Cgmasteracademy - The Art of Lighting for Games
https://www.vfx.cgmasteracademy.com/courses/the-art-of-lighting-for-games
Course Format: Standard | Skills Level: Intermediate/Advanced | Duration: 10 weeks
Assignment: Due each week. Expect to spend 10-20 hrs/wk viewing lectures, Q&A, and time on assignments.
PREREQUISITES: Maya, Basic knowledge of Unreal Engine and its tools, Knowledge of Photoshop. Course recommendations: Intro to Unreal 5
MATERIALS: Maya, Unreal Engine, DaVinci Resolve, Photoshop, PureRef
A 10 week course introducing students to the theory of lighting, and how to follow AAA production as a Lighting Artist using tools and workflows within Unreal Engine 5.
- This course will allow each individuals to learn the workflow of a Lighting Artist within a AAA production, varying from realtime rendering to pre-rendered shots for marketing scenes. The game engine that will be used for this course is Unreal Engine 5, created by Epic Games, which will build strong fundamentals on how to create Baked Lighting scene and a Dynamic Lighting scene.
- The students will learn how to adapt to different scenarios using Lumen and explore their favorite area of expertise within the Lighting department, covering Prop/Character Lighting, Environment and Gameplay Lighting, finally an intro to Movie Render Queue for prerendered videos for your lighting scenes. The course will provide the students with a set of different environments and assets, created by Adriano Grasso, to gain more accessibility for each student’s artistic vision.
- Week #1 INTRODUCTION TO THE ART OF LIGHTING : During this lesson we will dive into the basic fundamentals of lighting and where do we take inspirations from. The process will include useful links and Lighting Units to set the ground of the student’s formation. Basic Color Theory | Art Direction and Referencing | PBR/Lighting Units reference documentation
- Week #2 INDOOR SCENE - SEMI BAKED : Quick Intro to Unreal Engine 5 and its Lighting Tools including Direction Light / Skylight / HFog / Reflections / Lightmass importance volume etc. Baking Instructions – EV Values | HDRi setup for baked PBR scene for Skylight | Presenting a general PBR accurate unit sheet as reference for students.
- Week #3 OUTDOOR SCENE - SEMI BAKED: Outdoor Daytime – Skydome & HDRI | Reflection setup + VFX | Volumetric Fog | Player pathing
- Week #4 OUTDOOR SCENE - NIGHT TIME - LUMEN :Dynamic Lighting approach on: Volumetric Sky and Atmosphere | Real-Time reflections | Fill/Area Lights | Dynamic Post Processing
- Week #5 INDOOR SCENE - NIGHT TIME - LUMEN: Dynamic Lighting approach on: Volumetric Sky and Atmosphere | Real-Time reflections | Fill/Area Lights | Dynamic Post Processing
- Week #6 OUTDOOR SCENE - NIGHT TIME - EVENT LIGHTING - LUMEN: Dynamic Lighting approach on: Volumetric Sky and Atmosphere | Real-Time reflections | Fill/Area Lights | Dynamic Post Processing
- Week #7 CHARACTER LIGHTING 1 :Rim lighting | Scene temperature based on reference and mood | Turntable Shop and marketing shots
- Week #8 PROP LIGHTING 2: Rim lighting | Scene temperature based on reference and mood | Turntable Shop and marketing shots
- Week #9 PERSONAL PROJECT - PART I :Create an outdoor dynamic Lumen scene, indoor baked lighting scene. Or an outdoor dynamic cinematic lighting scene and indoor prebaked lighting scene
- Week #10 PERSONAL PROJECT - PART II :Quality and Balance overview | Performance and AAA production commitment times
