[TUTORIAL] Quick Time-of-Day Setup

Community Community & Industry Discussion
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Update! Release highlights:

Support for a moon is added!
New “SunMovementCurve” property lets you have precise control of speed of your sun during different times of day.
Sample map now included!
Properties are better organized, and a new “ToD - Debug” section has been added.

Download & more info: http://gregoryjb.blogspot.com/2014/06/ue4-time-of-day-setup.html

Hope you guys enjoy! And of course, leave feedback :slight_smile: What do you want to see added next?

Quick note: moon will not move; that is not a bug or a setup problem. I didn’t feel moving it was necessary, as nobody really notices that in real life - not like we notice sun’s movement, anyway. If you guys think it’s important I will add it.

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Keep up good work! Its crazy how far a good Time of day system/Sky system goes for a game (especially if its dynamic like ). I’ve been using your system and it works really well. I hope that you keep working on it/keep it update so when epic kinda releases their “store” you can release it on there.

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What it doesn’t move? Riot/Hiss/shun none believer! :stuck_out_tongue:

I’m going to download weekend.

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Okay fiiiine, I’ll make it move :slight_smile: What do you think is best way, just make it opposite sun at all times? (So that it’s always visible at night.)

@KRushin, glad to hear you like it! :smiley:

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I think opposite is safest way to start, if nothing else. I could think of some interesting world scenarios where you might want to have night in one section and day in another to simulate being on other side of virtual world, but that is a harder problem to solve since it can be so unique.

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How can i edit sun and moon texture?

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Other than using it for default ambiance i haven’t messed with it too much (or really even default sky BP). It would be neat to see more clouds by default.

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They aren’t a texture, they are a mask generated in material. I tried to make moon a texture, but I’m no good at complicated materials like that.

Ahhh yes, clouds. I tried making my own cloud system with dynamically adjustable clouds, but like I said, I suck at materials – so I failed. Right now clouds are defined by a texture (just find reference in mat) which I guess you could change if you wanted.

reason I haven’t posted an update in a while is because I ran out of ideas to implement (and because anything I wanted needed material skill, e.g. clouds). Sooo… any ideas? Or help with materials? :slight_smile:

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Hey Greg,

Just wanted to say a big thanks for providing TOD Blueprint as a starting point. We have taken it and added a few extra features which I can upload someplace for you to take a look at and incorporate if you like.

  • Changed curves to represent a 24 hour timeline, so we could make sunrise, sunset, dawn and dusk have different values
  • Added support to lerp between different post processing volumes over time
  • added support for Exponential Height Fog
  • Did some checks to make sure moon and sun directional lights are never on at same time. We wanted to make sure we were only ever using one Directional light in scene.

I will be covering all in a dev blog later week, and will make sure to credit you with initial TOD blueprint setup.

thanks again!

AJ
Uppercut Games

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Oh yeah we added moon movement in too :slight_smile:

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Would you provide a download link Please ?

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Wow Greg, that’s a great Blueprint you gave us here, thanks ! :smiley:

I’d love to try out UppercutAJ’s version as well, that static moon bothered me a bit. :stuck_out_tongue:

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We just want to add ability to change cloud density over time, and then I’ll put it up someplace for download :slight_smile:

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Is it possible to load system into sun that comes with exsample_map?

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Sorry for lack of updates, I’m busy IRL right now. Eventually I want to integrate new AO skylight as well, but I don’t know how soon I’ll be able to do it.

@UppercutAJ, I’m excited to see your dynamic clouds, I got stuck on that part :slight_smile:

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One small thing I noticed- Default Hour editor variable can go into negative numbers if you drag it left, which keeps it at night, but if you only keep dragging it right, it works.

Thanks for doing . Can we use it commercially for our published games?

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Oh yeah, I should have mentioned, you can use it for anything you want, commercial or not. Crediting me is not required, but desired. :slight_smile: (I should probably include a license file in next release.)

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Any news on ? Still waiting for it.

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Greg I’m adding in Environment Fog curves and Ambiance to system currently as well.

Also I’m adding ambient light to BP. For ambiant to work correctly you have to invoke recapture scene periotically for ray bounces to be accurate. Even with sky light being movable.

I’m using some of in City of Tristan I’m working on.

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Hello
i have put a SkyLight to Scene because with i have some smoother Shadows during day.
But i have some troubles now.

  • If i start Day (BP_DayCycle_SkyDome; Default Hour) at 24 hour then night is dark but i don’t have some Smooth Shadwos.
  • But if istart Day at 8 in Moring, then if have good smooth shadwos but Night is not dark!?!
    I need Smooth Shadows and a Dark Night.
    Have someone any good solution for problem?
    Greetings,
    Andreas