside the sphere I started adding static meshes and the scuplting began.
I created the scene using a series of different techniques. I took static mesh assets from the marketplace, Quixel bridge, TurboSquid and CGtrader.
I created a landscape using the sculpting tool and applied a general material as a base. Once the base was done, I added some small hills and sculpting around the land mass. Additionally, I used the foliage tool to spread plants and trees around the level. By utilizing the foliage tool, it made life a lot easier in terms of blocking things out.
Above is the atmosphere shot.
Niagara Effects
For space I created a quick Niagara affect to fake a weird galaxy effect. I duplicated the effect twice and set different particle sizes and parameters in order to create the effect.
The other Niagara two systems I created was a wind tornado (unfinished) and tsunami pushing debris around.
Audio
I added a series of tracks for opening credits and add SFX options too. I added the whole playlist for opening credits from here:
ABANDONED MUSIC | humanrobotsoul
I also added a bunch of SFX options too:
- electric glitches
- fire and explosions
- people noise for crowds or individuals
- Space engine noises
- Wind Atomsphere
- Waves
Conclusion
I learned a ton about the kin
