Environmental VFX

Published: February 2, 2024

Last Edited: April 12, 2024


Tools used:

Substance Designer
Unreal Engine

Assorted environmental VFX and shaders for a project I was working on at Earthshine. Many of the shaders react to other objects using distance fields, or use procedural UVs.

Particle effects made with Niagara.

Lava

Lava Shader
The shader reacts to the rocks being moved around in it!

Water

Waterfall VFX and River Foam shader. I was also responsible for all other assets in this video
Waterfall VFX

The water itself is a translucent shader. The waterfall is a static mesh with a dithered masked shader, vertex offsetting, and texture panning to give the illusion of movement, with a some particle effects at the base to add some splashes.

The river foam is an additional plane mesh on top of the water with a dithered masked shader. The shader reacts to objects intersecting it via distance fields.

Ocean shader and crashing waves VFX. I was also responsible for all other assets in this video

Translucent ocean shader with Gerstner waves. The foam around the rocks are part of this shader, and are automatically generated. The height of the waves also react to the depth of the water. The crashing waves are a manually placed particle effect.

Waves on the shore. I was also responsible for all other assets in this video

The waves on the shore are a manually placed particle effect.

Other

Opaque parallax ice shader. I was also responsible for all other assets in this video
Triplanar mossy rock shader. I was also responsible for all other assets in this video
Falling leaves VFX. I was also responsible for all other assets in this video