I want to have a camera that races around the level on a spline during game play, looping (even when not the focal point of game) that the user can access. When they press a button they can “possess” the camera wherever it is on that track and see what it sees and then tap the button again to get back to playable character.
How would I go about doing this?
Here is a good tutorial that has information about it: Unreal Engine 4: Let's Make a Camera Spline System - Greg Mladucky
It is a bit complex, but should give you an idea of what you will need.
Documentation on splines: https://docs.unrealengine.com/en-US/Engine/BlueprintSplines/index.html
Hi! Thanks for the tutorial! this looks really good. What I’m wondering now is how I can switch between two cameras and how I can make the camera that moves along the spline move by itself without player interaction?
Here is how to make a looping spline camera, its much simpler and closer to what you want: Camera Spline Track - ue4 Tutorial - YouTube
Then for the switching part, all you would have to do is call your camera reference in the level bp with an possession function, then setup and input to switch possession back to pawn.
Yeah it’s hard to explain, Actually what I want is the camera to be moving along the spline, doing it’s own thing nothing to do with the character. Moving steadily along the spline showing the level, not pointing/following the character. It’s Independent from the character.
Like a cut scene that you can tap in and out of, but when you’re not viewing the cut scene, it is still playing (looping forever). When ever you tap you are just shown wherever the camera is up to on the spline. Like live broadcast camera switching.
Hopefully that makes more sense? Haha
Those tutorials show that. Remove the player as the focal point/character. The rest of the mechanics are there.
In simpler terms all you need to do is setup a spline. The documentation above details how to do that. Attach a camera to it, as in the video above. Make a timer for how long you want it to travel along the spline. Set it to reset as it finishes creating a loop that endlessly rotates around the level. Use level bp to possess the camera as it rides along the spline and use it to switch back to player when input is pressed.
That will get your desired results.
do you know how I can reference a camera I create?
At this part the only camera I can access when I do get Get > is the first person character camera. Do you know how I can create another camera and reference it here?