(Resolved) Modeling tools no longer highlight hovered or selected faces in PolyEdand MatEd modes. GrpGen broken

[Fresnella]

Update 10/11 - These modeling tools are still broken for me since Thurs (5 days ago). I’m focusing on NPC animations instead but modeling is my primary task in UEFN. @endofthehall has commented that this is a known bug that has been fixed on the latest internal build so I hope the change trickles down to creators soon. Today @Wertandrew posted that it’s hindering their work too. Normal - UEFN - When selecting triangles in modeling mode (apply material mode) you get no selection texture

Update 10/7 - I’m still having these issues today. This is becoming a big problem for me if it’s not resolved soon, because at this stage in developing my game, 3D modeling is the main task I’m working on in UEFN. I’m blocked from working on my main game mechanic because of a bug with Building Props, so I’m focusing on the art side. Polyediting faces GrpGen, and MatEd are essential for my modeling and texturing workflow. I want to use UEFN modeling tools for my game https://forums.unrealengine.com/t/tidypals-devlog-week-2-update/657293/19 but if I’m blocked I might go back to Blender or Nomad Sculpt.

Update 10/6 : GrpGen tool also appears to be broken. Instead of generating colored patches to show the groups, it shows a gray grid material over the whole object.

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In modeling mode for PolyeEd and MatEd, faces are no longer highlighted green for me when I hover over them and yellow for me when I select them. Vertices, edges, and edge loops still do highlight though. This makes modeling difficult for me because I have no feedback about which face I’m hovering over or have clicked, especially when I’m trying to multiselect multiple faces at once. I can select and edit multiselect faces, but there is no highlight.

Also hovered and selected faces in Material Editing no longer highlight, which makes the MatEd tool functionally unusable. I can see the painted materials when I press accept, so I know that I am painting.

I tried exiting UEFN and reloading and it didn’t help. I also tried unchecking everything in the selection filter except for “Select Faces” and that didn’t help either.

This is actually a pretty big inconvenience for me because I’m modeling all of my assets in UEFN not Blender, so I would love to have it fixed soon! Because of this issue I have temporarily stopped modeling in UEFN and I’m going to work on other parts of my project. To me it doesn’t appear to be user error but maybe there’s something I can try to fix? Thanks!

[Flak]

Thank you for the detail on the report. I’ll be sure someone sees this.

[Fresnella]

Thank you so much, @Flak !

One of the main purposes of my game is to show off the visual capabilities of UEFN and I’m aiming to finish my MVP within the next few weeks, so modeling tools are crucial for me asap. Otherwise I’ll have to return to outside modeling programs like Blender and I won’t be able to advertise that my game environment was modeled entirely in UEFN.

There may also be problems with other modeling tools in UEFN as well, but these are the ones I that I initially noticed because they’re the ones I use most often.

As always, I appreciate the work the Epic team puts into addressing bug reports and I understand there’s always a lot for you to deal with!

[endofthehall (Russell Paul)]

Thanks for the report and thanks for pushing on the modeling tools. It is great to see everything you are doing with them. There is definitely something not working with the selection highlighting in polyEdit, triEdit and materialEdit. I am taking a look now to see if there are any updates.

Russell

[Fresnella]

Yayyy thank you so much for looking into this! And thank you for the encouragement about my work with the modeling tools! In UEFN / Unreal I love how I can model and texture my art in the same space where I map out the environment and implement game mechanics. No need to export and import across programs. It helps me visualize how everything fits together.

[endofthehall (Russell Paul)]

np, there was an internal thread about this as well and it looks to have been fixed. I did a quick test on the latest internal builds and it looks correct now.
Cheers,
Russell

[Fresnella]

Sounds good, thanks! I’m currently still not seeing selection highlighting yet in PolyEdit, TriEdit, or MaterialEdit on my end yet, so there must be a delay. GrpGen doesn’t show colors for groups either, it just shows a gray grid material on the mesh. Do you have any idea when I can expect to see the change? I’ll keep you updated.

