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par Thomas » Ven Juil 12, 2019 11:16 pm
UE is indeed more oriented towards the 3D, the very first window that appears when loading an UE project is in fact a 3D viewport.
Despite that, UE is more an assembly line than a real 3D modeling tool (except basic rig, the software doesn't provide any simple way to modify the 3D assets used in a project. That means, no modeling). The current state of UE offers a lot of passerels between various other softwares (Blender, Photoshop...) in order to import 3D and 2D assets inside an UE project.
Once the assets are imported, UE provides tools to place them in the 3D space, apply textures and various maps (color, light, shadow, normal maps...) to 3D assets, and define their properties (collisions, triggers...) to create a sort of level of a video game. You can also change the positions and properties of assets over time using the sequencer of UE.
This has been tweaked by some animation studios to create some scenes and movies, like a cinematic shot from a video game. Like this, UE drops its game maker purpose and becomes a film maker tool.
The main advantage of using UE for animation studios instead of other 3D rendering softwares is based on the fact that UE is a real-time engine. Meaning there is little to no render time when time comes to test different lighting methods, different angles for the camera and so on. So basically, these studios have a huge time gain on this part.
Concerning ILIAD now, it comes as an editing tool imbeded in the software, which, as I said, UE lacks. With it, people will be able to edit their textures (2D canvas usable as maps on any 3D asset) without having to import/export from photoshop or any 2D drawing software. For now, with ILIAD, we're able to edit a single image, and we keep all the UE logic, meaning people will be able to use it at full power if they know how to use UE and its 3D viewport.
With Odyssey, we'll have full control. We'll immediately get rid of most of the UE interface to be the more user-friendly we can be for various animators. We won't ditch the 3D possibilities of UE, but you can imagine something like this: at the start of Odyssey, some presets of projects interface styles will be offered to the user, like storyboard, 2D shot or 3D scene, for example, and depending on the user's choice, a custom interface with only the elements useful to the type of project selectionned will appear. Of course, all the tools of Odyssey will be available, no matter the choice, but they'll be hidden at first, and will only open if the user choose to open them. (for example, the 3D viewport won't show if the user selected a 2D shot project, until the user explicitely tells the software he wants to make the 3D viewport appears.).
Basically, tl;dr : ILIAD will require some knowledge of Unreal Engine. Odyssey won't, and will be a software of his own.