UE4 Sam's Room (Relight)

Some practice at authoring some different looks, using the season and weather as the key reference. Featuring a winter and late summer look.
I really wanted to practice a few methods and techniques this time round:
- Soft Shadows
- HDRI maps and skylight bounces
- Sun Source angle
- Fog

Interestingly enough I struggled on getting accurate fog beams and soft shadow at the same time! It seems like UE4 cannot do both at the same time, so I resorted to Distance Field Shadows with the main Directional Light being moveable. Not sure if the tradeoff is worth the possible expense? If anyone is has a bit more experience with shadows concerning a Directional Light and Distance Field Shadows, for small scenes in UE4 please chip in! It would be really appreciated!

Also this is my first rodeo implementing a LUT, its fantastic and does a lot to sell the mood even further. One critique of the winter scene is that the HDRI brightness doesn't really match or justify the amount of sunlight coming through the windows. This is something I'll keep in mind next time!

Below is the blueprint I created for the emissive lamp which can be changed during run time!

Below are some pictures from the late summer afternoon, version of the scene:

[UE4] A Strange Morning At The Office

A personal project in practice as I begin my journey into Environment Lighting for games. Heavily inspired by PLAYDEAD's "INSIDE", it was a joy slowly working on the scene + practicing modelling etc. I still battle with UVs so excuse the small artifacts on the objects. Here's to the first step ~

Environment modelling by myself.
Human Meshes by Render People.

UE4 Reflections Subway (Remix & Relight)

Log-line: Its been 5 years since the "shimmer" and nature is slowly beginning to reclaim the concrete structures in the major cities. Femi and his band of survivors has scoured most buildings, and now the only place left to scavenge is the subway tunnels below.

This is a remix and relight of the "Reflections" subway scene provided by Epic Games. I wanted to explore baked Indirect lighting, and this scene had a very nice central opening that was perfect for just that. Added some fauna and foliage to the scene to really drive home that abandoned feeling! Foliage is from the "Temperate Vegetation" pack on the marketplace (its free!)

This scene is heavily inspired by the Last of Us Part II, just finished playing the game over the weekend an dim blown away by Naughty Dogs approach to indirect lighting. Some crazy stuff going on within the game. Especially the precision to the craft that made the levels really feel like it was only being lit by one source. I very much in love with this idea of single source lighting and will look to explore it in this period.

Still a few things I have to learn, with indirect lighting intensity (possibly using post processing to cheat it per room?) using static lights to cheat the bounces and emissive etc. Really excited to get into the nitty gritty as I go along.

A little menu mock up included