March 30, 2016
Sci-Fi and Glitch Post-Process : Documentation
- How to Install the Post-Process Pack ?
- How to Add a Post-Process Effect in My Level ?
- Why Is One the Post-Process Not Producing Any Results on Screen ?
- How to Update a Post-Process Material at Runtime ?
- How to Manually Control the Speed of the "Pulse" Post-Process ?
- How to Change the Source Location of the "Pulse" Post-Process ?
- Why Are Some Post-Processes Not Appearing Properly in the Editor ?
- Why Are Some Post-Processes nor Working Properly with Screen Percentage ?
How to Install the Post-Process Pack ?
Once purchased on the marketplace, the package should appear in your vault in the Epic Games launcher (go to Library and scroll down to the Vault). Then click on "add to project":
Then open your project in the Unreal Editor and navigate to the folder created from the package:
You are now ready to use the package as you want. Take a look at the demo level located in the "Maps" folder to get an overview of all the effects.
How to Add a Post-Process Effect in My Level ?
To add a post-process effect, a post-process volume is required. See the official documentation.
To add one of the post-process effects:
- Select a post-process instanced material from the “Instance” folder
- Select the post-process volume in your level
- Go the properties of the volume (via the “details” panel)
- Find the “blendable” section
- Add a new slot
- Use the arrow to load the material
The order of the materials in the blendable list doesn’t matter, as each material has its own priority value. For more information see the documentation.
Why Is One the Post-Process Not Producing Any Results on Screen ?
Some of the post-process materials require additional engine features, which can be enable in the project settings. Make sure the "Custom Stencil" is enabled for example.
Take also in consideration the scalability settings, which can have an impact on the rendering of the engine. Low settings will sometimes disable post-process effects:
How to Update a Post-Process Material at Runtime ?
There are two ways to control by blueprint/c++ a material during gameplay :
The first solution is the easiest to implement. Just replace the main blending parameter of the material by one from a parameter collection that you created.
How to Manually Control the Speed of the "Pulse" Post-Process ?
The pulse post-process rely on a time variable by default. Open the “matpulseforce” material and simply replace the section before the “frac” node by a custom constant value. This value can be exposed as a parameter to be driven by gameplay code later. The range expected for the value must be between 0 to 1.
How to Change the Source Location of the "Pulse" Post-Process ?
This change can be a bit tricky if you are not familiar with material editing. Open the “matpulseforce” material and replace the “camera relative world position” node by new nodes, as showed by the images below.
Old location.
New location.
The "constant 3" node is the new source of the pulse effect in world space. You can convert this node into a parameter to control it during gameplay.
Why Are Some Post-Processes Not Appearing Properly in the Editor ?
This is because of a technical limitation of the unreal engine editor. Screen space UV coordinates are not updated properly for the viewport which can lead to "broken" effects like in the example below. The only way to visualize properly an effect is to use the "fullscreen" mode (by pressing F11) or by running your project in standalone game mode.
Why Are Some Post-Processes nor Working Properly with Screen Percentage ?
Since the version 4.19 of Unreal Engine the Screen Percentage feature has changed and some post-processes may not work properly. Make sure to download the latest version of the pack from the Unreal Marketplace to get the bug fixes regarding this issue.