Importing the terrains and trees into Unreal Engine was an exciting part of the project, but it didn’t go as smoothly as I hoped. While Unreal Engine is a great platform for creating immersive environments, getting everything to work as intended required some troubleshooting and adjustments.
Tree Import Challenges
My first attempt at importing the trees from SpeedTree didn’t go well. I used the same workflow I’d previously used in Maya, relying on opacity maps to mask the leaves. However, this caused a strange issue in Unreal Engine. When the camera got close to the trees, the edges of the leaves blurred and even changed colour, which completely ruined the look of the scene.
Serra and I worked together to figure out what was going wrong. Initially, we thought it was a camera issue, but after digging deeper, we discovered the problem was in the material setup. Once I re-exported the trees from SpeedTree, this time using settings optimized for Unreal Engine, everything looked great. Seeing the trees finally appear correctly in the scene was such a relief.
Building a Realistic Environment
With the tree issues resolved, I started refining the environment. I used procedural texturing in Unreal Engine to add variety to the terrain. By layering materials like grass, soil, and rock, I was able to create smooth transitions that made the environment feel more realistic and natural.
Finally, I used Unreal Engine’s foliage mode to place the trees on the terrain. It took a lot of trial and error to distribute them evenly and make the scene look balanced, but the end result was worth the effort. Watching the environment come together was incredibly satisfying and made the work feel rewarding.
This week reminded me that sometimes workflows need to be adjusted for different tools, and patience is key when things don’t work out immediately. Solving these challenges gave me a deeper understanding of how to use Unreal Engine effectively.