Virtual Worldbuilding in Unreal Engine Short Course

This exciting week-long course offers an overview of the basic features of Unreal Engine and guides students through the design and development process for open-world environments. Through a combination of presentations, practical exercises, workshops and demonstrations, students delve deeper into landscape design, procedural tools and particle systems to populate their level.

During the course, students learn how to create visual effects using Niagara, populate their level with photo-scanned assets manually, and use the PCG tool (Procedural Content Generation Framework). Students also use the Sequencer tool to produce high-quality cinematics to showcase their level.

The course offers an exciting opportunity for students to design and develop their own open-world 3D environment and use animated cameras to bring their creations to life. By the end of the course, students will have created their own environment and cinematic sequences showcasing their work.

Course outcomes

By the end of the course students should have:

• Developed a deeper understanding of the research and design process for open-world building in Unreal Engine

• Produced mood boards and storyboards for their environments

• Gained an understanding of the key elements of the Unreal user interface, as well as project and file management

• Acquired knowledge of materials, lighting, Niagara, water systems and procedural tools (PCG) for landscape design in Unreal Engine

• Developed an understanding of the Sequencer tool

• Rendered cinematic sequences showcasing their virtual environments

• Developed robust skills in level design and open-world environment creation in Unreal Engine

Topics covered:

• Introduction to Unreal Engine: presentation on the potential of real-time engines in the creative industries with examples

• Creative brainstorming: group brainstorm ideas for environment creation, gather references and develop worldbuilding concepts

• Technical workshops: introduction to the software, basic navigation and user interface, followed by two virtual worldbuilding sessions focusing on open-world landscape design in the engine

• Cinematic creation: introduction to cinematics and animation in Unreal Engine using the Sequencer tool to create high-quality cinematic sequences

• Post-processing and rendering: technical workshop on post-processing and rendering videos using the Movie Render Queue (MRQ), followed by time for project work and group showcase