[ 1 ] 3D Game Design with Unreal Engine 4 and Blender Combine the powerful UE4 with Blender to create visually appealing and comprehensive game environments Justin Plowman BIRMINGHAM - MUMBAI 3D Game Design with Unreal Engine 4 and Blender Copyright © 2016 Packt Publishing All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embedded in critical articles or reviews. Every effort has been made in the preparation of this book to ensure the accuracy of the information presented. However, the information contained in this book is sold without warranty, either express or implied. Neither the author nor Packt Publishing, and its dealers and distributors will be held liable for any damages caused or alleged to be caused directly or indirectly by this book. Packt Publishing has endeavored to provide trademark information about all of the companies and products mentioned in this book by the appropriate use of capitals. However, Packt Publishing cannot guarantee the accuracy of this information. First published: June 2016 Production reference: 1240616 Published by Packt Publishing Ltd. Livery Place 35 Livery Street Birmingham B3 2PB, UK. ISBN 978-1-78588-146-6 www.packtpub.com Credits Author Project Coordinator Justin Plowman Ritika Manoj Reviewer Proofreader Scott Hafner Safis Editing Commissioning Editor Indexer Amarabha Banerjee Monica Ajmera Mehta Acquisition Editor Graphics Rahul Nair Disha Haria Content Development Editor Production Coordinator Parshva Sheth Arvindkumar Gupta Technical Editor Cover Work Gebin George Arvindkumar Gupta Copy Editor Safis Editing About the Author Justin Plowman is a game designer and educator, who resides in the United States. At a young age, he discovered his love for video games and the joy they bring to others. He began teaching high school students about game development in 2005 and enjoys supporting the dreams of the next generation developers. He currently teaches at risk youth about game design and development through the West Michigan Center for Arts and Technology (www.wmcat.org); and also teaches Unreal Engine development as part of the Digital Animation and Game Design program at Ferris State University (www.ferris.edu). Justin has worked with Unreal Technology in the education arena for more than 10 years. When not teaching, he writes learning tutorials on different topics related to Unreal Technology, and continues to further his education by keeping up on recent industry news and learning about best practices related to both teaching and game development. He can be found on the Web at https://gamingbootcamp.wordpress.com/. Writing this book has been quite a journey for me, as it firmly falls in the realm of the things that I never expected to do. However, it has truly been a rewarding experience, and I can't thank the folks at Packt Publishing enough for this opportunity. I want to thank my wife, Jennifer, for helping me focus through the long nights of writing and development, as well as my good friend, Jacob Pollak, for providing me with the amazing piece of cover art. Most of all, I would like to thank the great Unreal Engine online community that has been instrumental in growing and nurturing my skills over the years. This book represents my desire to give back, and I hope that it encourages more designers and developers within the community to do the same. Thank you! About the Reviewer Scott Hafner is a professional game designer with over 10 years of experience in the video game industry. Over the course of his career, Scott has worked as a producer, a game designer, and a level designer on a range of platforms and genres including MMOs, third-person shooters, and RPGs. I would like to thank my wife for her continued encouragement and support in all that I do! www.PacktPub.com eBooks, discount offers, and more Did you know that Packt offers eBook versions of every book published, with PDF and ePub files available? You can upgrade to the eBook version at www.PacktPub.com and as a print book customer, you are entitled to a discount on the eBook copy. Get in touch with us at [email protected] for more details. At www.PacktPub.com, you can also read a collection of free technical articles, sign up for a range of free newsletters and receive exclusive discounts and offers on Packt books and eBooks. TM https://www2.packtpub.com/books/subscription/packtlib Do you need instant solutions to your IT questions? PacktLib is Packt's online digital book library. 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Why subscribe? • Fully searchable across every book published by Packt • Copy and paste, print, and bookmark content • On demand and accessible via a web browser Table of Contents Preface v Chapter 1: Unreal, My Friend, I'd Like You to Meet Blender 1 Installing Blender 2 Exploring the interface 3 Customizing your settings 6 Working with modes 8 Jumping into our first project 8 Getting things started in Unreal Engine 4 9 Summary 11 Chapter 2: Starting Our First Project 13 Using the Content Browser to start building the level 15 Using different types of light 28 Adding interactive elements using Triggers and Blueprints 31 Playtesting our level 41 Summary 42 Chapter 3: It's Time to Customize! 43 Getting started making game assets 44 Using the basic tools of polygon modeling 46 How to use UV mapping and why it's important 57 UV unwrapping our game asset 60 Basic texturing techniques 66 Summary 70 Chapter 4: Getting the Assets to the Level 71 Exporting our object from Blender 71 What is FBX? 75 Importing our object into Unreal 76 [ i ] Table of Contents Setting up and using our new 3D asset 79 Summary 86 Chapter 5: Taking This Level Up a Notch 87 Planning a more complex level 87 Whiteboxing a level for better asset creation 89 Level design principles 93 Advanced scripting techniques 95 Win conditions 109 Summary 112 Chapter 6: Monster Assets – The Level Totally Needs One of These 113 Designing our asset – inspiration and concept art 114 Advanced tools: Subdivide, Knife, Bridge Edge Loops, and more 115 Subdivide tool 116 Knife tool 117 Bridge Edge Loops tool 118 Triangulate modifier tool 118 Using multiple shapes within Blender 119 Summary 143 Chapter 7: Let's Dress to Impress! 145 Unwrapping complex objects 145 Marking seams 146 Unwrap tool 147 Stitch 148 Average Island Scale 149 Pack Islands 150 Using Smart UV Project 150 Custom Marking Seams 151 Unwrapping Cubes 152 Unwrapping Cylinders 154 Using different maps to create a more realistic look 165 Summary 184 Chapter 8: Lights, Camera, Animation! 185 How does Blender handle animation? 185 Rigging and using keyframes 188 Using Blender's suite of animation tools 200 Summary 204 [ ii ] Table of Contents Chapter 9: Bang Bang – Let's Make It Explode 205 Creating a class blueprint to tie it all together 206 Using sound effects 219 Using particle effects 224 Index 233 [ iii ]