I would like to get some input on my current work of modeling houses for UE4. I have been working on a game for some time now and designing many small props to go into my levels but now it is time to start making houses. I have tried numerous ways to build some modular meshes so I could piece together a variety of house models without having to model each one individual but they look less real than if you make the whole house as one mesh. My current single story house has 6 rooms inside which makes up a lot of wall space so I am having issues texturing them and keeping them somewhat hi-res so they look good because they are so small on my UVW template. Does anyone have any recommendations on how do break up the house into sections so I can manage to keep my texture quality or does anyone have any recommendations on the best ways to model houses? I wish the BSP brushes were optimized enough to use because I get the best results by using them though I am trying not to use them! I am attaching a capture of the model I made.
You can also use BSP brushes -> when the house is finished, just convert them to a static mesh
You can scale the UV’s so that the texture is tiling -> then you will keep the quality, but you will have to use seamless textures.
I think that you would have more luck with a more open-spaced approach to your house plan as it would look better, take up a bit less time and use less resources overall.
Just wait until he needs to get arched windows…
BSP’s are useless to say the least. I really wonder why in such a modern product they are still available. It’s like having a crank shaft in a spaceship.
I like BSP’s. I used the Source engine for 8 years and loved the simplicity of using brushes to build levels. It just takes a little bit of practice but you can make some beautiful works of art with blocks! Overall I love UE4 but the main thing that I think could be improved on would be optimizing BSP’s so they would render the same as a mesh so you could use them for all of the square shapes of the level and already have collision so I wouldn’t have to model everything in a separate program. I just converted a house that I made with BSP’s to a mesh and it works great, though now I need to make collision for all my walls. It would be beneficial to keep the collision from the BSP when it is converted
@Overwatch
Instead of making collisions, in material check use per poly collision. The perf impact should be unobservable and it will save you lots of work.
What Motanum said … I use BSPs to mock out my level and get the flow working nicely during preliminary testing. I then do a second pass with art and assets and replace the mockups. This is one of the reasons I enjoy using UE4 … please don’t take this away for us non-artists. 8-{
Because with a BSP I can create ramps and angles much quicker then doing it in a modelling app and importing it. I also can tweak angles and sizes as the game testing goes on. Once we are happy with a level … we export the BSPs to Static Meshes and then use those in the modelling app to make the final versions.
But using BSPs I can do faster iterations in between testing then I could with just static meshes.
Sometimes you will also model something only to realise that it is too small or too big or just doesn’t fit right … by doing it the other way around … I can eliminate these issues.
I like using the bsp’s because I don’t have to uvw wrap the texture to the model… just drag it and scale it on the bsp and as long as they are proportional the textures lineup. If I model small cube meshes to use as walls then all the textures must line up which can be a nightmare using 3ds .
@Overwatch: As pointed out … the best way to model is to do whatever works best for you and your pipeline. and I could argue the merits of each other’s pipelines until the cows come home … but we each do what works best for us. 8-}
What might be more beneficial is to look at some of the modular packs available on the Marketplace … I think if you are going to go for buildings and need a bunch of them … modular is the way to go. This will also allow a coder to procedural build houses for you if the need ever arises.
I convert from BSP to Static Mesh using the editor. Then export those and make my new model using that as a reference (i.e. for space and size constraints). Then import it back in to the engine and place it.
Thank you for everyone’s input. I agree there are many ways to do this and I have learned enough with your comments to move forward. I am a one man team so I try to take the quickest approach with the best quality thought that doesn’t usually go hand in hand.
