Landscape #1: Sculpting and Materials

By following this tutorial I was able to learn about creating landscapes in Unreal and many of the tools.

Firstly by going to the Landscape mode, I selected my size. Considering the playable size of the map will be restricted to the building, and the terrain is only what they will see through the windows, I don't need a particularly large landscape, which will use up more processing power.

Using the Sculpting Tool I was able to create some hills and mountains. The higher ones appeared particularly stretched and unnatural, so I used the Smooth Tool to run over them all to create a realistic shape.

The Hydro Erosion tool was used to create small grooves at the bottom of the mountains to give a realistic erosion effect that would be apparent over years in reality.

The other tool I used was the Retopologize to prevent stretching of materials once applied.

I created a new material, using the naming convention M_ (to denote material). Inside the file, I created nodes to connect three materials (defining the amount on the left panel). 

The reason for this is to create several layers that I will be able to paint with continuously. The main ones being Grass, Rock, and Gravel from the StarterContent folder.

Two types of files are included, _D for Base Layer and _N for Normal.

Using the LandscapeCoords node and linking it to all the textures, followed by adjusting the Mapping Scale adds a greater level of detail to the overall landscape to give it a much more realistic appearance.

Before:

After:

With a combination of tools, primarily the Sculp, Smooth, and Retropologize I was able to create the heightmap. Furthermore, with the use of blueprints, I was able to implement three materials which can be 'painted' on the terrain to achieve my first version of a terrain.

There is more work required to accomplish the level of detail I am hoping for. However, I can see the terrain formation coming along and with the exploration of materials, I hope to achieve rocky mountains, gravel ground filled with rocks and dead trees to enhance the dark, isolated atmosphere of the game.