Lighting Workshop Part 3: Interior/Exterior Environment

Final Exterior Environment shot with Old Cannon and props taken from Megascans, lit in Unreal Engine

Final Interior Shot with Old Cannon and props taken from Mega Scans, lit in Unreal Engine

Exterior Lights Breakdown:

Directional Light used as Key

environment sky mixer, used for bounce light

Rim 01

Rim 02

Interior Light Breakdown:

Key Light, with temperature

Rim 01

Lighting Workshop: Dramatic Outdoor Environment Scene

 

I used this workshop to focus on creating dramatic outdoor shadows with environment fog and directional lights. Lighting set up in Unreal Engine using HDRI backdrop, simulated atmosphere, and a 3 point light set up.

Models from Quixels Megascans

How I achieved the in-camera sun glow effect with a rectangle light and directional fog.

Lighting Workshop: 3 Point Lighting

        3 Point Lighting Set Up Created in Unreal Engine as part of a lighting exercise. The Lights were created first in White Light only, then separated by color assignments: Red for Key Light, Green for Fill Light, and Blue for Rim Light. 

3 Point Lighting Set Up for Le Transi De Rene De Chalon

Model provided by threedscans

    A separate 3 Point Lighting set up was created for the second model, which was lit with the same method as the first; a key, fill, and rim light in white and then in color. Again, Red for Key Light, Green for Fill, and Blue for Rim Light.

3 Point Light Set up for Glykon

Model provided by threedscans

 

2023 Animation Reel

    This reel compiles all the best animation work from my first semester at FIEA, which includes some walk cycle practice (both biped and quadruped) and my first attempts at creating animation state machines in unity and unreal.

 

Stranger Things: Final Week Animation Updates and General Project Polish

 

    Week 5 of this project ended up being thanksgiving break, so the blog posts go straight to the final week of updates, starting with our Interactive Character animation.

    The final model came in; since the model's dimensions had shifted some, the rig was adjusted to compensate, meaning the animation clips were bent slightly out of proportion in the original maya file shown above.

    Luckily, this was easily remedied using Unreal's IK retargeting system, most of which was done by our tech artist Cal. With a couple of tweaks on the IK solvers and joint offsets in the new animation files, the new model was able to run on the original animation clips and the longer extended fingers no longer clip into the legs.

Updated Animation Blueprint with new Preview Mesh

Pls Mute This Audio I didn't realize it was recording me

IK Retargeting Solver with source and target meshes

    With the animation officially complete and working in engine, I was free to make some polishing edits and assist the others with their final touch- ups, which included some texture/material troubleshooting, perforce being picky with source files, and final lighting/shadow adjustments. Mostly, I was responsible for timing the background music of the level and adding sound effects to the demogorgon when specific animations are triggered.

Simulation of VR Environment in Engine

Pls Also Mute This Audio I didn't realize it was recording me

    Overall, I think we really excelled as a team this week and our project turned out incredible. Despite all the high learning curves and setbacks this was a very rewarding experience, and I can't wait to show it off to everyone tomorrow.

    Shoutout to the rest of my excellent team for all your hard work!

        3D Eleven Hands and Demogorgon Models + Textures: Tristan Spear

        3D Environmental Assets + Textures, Lighting, Nav Mesh Assistance: Haley Kroppman

        Blueprint Implementation, Lighting, Perforce Directory Operations, Environmental VFX: Haoyu Wu

        Blueprint Implementation, Rigging + Skinning, Quality Assurance, Bug Testing: Cal Wohnoutka

Perforce Documentation

Stranger Things Week 04: Interactive Character Animation

 

    In week 4 of the VR Project, the Demogorgon, our interactive character, was ready for its first pass of animation. The Demogorgon is currently animated to idle when the player is not nearby, aware when the character approaches, attack when the player gets too close, and hurt when the player throws objects and hits the Demogorgon's inner trigger box.

    The animation was then taken into a new ABP for the demogorgon and set up into a state machine that moves between the states of awareness.

Perforce Documentation

Stranger Things VR Project: Week 03 Hand Animation Update

    For week 3 of the VR Project, the skeleton and mesh of the hand changed significantly enough that the animation had to be redone in maya. Using the same animation layer process as last week, the animation was easy to update in a few hours (4). 

    The animations were then brought in to replace the old clips, and in the Class Settings of the ABP, changed the ABP's skeleton to the Final Skeleton update. Additionally, the Grab animation for non-snap objects was replaced in favor of the Psychic Idle animation, where now Eleven can use her psychic power to levitate objects a few inches away from her hand. Next week, the hands will be able to interact with the character: Eleven will use her power to harm the demogorgon proxy. 

Perforce Documentation