BA7 | Concept and Pre-Production #21

UDK Basics, Environment Effects, Lighting and Viewport Options (Tutorial)

To continue my practical studies for pipeline and workflow towards BA8 I am going through a tutorial list that covers the fundamentals of UDK. I chose the tutorial because it featured creating fog in an environment and how to set it up but I figured it would be best to try and follow as much of the tutorial as possible to expand my UDK knowledge.  I plan to take notes and try to reproduce elements to the best of my ability as I go along, documenting what I learn through notes, screen shots and practical studies. 

 

By selecting VIEW > BROWSER WINDOWS > SCENE I can view a window that documents the various attributes within my scene. This screen shot shows s the scene attributes from a newly created scene, the actors, lights and volumes are pre loaded into this default scene as the window shows. 

1. DefaultPhysicsVolume: this is the default actor that creates basic physics within the level so that objects with advanced physics like collisions, particles and animations can be used. 

2. DominantDirectionalLight: this is the actor that basically acts like the sun, it simulates natural sunlight into your scene (if you have a daytime scene open, if you open the night scene it will mimic moon light). 

3. ExponentialHieghtFog: this is a type of height fog that can be used in UDK. Depending on the attributes, the height fog can cover an entire level, change in density and be manually manipulated. 

4. Lightmassimpirtancevolume: this is an area that directs UDK to increase the quality of lighting for. It means that areas can have less light quality thus reducing the build times for un-playable areas and can also decrease build time by not rendering out high quality lighting on distant objects. 

5. Playerstart: This tells UDK where the player will spawn into the level and begin playing. 

6. Static mesh ground/box. 

7. Static mesh ground/box.

Using the content browser in UDK, I set up a basic scene of tree’s similar to the one in the tutorial. 

 

I then opened up the DominantDirectionalLight so that I could edit the light in the scene. I did this by selecting the “LIGHT” tab > Light Component and then opened the Light component and Light shaft options. 

 

As you can see, I was able to edit the colour of the directional light so that it altered the overall ambience of the scene. 

Under Light Shafts I am given the option to alter the directional light ray colours.

 

Next thing to practice is adding lights to the environment and editing how they manipulate assets and shadows within the level. To do this I used a shortcut where I held down the “L” key and clicked anywhere in the UDK viewport. This created a light in my scene which I was able to move into position. In this case I moved it to the woodland tree area. I could have also built a light by using the Actor Classes tab (VIEW > BROWSER WINDOW > ACTOR CLASSES) and opening the LIGHTS TAB and then SPOTLIGHTS. You can simply drag the spotlight into the scene. 

 

These lights work the same way as in Maya. SPOTLIGHTS illuminate an area in a rotatable cone, POINT LIGHTS illuminate an area around the light. I was able to RIGHT CLICK > LIGHT PROPERTIES to open the attributes to the spotlight. From here I was able to edit the colour to suit the scene. 

 Okay so now its time for the fog part of the tutorial which covers the fogs I have mentioned previously so I will finally be able to give them a practical study in UDK. UDK offers various fog options which can be accessed from the ACTOR CLASSES tab. 

The scene comes pre loaded with an ExponentialHieghtFog. According to the tutorial, the fog is “slightly more expensive than regular height fog but is still the preferred choice for most people”. 

Exponential height fog relies on the dominant directional light, AKA the sun, and its position. It renders two separate colours of fog which blend in the middle where the light is cast. One colour is called “LIGHT INCATTERING COLOUR” and this comes from the direction of the sun, the other is called “OPPOSITE LIGHT COLOUR” and it comes from…well, the opposite direction :P 

For my practical study I am going to follow the settings given to me in the tutorial. I RIGHT CLICK > SELECT EXPONENTIAL HEIGHT FOG PROPERTIES to bring up the attributes that I can manipulate. I immediately bump up the FOG DENSITY to 2.000000 which changes the environment drastically, it is now encased in a thick fog. I am also able to change the colour of the fog by selecting the OPPOSITE LIGHT COLOUR and LIGHT INSCATTERING COLOUR

 

Fog Density: How thick the fog appears in the environment.

Fog Height Falloff: Controls how thick the fogs appears the lower to the ground

you are (and thinner the higher you are).

Fog Opacity: The distance from the camera that the fog will begin. 

Im going to stop the tutorial now because fog was the main thing I wanted to try. The tutorial goes onto discussing LightVolumes and Lightmaps which aren’t what I am studying currently. I fiddled around with the fog settings to finish the practical study and I really like the outcome. I added some more set pieces in from the content browser. 

 

I thought I would try and recreate something along the lines of a creepy abandoned jungle so that the environment kept inline with my project. I am really happy with what I have created in this practical study and Im glad I have learnt how to use height fog. Here are some screens showing the final  outcome.

I did alter some of the settings along the way for the directional light, spot light, height fog an and terrain materials so if the images change that is why but these are t ones that I consistently liked most :D