Unreal Engine for VJs: From Metahuman to Show-Ready Loops
I’ve been wanting to share my Unreal Engine workflow for a long time, but the idea of recording a complete, concise walkthrough always felt a bit daunting. What finally pushed me to do it were requests from some superfans for this kind of breakdown. It made me realize that—even if the tutorial isn’t perfect—it’s worth sharing my process if it helps move the VJ scene forward.
Unreal Engine Walkthrough
This is a raw walkthrough of how I created the Sentience VJ loops in Unreal Engine, from configuring the Metahuman to building the background and animating the face and lasers.
Here are links to the tutorials I mention:
Creation Process
Sentience was created using a Metahuman head inside Unreal Engine 5 (UE5). I wanted a minimal look—simplicity can be powerful, and keeping elements minimal makes them easier to mix with other visuals in a VJ’s library.
Concept
The idea was simple: a synth’s head is mounted on a wall, waking up and becoming sentient.
I started with a quick proof-of-concept using a Metahuman from a previous project—mainly to test facial animation and positioning within a circular frame I modeled directly in UE5. Once I had a basic test working, I created a new female Metahuman in the Metahuman Creator web app, adjusting the face to be rounder so it fit better within the circular mount.
After importing the character into UE5 via Quixel Bridge (in the highest quality setting), the first task was removing the body and neck. I followed this tutorial that used material masking to make them invisible—technically, the Metahuman was still there, just partially hidden.
Synth Look
Since Metahumans are highly realistic—complete with skin textures and facial fuzz—I stripped those details away. I removed the facial fuzz, wiped out makeup, and replaced the skin texture with a plain white material.
At this stage, I had basic lighting already set up from previous projects: two Rect Lights and a rim light from behind (which later turned out to be a near disaster). To enhance the synth aesthetic, I wanted an imprinted circular marking on the forehead. Instead of modeling it separately, I followed this tutorial that fakes the effect by modifying the face’s color and normal maps. It worked well enough for what I needed.
The circular mount felt a bit flat, so I gave it a convex shape and added an external emissive ring, creating these elements in Cinema 4D before importing them into UE5.
Animating the Face
Animating the face was surprisingly straightforward. I followed this tutorial on Metahuman Face Expressions and chose a preset where the character opens its mouth. That’s when I had the idea to introduce a laser beam.
To create the beam, I used a simple cylinder modeled directly in UE5 and animated its movement in the sequencer. The result was exciting—it had real potential.
Building on that, I moved to the next loop: four different expressions combined with subtle shifts in the face’s angle. But something was off—it looked flat and unremarkable.
The Light Revelation
The breakthrough came when I started working on another loop—a rotating light that revealed the face from different angles. Unlike my previous lighting setup, this new Rect Light was positioned lower, reflecting beautifully on the face and adding much-needed depth. It was a game-changer.
I adjusted the entire lighting setup to use these lower-angled lights, and suddenly, everything clicked into place.
Rendering & Final Touches
I rendered the loops using the Path Tracer renderer at 1000 samples to get the clearest image possible. While I could have reduced noise in DaVinci Resolve, I prefer to avoid post-processing when I can—it adds extra steps and creates additional loop variations, making things cumbersome. I only apply noise reduction when absolutely necessary.
Resolume Arena Project
Creating this project was a lot of fun. Since all loops share the same camera angle, layering them in Resolume is seamless. Changing blend modes unlocks unexpected new looks.
For added flexibility, I included a few shape layers for Resolume’s Mask Mode, allowing VJs to split the face in half and mix different expressions or colors. I also applied various color treatments with the Colorize effect to inspire different color schemes.
In case you want to see how the final VJ loops mix inside Resolume VJ software – watch the Resolume Walkthrough video on the release post.
Final Thoughts
Sentience is all about expression—both human and machine. It’s minimal yet powerful, structured yet flexible. I hope it sparks new ideas for your own mixes!
I hope this gave you a useful peek into how I approach things, maybe helps you get started with Unreal yourself—and ultimately leads to better visuals out there.
Let me know if you have any feedback or insights via email at [email protected] or DM me on Patreon / Facebook / Instagram.
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