UE5 Foliage Wind System (Pivot Painter)

This project is an exploration of dynamic vegetation to add dynamic and realistic wind-driven grass materials to game environments. The dynamic material is built based on Pivot Painter workflows and Unreal Engine’s Content Examples. I am generally satisfied with the final result.

The material takes velocity vectors as input. In its current state, the grass can interact with character position and movement, allowing it to be pushed aside naturally. By using a Render Target to record character movement trajectories and velocity vectors, the system has the potential to support more advanced interactions, such as responding to gameplay abilities.

Houdini was used to add pivot data and X-vector information to the meshes, which are then utilized in Unreal Engine material nodes to achieve the wind animation effect.

Grass static meshes are sourced from a Fab Marketplace vegetation asset pack - temperate Vegetation: optimized Grass Library