I’m encountering a strange halo artifact around my character when rendering using Path Tracing with Lumen. This halo is not visible when playing the sequence directly in the editor viewport.
This screenshot shows the halo artifact in the rendered output. It appears that the background isn’t blurring correctly around the character in the render.
I’m wondering if this might be a specific interaction between Lumen and Path Tracing during rendering, or perhaps a sequencer rendering setting I’m overlooking.
Any insights or suggestions on how to eliminate this halo artifact would be greatly appreciated.
There is a bug in 5.5 that presents this way. Can you disable Alpha Output in the project prefs and see if it goes away? Its since been fixed but I have lost track if its out in a hotfix yet.
To further test, I rendered the character alone and the background separately. In After Effects, I attempted to composite them using a Z-depth luma matte to create a clean edge. Unfortunately, even with this technique, I’m still seeing a dark halo around the character. This strongly suggests that the problem is indeed rooted in the character’s material.
Now, I just need to figure out what’s wrong with the material.
Update: The halo issue is visible not only in renders but also in the viewport. I’ve updated to UE 5.5, but the problem persists. I’ve also contacted the asset creator, who reports that the materials appear normal on their end.
I don’t try and put a simple/default material and see what happens. If it is the material I would go in there and start detaching things until you can single it out. My guess is WPO or something.
