Post Process Volume

Post processing volumes can affect multiple things in a level like bloom, depth of field, colour grading and other effects. These are easy to create and can even drastically change the way we play and see created levels. They are essentially a defined area where the properties of the world’s appearance are altered to give a different result much like a photographer doing post processing on his pictures to make them look better.

To create a post processing volume I first selected the builder brush and used it to create a volume in which for me to change the values and appearance of my level. But I want it to be a post processing volume so I used the blue 3D cube on the right side under the volumes section on the left from the viewport and changed the volume into the post processing volume.

The colour grading is used to change the tone mapping of the level. Swapping the colour gradient causes UDK to use different colours to render the level. After playing around with different colour grading for my level I decided that I would change my level to a post process style called blue horror because it gave my level a very cold, lonely and isolated feel.

After a few plays of the level after the post process was added I realised that it sort of made all the work I done on my lights null and void so I decided to take it out and keep the original lighting because it felt better in the level.