Quick and Easy Top-Down-Maps using Blender!

 Yo!

Today I want to share a super useful trick I found out about recently. As you may know, if you've gone through even just one of my blog posts, I tend to use Blender to block out my levels and import those into Unreal. It's very quick, and I'm super used to the program, so it lets me iterate on level ideas extremely quickly. As it turns out, you can also use Blender to make quick, ultra-accurate Top-Down maps. Top down maps usually take a TON of time, especially if you want 'em to be good. It's one of the most arduous parts of level design, in my opinion, and that's saying something! This job is time-consuming as is!

So, the good news is, Blender can help! Now, this mostly works with levels made in Blender, or Maya, theoretically, because they need to be meshes. In theory, you can get stuff modelled in Unreal exported as an FBX, which can then be imported into Blender, no problem, but if you have a ton of models and a landscape, I'm not entirely sure how well the process will go. 

So, lets assume you have made a nice level blockout in either Maya or Blender. Import the mesh and head to the camera settings. Set the scene settings here to however big you want your map image to be.

I went pretty big with my image size. Next is the camera settings. Freestyle pen is the option we want- It'll turn edges into white lines. Perfect for blueprints or maps!

Now, we need an orthographic camera in the level. Make a camera, set it to orthographic (obviously...) and position it above the level. 

Here's my specific camera settings. Set the "Clip Start" and "End" carefully- that's going to determine what's inside the render. You don't always want the entire map, just the relevant polygons is usually best. 

That's pretty much it. Hit F12 and peep the render. You might need to set the active camera to the orthographic one if it didn't happen automatically. It'll come out looking like this! Wow!

From here's it's just a matter of taking the image into Photoshop, or your graphics tool of choice, and editing away any rough edges and adding detail where necessary. 

For now, that's pretty much my MO. I want to get a bit deeper into this, and try to see if I can automate showing off different elevations. I'll make a better guide later!