FLARE lights the Mountain sky in Unreal Engine 5

Nanite and Lumen in action synthesizing some photorealism in this UE5 tech demo. The game is running at about 60fps on an RTX 3070 with Raytracing. I wonder how well Unreal Engine 5 graphics will work on a PS5?
The sound is a mix of general wind ambiance and binaural wind whistling for an extra touch of realism(try it with earphones!). Learned how to make the Exponential Height Fog work with the SunSky actor, and react to it. Look for the Unreal Tutorial for SunSky!
The flare is a light actor with a massive radius, and Niagara particles attached. (smoke and trail).
Using the snow pack from Megascans mostly.
Follow me on Instagram: / parall.peak
Follow me on ArtStation: www.artstation...

[@Xerxe5]

Welp, that's it folks, we've officially achieved "graphics".

[@MelhemSfeir]

Love this!

[@UnchartedWorlds]

@Spencer hahahah 😂

[@zdenekburian1366]

@@MelhemSfeir Not only are you a master of computer graphics and experimentation with this tool, your very interesting cultural background can be understood from your works, thanx for the uploads

[@guily6669]

Now we need matching physics and GPGPU raw POWER calculating things like the drops of water actually filling everything exactly like real life until it floods everything, then even water comes out of the screen, floods the PC and kapufff :)

[@nickplays2022]

But how much disk space does it take?

[@lunaranxiety4589]

That closeup of those rocks on the ground with the handheld camera is so convincing. It's crazy, it really is haha

[@pushqrdx]

some may say it's unreal

[@orrefis]

I agree except for the closeup of the snow, they still got work to do there, but I can't imagine that's something they prioritize. Also a bit meta I guess is the fact that most handhelds now have a stabilizer (either hardware or software) so you don't really get those "screen shakes", at least not the way they're simulated here.

[@jojolafrite90]

To have the same level of detail in a 3D suite like Blender, you could use adaptative subdivision (edit: And it's only useful during rendering), but you'd probably need what would seem like an infinite amount of RAM compared to the amount of it found in common PC's.

[@jandreb0324]

@@orrefis if I may, I believe some amount of sub surface scattering in the snow may have helped... I may be wrong though😅 anyways, kudos to these guys... it really is a breath taking piece

[@arabiannights5301]

@@orrefis Yeah the snow looks a lot more like cement or some kind of gypsum. That and a flickering shadow gave it away, but you could convince me it's real footage at a glance if I didn't know better ngl.

[@xjlskrmn1517]

Midway through the video, i forgot I was watching unreal engine 5 and I was like "Why am I watching mountains?".

[@Ben-ry1py]

This is the first video I've seen of realtime graphics that I can't tell it's not real, even after knowing it isn't. Bravo!!

[@Kajenx]

There were two minor things for me. One was the shadows on the distant mountain peak looks like they were pixelated or just chunky. This could either be from the poly count of the model itself, or just an artifact that'll be worked out of lumen eventually. (On second look, it might actually be some kind of shadow bias artifact. The shadows look striped.) The other was the close ups of the snow without subsurface scattering. It looked very hard-surface. I don't think Lumen can do SSS yet, so that'll likely be fixed too. Very minor things, though. I think we really are finally "there" with this generation of graphics. The next big step will be AI controlled character rigs so character actually move correctly.

[@cherrychocolate111]

Really, even with the snow? The snow on the ground with the rocks gave it totally away for me.

[@garyhamilton2104]

I never really fully understood the impact that realistic and high quality lighting has on a scene. Now I do

[@evolicious]

Now you know why the plebs that hate on RT have the big dumb

[@LionHrodgari]

Yeah its hard to explain but it felt like I was watching a REAL shot of someone filming FAKE snow. Like you can see the snow is fake because its a bit pixelated but somehow it still looks like its beeing shot in real life because the light makes the scene itself look real.

[@Stellarian]

This is mind-blowing wow

[@MelhemSfeir]

Thanks!!!

[@MrArjanvT]

I'm trying to figure out why I like so much to look at hyper realistic simulations of reality when I can also look away from the screen to see hyper realism..yet here I am

[@cherubino95]

I think because the computer do things better than real life... I mean, house or snow are "perfect" in computer graphics because they don't have the impurity of the real world

[@thelordoftime803]

It's because we are gods in the virtual reality and we're making it appear more and more real. You don't have the same power over reality, so it has lost your interest even if it looks as real as it gets.

[@ninjafruitchilled]

Well I don't about you, but I sure don't have mountains like this anywhere near me.

