News from GDC - Real Time Rendering is Here

Head of Escape Studios Ian Palmer recently attended the Games Development Conference ("GDC") in San Francisco, checking out the latest developments in the Games Industry, part of our industry outreach to make sure we're always teaching the latest technology.

So what's new in Games? The answer - d'oh! - is Virtual Reality, which continues to be the most promising emerging technology in our industry. And, of course, the awesome power of real-time rendering.

Ian Palmer

Virtual Reality
"Everyone was talking about VR, although there is still a lot of work to be done here in terms of content. Occulus, Playstation VR and HTC Vive were the biggest players pushing their own brands of immersion, with some interesting insights into the challenges in terms of interfaces and engaging players in games like Job Simulator (http://jobsimulatorgame.com/) and Rockband VR (http://www.rockbandvr.com/)."

Real-Time Rendering 
Epic's Unreal Engine has really stolen a march on this, and they teamed up with The Mill to demonstrate the potential with their short film Human Race: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MQ3QuZtrxl0.





Behind the Scenes
If you want to see some detail on how they made it, there's some of the "behind the scenes" stuff here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihtniS2jmck. 




The fact that a similar approach was used for the some scenes in Star Wars - Rogue One by ILM (using a tweaked version of UE4) just adds to its credentials and, whilst at the moment this technique is predominately being used for hard surfaces, it is surely only a matter of time before it supports more diverse objects. 

You can see more about the tech here: https://www.unrealengine.com/blog/quality-and-innovation-take-center-stage-during-state-of-unreal-at-gdc-2017."

---Ian Palmer

The Escape Studios Animation Blog offers a personal view on the art of animation and visual effects. To apply for our new BA/MArt starting in September 2017, follow this link. We train all our students with practical real-world skills, to give them the best possible chance of a career in industry. To see some of our animation success stories, follow this link.