rdBPtools Tutorial 18 – Moving Actors to the Foliage System
Last Updated: 11th May 2024
Tutorial created using rdBPtools version 1.30
rdBPtools brought another new tool – the ability to move static meshes, ISMs and HISMs over to the Foliage system. It’s now easy to move instances to and from Foliage.
Before UE5, it was simple, the meshes were added to the Foliage System and nothing else was needed. In UE5.0 and above there is WorldPartition and the FoliageTypes need to be created for each tile in the landscape. This usually prompts for a new FoliageType to be specified/created when dragging meshes into the FoliageTool, this tool gives the option to either create default ones in the meshes folder or to customize how you want (hold down shift when selecting the tool from the menu).
It’s straight forward and quick to do, just follow Steps 1-3 for the simplest way, or Step 4 to use the settings window.
Step 1. Select Blueprints and Meshes in your level
Select the Blueprints (containing StaticMesh Components and/or StaticMesh Instances) and/or StaticMesh Actors in your level that you want to move to the Foliage system. You can do this either from the world itself, or from the outliner.
Step 2. Right-Click and select the Move To Foliage tool
Now right-click on your selection, and choose the “Move to Foliage” tool in the rdBPtools->Conversion section of the menu.
Step 3. Done
Done, that’s it for simple moving – the selected meshes will now all be part of the Foliage system and their actors/blueprints will have been removed.
If your level has WorldPartition enabled, the instances are added to the correct partition’s instance handlers. Foliage Types are automatically created.
Step 4. Move some foliage using the Settings window
The previous method of moving meshes to the foliage looks for existing FoliageTypes, using them where it can – and creating new ones in the same folder as the mesh resides.
If you want more control on which FoliageTypes are used, for instance if you want to use different FoliageTypes for the same mesh, you can hold down the shift key when selecting the menu option. This then opens the window below for each selected actor/instance:
From this window you can select any FoliageType in the project from the top drop-down – note that if the FoliageType you select uses a different mesh – it’s mesh is used when moving to foliage.
The second drop-down allows you to select a FoliageType that is currently in use by the Foliage System.
The Checkbox can be left ticked to always use your choice for the mesh selected, or un-ticked if you want to make a choice for each instance of the mesh.