Hello Everyone, I hope your summer is going well!
Some time ago, I posted my beginning efforts in experimenting with UE5.3 and Linux Mint. I just wanted share my current progress so far:
Earlier this spring I went to my local parks to Photoscan many of the natural rock features. I did this with the confidence of ignorance - I used a zoom lens (17mm to 85mm) on a Canon 5D MKii. This is more of a workflow WIP than a definitive project. The lens was taped so that I didn’t change the focal length by accident during photo acquisition.
These were rough and quick captures anywhere from 20 to 75 images per asset.
The resulting files were imported into Meshroom and were combined and exported as .obj into Blender 4.4.3.
Cleanup took some time as I had to either rebuild mesh tears or slice away parts that were beyond saving.
Once cleanup was complete, I then had to reduce the face count/mesh size to make it a viable asset for Unreal. Most of the meshes ranged anywhere from 1 million to 2 million plus faces/vertices. I was able to bring them down to around 4K to 2K size using the Decimator Modifier in Blender.
After that, I had to export the mesh/model/assets into an .fbx format for UE 5.5.
It took some doing, but I got it to work after some trial and error.
So why go through all of that trouble and spend all of that time to photoscan items when I could have simply just downloaded something similar from FAB marketplace? Or use A.I.?
Because I want to create my own assets for my project and learn the process from top to bottom.
Next up? Combining assets and crafting the terrain for the level. Stay tuned.
Here is a close up pic of the UE5 avatar and an asset to show the base scale.
A brief update: Created a basic shape of a building concept in Blender from a rough sketch and imported it into the project (as an .fbx file). I will use this as a guide for building it within Unreal.
Hello and welcome back. I’ve been off the radar for quite sometime (life has a way of doing that), but I’m returning to this project. I’m cleaning up some additional photogrammetry captures that I made last year (more rocks, terrain). Also sketching out building exteriors for trim assets. Should have something to actually show in the next update. In addition, I’m still using UE 5.5 and Linux Mint 21.3. Behind the times I know but I cannot upgrade at the present moment for a variety of reasons. Right now, both are stable and they work for me.
For this update, I have blocked out a VERY ROUGH grey box WIP for the first level. This is the first section of a larger complex and is not complete. I have highlighted only one of three entry paths from the underground entrance. This particular path leads to the first floor. The flow goes as follows:
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The player enters the underground entrance at the front of the building and right away, the progress and sight line is interrupted by a lamp bearing support pillar that bisects the path. Do they travel left or right?
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Which either path they take, they are met with the back side of the hallway which now offers three choices- two on the right and one on the left. For this example, we will take the left.
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As the player approaches the left doorway, they can see an arch that takes that is part of a stairway (uncovered in this view)
4 and 5) Now, stepping beyond the arch, on the players right is the stairs leading up to the elevator shaft, which has an entrance on the opposite side of where the player is advancing, forcing them to continue into the larger space.
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Just beyond the elevator shaft on the right, the player gets a wider view of the first floor area and the skylights.
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A view towards the front of the entrance/ first floor from the far left corner (as the player advances from the stairs)
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A view from the second level/mezzanine far right corner, that provides an overwatch position view of the elevator.
This time I have made a trail from the doorway on the right in the entry hall (1) into the greater garage area (8).
The yellow trail indicates the player path if they decided to enter the right hand side doorway from within the underground entry hall.
1. This view is angled towards right hand side door if the player is centered in the underground passageway.
2. This is a head-on view of the right hand side doorway.
3. This is the view from within the transition space (i.e. short hallway) between the door and the staging area.
4. This the view from within the staging area proper. The proxy roof only lets in a band of light around the space which will help set atmosphere before the player enters the brighter garage beyond.
5. This view is from the center of the staging area but looking back at the staging office area which also leads into the garage.
6. The view from the center of the staging area into the garage proper. Note the open areas forward and on the right hand sides which are brightly lit.
7. View from inside the garage and note the access doors on the left hand side.
8. Further into the garage towards the support columns.
