Using realistic materials is one of the most effective techniques for making truly immersive virtual reality (VR). In the Introduction to Materials class, students will learn the basics of creating materials in Unreal Engine. We will explore the UE material editor interface and learn the basic properties of a material. Students will learn how to import high quality materials from the free UE material library, Quixel, and go over the texture files that comprise a realistic material. By the end of the class, students will model a surrounding environment for their VR world, and will texture their world using they own material library.

This is a “no code” course and will focus on making VR applications primarily using the tools that are already included in Unreal Engine (UE). While the functionality of these VR sessions be more limited, this course will minimize the amount of coding required to make VR applications, so students will not need a background in coding to be successful in this course.