I just spent 3 hours trying to understand how to build a very basic cubemap from 6 pictures I have and was unable to progress at all. Unreal proposes 2 tools to create the dds files that only work on Windows and I am on Mac. I manually created a TIF file with my 6 images next to each other and imported it in UE. What’s next to bring this TIF in a CubeMap ? Thanks
Once you’ve made the HDR, it’s a piece of cake now:
Just enable the plugin, restart, drag the HDR actor into your level and point it at your cubemap 
Thanks, I could install the HDRI Backdrop, but my problem remains: How to create a cubemap that I can then assign to the backdrop ?
How you actually make an HDR is external to UE, you can’t do it in the engine.
As far as I know there’s a plenty of tools, but I’ve never done it. Photoshop for one…
Making or finding an HDRI image is not the issue. However I have the impression that UE4 can only make cubemaps from DDS-format files (my HDRI are JPG), and I couldn’t find a way to generate DDS files from Mac.
I just checked some HDRs I purchased, they’re all JPG. I just import them and point the plugin at it.
equirectangular hdri jpegs can be mapped directly onto an inverted sphere
look at the bkd here, its an equirectangular 360 jpg mapped on a sphere.
actual cubemaps are something else, I don’t hink there is a tool to auto create them, except an online one, but they basically can be made like this image using pshop, then they are mapped, each face, to an inverted cube.
I prefer equirecangular images as these are what you get in an hdr jpg.
as well, with cubemaps you have a lot of dead space in the texture taking up your ram with blank pixels.
UE actually uses HDRs now, not the same thing as cubemaps. Even though they call them cubemaps.
You can make your own HDR in the editor using a cube render target.
any scene you can make in blender or Unreal can be captured to an equirectangular 360 by using cycles 360 camera lens or unreal’s panoramic capture tool
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