Mastering Unreal Technology, Volume II Advanced Level Design Concepts with Unreal Engine 3

Mastering Unreal Technology, Volume II: Advanced Level Design Concepts with Unreal Engine 3 is your start-to-finish guide to state-of-the-art Unreal Tournament 3 modding and level design. Here’s everything you need to know to take your game design skills to the next level, creating content with breakthrough depth and interactivity! Your authors aren’t just the world’s #1 Unreal game development trainers: They’ve built the training mods that shipped with Unreal Tournament.

Now, working with the full cooperation of Unreal Engine 3’s creators, Epic Games, they introduce innovative, pro-quality techniques you’ll find nowhere else: outstanding solutions for everything from particle effects to physics, materials to cinematics. Packed with tips, hands-on tutorials, and expert insight, Mastering Unreal Technology, Volume II will help you take Unreal Tournament 3 and Unreal Engine 3 to the limit...and then blow right by it!

You’ll find expert tips on

-Creating advanced materials that leverage the full power of UnrealEd’s Material Editor

-Bringing levels to life with objects affected by gravity, collisions, and player influence

-Creating fire, smoke, sparks, and more with Unreal Engine 3’s particle effects system

-Building custom user interfaces, including Heads-Up Displays (HUDs) that update constantly

-Using SoundCues to mix, modulate, crossfade, and attenuate sounds

-Generating real-time camera-based effects, including depth of field, motion blur, and color adjustment

-Using post process effects to quickly transform a scene’s look and feel without changing existing materials or textures

-Animating characters and vehicles that move with unprecedented realism

-Creating in-game cinematics that develop your characters and move your story forward

Jason “Buzz” Busby is president and chief executive officer of 3D Buzz, Inc. For more than five years, he has taught 3D animation, programming, and game design through his website 3dbuzz.com, which has more than 275,000 members. He coauthored Mastering Unreal: The Art of Level Design and Mastering the Art of Production with 3ds Max 4 and has created and overseen the production of more than 1,000 hours of video training.

Zak Parrish, chief of operations at 3D Buzz, Inc., has developed hundreds of video tutorials over 3D animation and game design. He helped produce training videos that shipped with Unreal Tournament 2004: Special Edition as well as those that shipped with Unreal Tournament 3: Limited Collector’s Edition. Zak also coauthored Mastering Unreal.

Jeff Wilson, 3D Buzz’s technical consultant for the Unreal Engine, helps develop the company’s Unreal Technology training videos. He has been studying the Unreal Engine for five years while creating modifications for Unreal Tournament 2003 and 2004. Wilson moderates the 3D Buzz forums.

Busby, Parrish, and Wilson are also coauthors of the companion book Mastering Unreal® Technology, Volume I: Introduction to Level Design with Unreal® Engine 3.

