Interactive Foliage in UE4

Abbeysaurus

Hey guys, I've been working on getting some shader based interaction for grass and small plants. I'm currently working on small stealth game and hiding in the bushes are a key mechanic. I set out to try and recreate some of the foliage interaction similar to what Naughty Dog did in Uncharted 4. It's not as detailed, but I managed to get something pretty believable without any physics. What do you guys think?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=luH7Gtcv0pY

Here I tried using a RenderTarget to draw the effected grass area, it might look a bit better, but I'm not entirely sure I'm keeping this. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QdE58_rarMo

CybranM

Looking good, I prefer the second video but Im assuming its more performance heavy

Abbeysaurus

CybranM said:

Looking good, I prefer the second video but Im assuming its more performance heavy

Ah thanks man... Well with the 2nd video, I'm having trouble getting the grass to fold back up. There are ways to do it. But performance wise, they are pretty much the same. The second method could be heavy if the RenderTarget res is too high on like a massive map.

Ashervisalis

Both videos look great. It'll look even better if/when you're able to get the grass to fold back up. Good job!

Abbeysaurus

I've made some progress on the shader, The leaves and branches now interact separately with the character.

FreneticPonies

Yeah pivot painter or some Signed Distance Field thing are going to be the way to go for performance reasons.

Looks good! I'd say it delivers the intended effect.

prixster

Your second video is good but for most types of foliage i think first video should be the 'forward-step' for you.
Good luck!

Abbeysaurus

FreneticPonies said:

Yeah pivot painter or some Signed Distance Field thing are going to be the way to go for performance reasons.

Looks good! I'd say it delivers the intended effect.

I haven't had much luck working with distance fields for this approach. Wasn't able to calculate the rotation angle and normalisedrotationaxis without a sphere mask