[Fresnella]

Hi, Russell! In today’s meeting with creators who are interested in tutorializing parts of our games, Andrea mentioned that in the future UEFN creators might create simple shapes in UEFN and then move over to UE to level up their modeling skills. Does this mean the UEFN modeling interface will change before Public Beta? I always assumed that Epic would eventually simplify the UEFN modeling tools, rather than keep them the same as the UE tools, but I didn’t know when. Does this affect Epic’s plans to fix the current UEFN modeling tool bugs? Is Epic’s thinking that it doesn’t make sense to fix current modeling tool bugs when the current tools will be outdated soon anyway? If so I’ll just model in UE. I plan to create tutorials for the UEFN / UE modeling tools in addition to using the tools, so it’s helpful for me to know the roadmap. Tagging @rmsEG in this too. I don’t know Andrea’s Forums username!

Edit: In Discord Andrea mentioned that the UE tools are also due for an upgrade, which trickles down to UEFN. So I understand why modeling tools are a complicated topic, and I’m ok with them being in flux! As an artist I like working with tools that are on the frontier and I understand that flexibility is a part of that.

[rmsEG (Ryan Schmidt)]

Hi BlueClairy, it seems like there is some miscommunication in our internal teams. The modeling modes in UE and UEFN are nearly identical, and we intend to keep it that way. So there is no reason to try to move content from UEFN to UE to do more “advanced” modeling, as you will find all the same features and limitations. The only major difference between UE and UEFN, in terms of modeling mode specifically, is how StaticMesh Assets are managed (UE has more flexibility here).

The modeling interface will not substantially change before Public Beta. We are continually making improvements, but we have ~80 tools, and the improvements are incremental in the context of particular Tools. We are looking at doing a more significant UX overhaul in the future, but both UE and UEFN will get those improvements.

The fact that it is taking so long to get a fix out for this, is entirely my fault, I thought I had fixed it but the fix didn’t go into the private alpha version. In the same way that UEFN is a big change for Creative users, it’s a big change for those of us who have primarily worked on UE, which releases updates a few times a year, with long periods of testing and bugfixing in between

However the UEFN Tools will not ever be “outdated” relative to UE, in fact at some point in the future we expect that Modeling improvements will appear in UEFN before they come out in UE, because of the more frequent UEFN releases (In UE we can only release updates as part of major 5.x revisions, which will only happen a few times a year).

So, I would say, if you are creating tutorials, it’s better to create them for UEFN. They are likely to help many more people, and any UEFN modeling tutorial will basically also apply to UE (the opposite is less likely to be true because of all the other “stuff” that UE has that isn’t available in UEFN).

(also, it’s super exciting for us that you would be creating these tutorials, so don’t hesitate to ask questions/etc!)

[Fresnella]

Hi Ryan! Thanks for the info! Wow, that’s really exciting that in the future Modeling improvements might appear in UEFN before UE! I love the UE modeling tools, and the way you can apply materials to polygroups. I was having fun today modeling and texturing some organic leafy shapes for plants. PolyExt is great for leaves. I’m due for an update on my TidyPals devlog so I’m going to post my plants soon. I’ve spent some time learning Blender before, but navigating in UE feels more concrete to me, like I’m actually modeling and painting a real thing in space.

I’m definitely interested in creating UEFN modeling tutorials once I’ve got the modeling skills! Materials too. I’d like to show creators how to model some of the props they’ll see in the game that I’m planning on publishing with Public Beta.

Also, should I expect the UEFN modeling tools fix next Tuesday, October 25th? That was the last date I heard.

[jay_villanueva]

This update is great @Fresnella ! Keep it up! It looks like nothing else in FN!

[Fresnella]

Thank you, @jay_villanueva ! I just added another entry now, showing my modeling and texturing process for my basic masked plant template. I hadn’t posted in a while because I thought the work I was doing wasn’t very flashy to look at - lots of behind the scenes groundwork and material graphs. But sharing my imperfect WIP helps me work through my ideas and think of questions, so I should do it more often. https://forums.unrealengine.com/t/sprigs-plant-shop-devlog-update-4/657293