[@danielpena7428]

Because, like a purple supervillain once said: "Reality is often disappointing"

[@arabiannights5301]

@@cherubino95 Meh, more because having to actually go to a mountain takes time, money and preparation. Still a fun thing to do, but there's something uniquely impressive about having it rendered on your screen. If I had to pick one or the other I'd still take actually visiting the real thing though.

[@Stormz.1337]

Seeing this makes me wanna have a Red Dead Redemption 2 remake in UE5 ;)

[@LucasBorges-nx7hu]

I was thinking, can't wait to a RDR with this engine.... just amazing

[@amac7706]

Snap!

[@serror3416]

That's funny. Rdr2 also came to mind when I watched this.

[@nickplays2022]

I think it would take too much space

[@evolicious]

R* uses their own engine, so no.

[@Darrf]

Holy Cow that shaky cam and focus switching makes it even more realistic.

[@GeekyDud]

I'm late but I think this demo shows that we finally have a need for better assets. The ONLY time in this video where the image breaks down that I noticed is in the close up shot at 0:44 , where some of the rock textures kinda break down up close. This is no fault of you, or really even the 3d artists who scanned and created the assets. It's just that now with Nanite and such realistic lighting, we have a need for higher quality assets. And because the demo looks so real that moment falls into the "uncanny valley", which is a compliment imo, as it's a testament to just how realistic everything else looks.

[@MelhemSfeir]

Agreed

[@kudjo24]

Shit I thought that looked the best, stuff is off with snow particles in other shots rather

[@mattbecker3634]

As my friend said when we watched this together, "usually graphics in games are good until you get close then that breaks the illusion. In this, the closer you get, the more convinced you are!"

[@brainmind4070]

You obviously weren't looking at the snow close-up.

[@mattbecker3634]

@@brainmind4070 yeah the snow effect was the worst part but the ice on the walls and the rocks and terrain was beyond belief.

[@brainmind4070]

@@mattbecker3634 All the snow/ice needs more subsurface scattering. Even from a bit of a distance, you can tell something is wrong. But that super-close-up shot of the snow made it look like white cement.

[@kebabfoto]

holy shit that's so nice, I showed this to my friend without showing him the title of the video and he couldn't tell it was fake until I told him it was.

[@MelhemSfeir]

Love this

[@gamma3d842]

woooooow!!!! this is reality 100%... insane!!

[@MelhemSfeir]

Thank you!!!

[@Freddie1M]

I think the flare was unrealistic, it wouldn't have gone that far

[@maxpayne69.]

Flare is supposed to show the new lighting engine

[@Freddie1M]

@@maxpayne69. yeh but went too far, not realistic projectile mechanics

[@linteegames7300]

@@Freddie1M it is real projectile mechanics though just because it went further than a normal flair doesn’t mean it’s unrealistic

[@FortniteDefiantTuber]

This makes me want a game set in The Rocky Mountains where you’re stranded and have to survive on your own while surviving horrible mountain creatures that are hunting you down 👀

[@DaysOfFunder]

As a game dev that's a great idea...

[@maxpayne69.]

Check out “Kholat” 👌🏻☠️☠️☠️

[@kudjo24]

Canadian Rockies would be ideal, far more hostile than American rockies.

[@NickBDesigns]

Holy moly, what in the world ? This looks amazing realistic. I bet you gpu is on fire 🔥

[@illironiks]

that's the thing with UE5...it really isn't

[@greenmih]

that evening light on the peak gave me chills

[@makanansari144]

I love it amazing how we reached to this point! two things I think could make it even better was translucent reflective snow and the shadows from flare maybe could be smoother since it's not that strong like sun, keep it up *.*

[@tkkstar]

This one has to be my favorite of yours by far! The flares are a nice touch.

[@MelhemSfeir]

Thank you!

[@presidentresident]

But for real, incredible. Im realizing from watching a bunch of these that this isn't just plug and play to make it look this good. Great job.

[@chattclouds8281]

I grew up on video games and I'm still blown away by the way this looks.

[@MelhemSfeir]

Thank you!

[@lxc647]

I don't care what game this looks so mind blowing it will instantly get me interested.

[@taylormalone2627]

RDR3 is about to be lit

[@SuPaKidge]

Gta 6 aswell

[@DrillManga]

This is so astonishing. You're amazingly talented, and that transition of the sunlight gave me chills. Imagine seeing such a spectacle in real life. I would immediately believe the world was flat HAHA! I'm serious!

[@MelhemSfeir]

Thanks a lot! I feel the same! Imagine you can just control the sunlight like that!

[@jameswhite2133]

Pretty soon we could be living in these worlds, crazy

[@shelby4475]

This is freakin insane!!! THE QUALITY!!!!

