Develop a stunning video with Substrate
Mondlicht Studios pushes the boundaries of Unreal Engine 5’s new Substrate tool in the creation of the stunning Symphony cinematic
UNREAL ENGINE 5.2
This project was created in collaboration with Epic Games and BMW at the beginning of 2023 for the Game Developers Conference (GDC), where a whole series of updates and brand new features for Unreal Engine’s latest iteration were announced to the world.
Besides the mind-blowing new Procedural Content Generation (PCG) framework, another huge addition is Substrate, the material authoring system found in Unreal Engine. In addition to all the new material properties with different types of multi-layer shading, the Substrate tooling opens up more opportunities for setting up and mixing several materials into one, which enables the achievement of more complex and photorealistic effects for artists.
This became our primary idea: to try to pull off as many gorgeous visuals as we could based on the new possibilities and using various effects. The video itself is a mix of the technical capabilities of the engine and our own creativity. An important part of the project was the fact that we wanted to use real-time rendering and avoid the Path Tracer. Of course, before its official release Substrate was at an early stage, so we had to use some neat tricks to make sure everything worked as it should.
Our take on the final video is best explained by our CEO, David Schaefer: “This project, even though on a tight deadline and with many obstacles to overcome, was extremely enjoyable. We had total creative freedom – which is really rare – using this beautiful BMW model to show off what we could do in Unreal with Substrate.
“We were incredibly honoured to be regarded as one of the best CGI production companies in the world, but have still pushed our creativity more and more with projects at the intersection of the roles of a production company and an ad agency. Symphony was one of those projects we could pour our creativity into more than just executing a brief in the most beautiful way we could.”
02a
01 IDEATION AND FIRST DRAFTS
A car is one of the best but also most demanding products to work with. It’s perfect to test out a complex set of materials. Metal, car paint, rubber, glass and plastics with various finishes combined with the environment create dynamic reflections in action. All of that makes a car the ideal candidate for showcasing what a new material authoring system is able to achieve.
Tweaking car
