I’ve been dabbling lately in film projects ever since I had a story idea based off Frank Herbert’s Dune. The latest film from Dennis Villeneuve was nothing short of a masterpiece and has greatly inspired me to pick up the camera.
I’ve been working on a 10 min tops screenplay for my story , a fremen warrior on a mission in the deep desert (not going to spoil more! The stillsuit is a work in progress as I type this , a combination of foam and glue as well as 3d printed pieces to top it off have all been a side hobby for the past 6 months.
With Unreal 5 and Lumen , I knew I had to create a portion of Wadi Rum, or at least a set that resembles the geological characteristics of Wadi Rum. This has sent me down a Houdini procedural generation rabbit hole for Wadi Rum style butte and rocks. Plenty of photo reference has been gathered and I was quickly able to get results through a combination of Houdini and Substance.
Throw the results into Unreal and some quick dynamic sky lighting and we can check out the results.
Not to shabby, I’m continuing with experimenting with getting a few more details out of Houdini / Nanite, the terrain is going to be a next step , currently in order to get displacement we have to use the “virtual height mesh” which has been a bit finicky to work with , especially when it comes to texture resolution quality.
Ill be back with more updates and some 3d printed props!
Thanks!