[@MelhemSfeir]

Thanks!

[@BooneDavey]

Bless u for not doing just another one in the rocky desert.

[@Art1stical]

Great job! You might want to look into reducing the fall speed of the flare. Makes the mountain look tiny. If things fall at 10 m/s (Earth's gravity), having the flare drop across the screen in less than 10 seconds means the mountain is less than 100 meters tall xD Just a minor observation. Everything else is impeccable. The handheld section looks incredible.

[@3ban682]

No, objects falling accelerate at a rate of 10 m/s, so after 10 seconds it would have fallen approximately 550 meters.

[@Art1stical]

@@3ban682 You are absolutely right. I confused the gravity acceleration concept with terminal velocity. Still, i do think the flare looks like, it either moves too fast, or the mountain looks small. After giving it some thought, I think it has to do with air resistance, and the relatively slower fall rate of a flare.

[@themusketeer9458]

Awesome! Is it possible to make this downloadable? I wanna zoom around and shoot flares everywhere😂

[@FromStudyToSleep]

It's here. I've been telling people for 10 years that within 10 years our games will look like movies

[@Ccodebits]

This is truly Unreal

[@McDaniel77]

Impressive! This is almost photorealistic.

[@aliahmed7618]

I’m just speechless 😶

[@UnrealArchvizVideoTutorial]

Wow. Fantastic work. Nice!!!

[@binxyde]

So awesome!!! Especially the camera handling and focussing in the beginning - so damn real! I think UE5 will change the game(ing). 🥰

[@jaberus2]

Walking through a mountain recording and pretending its UE5 . . . Nice

[@MelhemSfeir]

lol you caught me!

[@davidc1179]

Creating an UE5 environment and pretending it's reality... Tssk.

[@jaberus2]

@@davidc1179 whooosh

[@PhilW222]

This is crazy good!

[@proudpatroiot5676]

Bruh imagine if steep looked like this

[@RapidVidsProductions]

steep 2

[@D3kryption]

Excellent work!

[@DAG_42]

Wasn't convinced it was computer graphics until I saw the snow close-up... This would be crazy in a game

[@BigOlBoxofSTFU]

I'm 100% convinced we are in a simulation now

[@holzteppichverleger]

The can call it REAL engine by now

[@CountMount-Cristus]

That's smooth

[@brutaltamilgaming7416]

This is real game scene . I can't believe that

[@gaboaaa23]

me in 20 years: Hi son, do you watch a documentary chanel? No dad....thats Playstation8

[@_.kymari._5365]

The futur is now *^*

[@tmattoneill]

the future is snow

[@pomponel]

Amazing, incredible, very good job ..! I hope one day to be free from misery and to be able to buy a PC that can draw like this with the Unreal engine.

[@user-pw7ss3ud6m]

What a big mountain of foam

[@KaviNeo]

*Star Citizen* Needs this Engine. 🔥

[@crustman5982]

Why? then they’d actually be able to finish it

[@noahjoseph19982012]

The moment the slider moved real time hit me

[@bluegizmo1983]

I spotted one minor shadow glitch in the very beginning of the video (horizontal black bands where a shadow should be, right in the top middle of the screen around 0:05), but other than that it was perfect! Most realistic realtime scene I've ever seen!

[@pijusmagnificus3747]

This is getting insane... Amazing job dude👍🏻

[@crashoverwrite5196]

Sick just amazing. I fu..... love it. The snow needs an upgrade but damn

[@MelhemSfeir]

Thank you!!!

[@JStevensdk7]

But will anyone ever make a killer FPS out of it at this quality? Never.......

[@jalpranjal]

Looks incredible.

[@augury2699]

Even more interesting is how some of the light remains even after the flare goes behind the mountain. If you've ever been in a dark room and just got a quick flash of light you know what I'm trying to say.

[@kizzgizz]

This is looking more realistic than reality

[@tubularmonkeymaniac]

Reality only has 4GB of video memory

[@TheAdibo]

cool & flarey walkthrough

[@bobtruck1594]

Man..... we have come a long way. Almost there. Very close.

[@D71219ONE]

Plot twist, this is actual footage of a real mountain.

[@pepperey1986]

I'm predicting UE7 will be when games will look the same as irl

[@boastyy]

That looks awesome, would even make an awesome game with two guys in snow camo sniping, looks so realistic.

[@Dungoan-tz1zr]

someday they will make game in UE5 with quality like this video, this video reminds me of operation lock map and narvik map in battlefield 4 and battlefield 5, I believe in the future WW3 games will achieve such good quality with UE5

[@silva-vini]

this looks absolutely fantastic, but I'd love to see UE5 rendering rather different scenes, not mainly rocks as in every UE5 demo ever. Maybe some urban scenarios? Rainforests? Undersea? Cant wait to see what this engine is capable of other than drawing rocks.