CHAPTER 1: Introduction to Advanced Level Design . . .  1

Who Is This Book For? . . .  2

What Should You Know Before You Start? . . .  2

What We Mean By “Advanced” Level Design . . .  3

Included Assets and Game Assets . . .  3

Working with INI Files . . .  4

Future Software Changes . . .  5

CHAPTER 2: Advanced Material Construction . . .  7

Material Instancing and Parameters . . .  7

Blending . . . 9

UV Manipulation . . .  10

Normals . . .  11

Depth . . .  12

Special Lighting . . . 13

Reflections . . .  14

Distortion . . .  14

Transparency . . .  15

Subsurface Scattering . . .  16

Custom Lighting Models . . .  16

Summary . . .  151

CHAPTER 3: Working with Volumes . . .  153

Available Volume Types . . .  154

Basic Volume Properties . . .  156

BlockingVolumes . . .  156

PhysicsVolumes . . .   159

TriggerVolume . . .  170

PostProcessVolume . . .   186

LevelStreamingVolume . . .   188

LightVolume . . . 188

ColorScaleVolume . . . 189

ReverbVolume . . .  189

RB_ForceFieldExcludeVolume . . .  190

UTAreaNamingVolume . . .  190

UTAutoCrouchVolume . . .  190

FoliageFactory . . .  190

Summary . . .  192

CHAPTER 4: Physics Objects . . .  193

Types of Physics Objects . . .  193

The Concept of Rigid Bodies . . .  196

Working with Rigid Bodies in Unreal . . .  197

KActors . . .  200

KAssets . . .  208

Constraints . . .  211

The Physics Asset Tool (PhAT) . . .  229

Cloth . . .  245

Impulse and Force Actors . . .  252

Physics-Specific Kismet Sequence Objects . . .  258

Physical Materials . . .  263

Summary . . .  268

CHAPTER 5: Creating Special Effects with Particle Systems . . .  269

Anatomy of a Particle System . . .  271

TypeData Modules . . .  283

Modules . . .  286

Cascade Particle System Editor . . .  293

Particle-Specific Material Expressions . . .  301

Types of Particle Modules . . .  312

Beam Emitters . . .  356

Mesh Emitters . . .  374

Trail Emitters . . .  382

Fluid Emitters . . .  393

Levels of Detail . . .  397

Emitter Actor . . .  406

Modifying Particle Systems In-Game . . .  407

Troubleshooting the Effect . . .  480

Summary . . .  481

CHAPTER 6: Creating User Interfaces . . .  483

UI Components . . .  483

UIs Versus HUDs . . .  484

UI Design Workflow Overview . . .  485

The UI Scene Editor . . .  492

The UI Widgets . . .  496

Working with Widgets . . .  498

Widgets States . . .  513

Widget Navigation and the Focus Chain . . .  541

Working with User Inputs . . .  543

Data Stores . . .  548

Styles and Skins . . .  549

Fonts . . .  566

Adding Functionality . . .  569

Sounds . . .  598

Creating HUDs . . .  600

Summary . . .  601

CHAPTER 7: Sound System . . .  603

Sound Types . . .  604

USounds Versus SoundCues . . .  604

The AmbientSound Actors . . .  612

The SoundCue Editor . . .  613

SoundCue Nodes . . .  614

Kismet Sound Actions . . .  632

Working with Music . . .  638

Working with MusicTrackBanks . . .  642

Summary . . .  666

CHAPTER 8: Post-Process Effects . . .  667

The Four Key Methods of Controlling Post-Processes . . .  668

Accessing and Assigning PostProcessEffect Objects . . .  670

Types of Post-Process Effects . . .  675

Post-Process Editor . . .  681

Controlling Post-Process Effects In-Game . . .  715

Summary . . .  716

CHAPTER 9: The Unreal Animation System . . .  717

The Unreal Animation System . . .  718

Skeletal Animation . . .  723

Morph Animation . . .  734

AnimSet Editor . . .  737

Animation Blending . . .  753

AnimTree Editor . . .  754

AnimTree Editor Nodes . . .  770

Morph Nodes . . .  796

Facial Animation with FaceFX . . .  839

FaceFX Studio . . .  840

FaceFX Studio User Interface . . .  872

Physical Animation . . .  900

Setup Procedure for Physical Animation . . .  906

Skeletal Mesh Actors . . .  907

Skeletal Mesh Component . . .  907

Summary . . .  909

CHAPTER 10: Creating Cinematic Sequences . . .  911

Cinematic Sequences . . .  911

Camera Actor . . .  915

Camera Effects . . .  916

Image Separation Through Lighting . . .  920

DumpMovie Command . . .  920

Putting It All Together . . .  920

Summary . . .  999

APPENDIX A: Distributions . . .  1001

Overview . . .  1001

Distribution Types In-Depth . . .  1003

General Performance Cost Comparison . . .  1019

APPENDIX B: The Curve Editor . . .  1023

Animation Curves . . .  1024

Controlling Interpolation Curves . . .  1026

Curve Editor Interface . . .  1030

Preset Curves . . .  1035