Description

I wanted to start learning Unreal Engine 4 last year but couldn’t dedicate the time yet. I finally started learning the software at the beginning of this year and just finished my first project with it.
It was interesting to have most of the work done within the software. I’m used to waiting for a 3D software to finish rendering, exporting a bunch of passes, then compositing in post, etc. I still had the freedom to export passes, but the engine handles it well for the most part. All depth of field, motion blur and volumetric lighting were done within Unreal Engine 4 with some very minor additions of RSMB done in post to cover the strange artifacts that UE4’s motion blur can sometimes produce.
Seeing as this is a cinematic and not a game, I cranked up the cascaded shadows by quite a bit. I stuck to 1 LOD for the trees to not have the “pop” effect as the camera traveled through. This is why I didn’t go with the highest LOD (LOD0) from what I remember in order to ease the load. (except for the trees that are far away, which are billboards)

I created the landscape with WM. All the foliage was made using Quixel’s assets.
The trees can be found here
Song is “Pixel Empire” by Madeon

Applications Used

After Effects, Cinema 4D, Photoshop, Unreal Engine 4, World Machine