Overview
Lanterns of the Lost
Lanterns of the Lost - Cinematic Trailer
Lanterns of the Lost is a lighting-focused project created in Unreal Engine 5.5.3 that explores how time of day alone can reshape the feel of a scene. The goal was to experiment with both daytime and nighttime lighting to bring out different aspects of the same environment, showing how light and shadow can completely shift the viewer’s perception.
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For the nighttime version, the focus was on mood and tension. Using Lumen for dynamic global illumination, I aimed to create soft, haunting glows around the lanterns and church windows, with volumetric fog adding weight to the atmosphere. Mega lights and spotlights were carefully placed to highlight key elements—like the gravestones and hanging lanterns—without overexposing the scene. The result is a dark, quiet space that feels isolated and eerie, where every small light source matters.
Lanterns of the Lost - Daytime
In the daytime version, the mood transforms. The scene feels more grounded and tranquil, with natural light emphasizing the environment’s structure and detail. Here, I focused on balancing direct sunlight with softer shadows, allowing the landscape and foliage to breathe. Height-based volumetric fog remains, but is subtle—used to retain depth without overpowering the clarity of the daytime setting.
Both lighting scenarios make full use of Unreal’s Nanite technology, ensuring high-resolution assets like the church, gravestones, and foliage retain crisp detail no matter how close the camera gets. Terrain was shaped using height maps and tessellation to add realism, and the assets came from Scans Factory, FreshCan 3D, and Quixel Megascans, all customized to fit the tone of the scene.
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This project was an exercise in lighting control, pushing my understanding of how different setups, whether it's the warmth of lanterns at night or the crisp light of day, can define a scene’s emotional weight. It also reinforced how essential subtle adjustments in fog, exposure, and bounce light are when trying to achieve a believable atmosphere.
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Lanterns of the Lost is a personal study in cinematic lighting and environmental storytelling, emphasizing the power of time-of-day shifts to transform a world’s tone with minimal changes to its physical layout.