[@MelhemSfeir]

Maybe check the other vids ?

[@DaysOfFunder]

Keanu Reeves: WOAH

[@rtdietrich]

At the first Moment, I took it for real..... wow

[@TristanCleveland]

This gives me the same feeling as watching a Jimmy Chin mountaineering video... and that's insane.

[@MelhemSfeir]

Thanks Tristan!

[@peruface]

Imagine a brand new shadow of the colossus game on the ps5 like this

[@shinyheart3373]

So, basically you become god with ue5.

[@thronosstudios]

Wait... how did you do that? How did you take live footage of the Swiss Alps and made it seem like it was UE?

[@MelhemSfeir]

:D

[@maxpayne69.]

With graphics like these no mom has got a legit reason left to chide their kids to GO OUT & play! 😍😍😍

[@iizvullok]

Now we need a Skyrim remake in UE5. Bethesda, hire that guy!

[@josevieira3367]

i can activate ray tracing along with nanite and lumen, sorry my ignorance was that i saw ray tracing is debugged! Congratulations on the work it's amazing, perfect, top top top

[@MelhemSfeir]

Thanks!!!!

[@relaxingblog]

It was great and beautiful. Good luck👌

[@patyfreenam860]

Great work, the only cons if I may is the closeup of the snow shader which looks not really convincing but I guess that a real snow shader at the moment is quite a technical limitation of the engine. Keep up the good work! 👏

[@JDCypr3ss]

Totally unreal!

[@robertprescott9577]

Also love the sliders to adjust the sun.

[@MelhemSfeir]

Thanks Robert !

[@benjamink5546]

You always bring the hardest content. 🤩👏👏

[@digiman76]

Its actually more realistic than the real world. Impressive.

[@MelhemSfeir]

Thanks Digiman!

[@Oakyere]

The only thing is the snow looks a lttle off but the camera movements are so convincing

[@Sloot786]

Agreed. Needs some SSS or something.

[@presidentresident]

Yeah when its super close up? I wonder if theres a way to create like 1 million individual snow flakes to cluster wherever the camera is close enough to where you would normally see individual flakes.

[@Oakyere]

@@presidentresident idk if jt needs to be that detailed but it could its missing some of that glitter sparkle look so has, as well as that translucent look

[@Sacrer]

It looks more real than the real world

[@devendra.sanghavi]

I came here to see the flare shoot one more time

[@MelhemSfeir]

Lol haha been a while

[@dsoprano13]

That RTX 3070 is a beast. Imagine what the 3090 could do with UE5

[@iamXanderJones]

now I know I live in a simulation. congrats

with my jaw dropped the entire lenght of the video

[@MelhemSfeir]

So kinds thanks!

[@lancemarchetti8673]

Top class work!

[@manojkale4408]

Mind boggling.. it's look really live like someone took video from 4k camera in those cold wilderness

[@nsmoonwalk414]

awesome

[@solodagci]

It looks realistic. My only gripe is some artifacts in the shadows. They are a dead giveaway. The shadows are not smooth, they have jagged edges and cause some banding.

[@Thanathyr]

C'est tout simplement magnifique 👍😱

[@MelhemSfeir]

Merci !!!

I can feel the cold!

[@stephenmackenzie9016]

Will it play Crysis on High settings though

[@exiledrabbit]

The snow just looks like concrete up close, it doesn't glisten or look like it's made of individual flakes it's just all wrong

[@mycolligjusvartid]

Yes I noticed that too. But very impressive overall

[@_squiff_]

Umm.. So.. This has probably been asked many times but emm... Can we please get a tutorial on your amazing camera. If not that okay. Amazing vids nethertheless. Much love

[@MelhemSfeir]

Thanks! Not focused on tutorials atm but I will at one point

[@illironiks]

dude star citizen with this level graphics.....!!!!

[@VampNeo]

Welcome to NatGeo 4K ! Damn this is so real built with Unreal l.

[@vividdylan400]

Realer than real.

[@vavilin4122]

woooooow!!!!

[@Porschession]

First of all: greatly done! I would improve the following things: 1) in the wider scenes I can see bleeding shadow artifacts. 2) in the detail shot, the snow as well as the stones need to sparke a bit. Now they look too blant. 3) The falling rocks look ridiculous. Get rid of it.

[@lastprophet9904]

Unreal.....surreal...

[@SafouaneAYADI]

Realistic