rdSplatTools Tutorial 2.12 – Loading Different rdSplatMaps at runtime

Last Updated: 10th October 2026
Tutorial created using rdSplatTools version 1.00

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It’s possible to change the rdSplatMaps you’re reading from at any time during play.

This can be handy for things such as going underground and moving around multi-layer areas. It’s much more efficient to do this than to build volumetric SplatMaps (although I do plan to add these in an update).

This Tutorial demonstrates this in a simple level with a cave like structure.

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Step 1. Create a new Level

First, create a Basic Level, delete the floor and create a default landscape.

Sculpt the landscape so there’s a hill with a steep side, the paint a hole in the landscape on that side for the cave entrance – also paint a river and small lake on top of the hill. Add a Plane static mesh for the floor of the cave and fill the sides with Rocks. Make a path and flat area on top of the hill to showcase the external rdSplat values.

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Step 2. Paint the Outside rdSplat

Open the rdSplatTools Edit Mode and paint your landscape’s water parts with a mask – then add a falloff of 128.0 to them. Save this.

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Step 3. Paint the Cave rdSplat

Now, to get access to the cave area, I created a second landscape the covering the first, but flat. Then hid the first one while painting this rdSplatMap.

Add two extra layers to this splatmap and paint a faint dot in the center of the cave with layer 2, and the whole inside of the cave with layer 3.

Also paint a small area with layer 1 for a water sound along the edge of one wall

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Step 4. Add the TriggerBoxes around the mouth of the cave and a PointLight

Now add two TriggerBoxes to the level and set it up to encompass the mouth of the cave, one direction in front of the other.

Add Actor Tags to the triggers, call the inside one “InsideTrigger” and the outside on “OutsideTrigger”.

Then add a PointLight and position it over the strongest part of the CaveLayer2 splat value near center horizontally (just over head height).

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Step 5. Create the water sound

In your ThirdPerson BP, add a SceneComponent for the pivot, call it something like “SoundAxisBase” and add an AudioComponent as a child to that – same as tutorial 2.4, the middle part of section 4. Point the audio to your water sound.

You’ll also need the reverb submix, just use the one from Tutorial 2.5, section 4.

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Step 6. Add the control code to the ThirdPerson BP

Now add the initial load splat to the BeginPlay.

Add a BeginOverlap Event and add this code, it loads the specific splat depending on if the enter or exit event is triggered.

Now add this code to the Tick event:

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Step 7. Done

That’s it – position the camera (or PlayerStart) outside the cave (or change the default loaded splat to the cave one) and Play – the water sound will have no reverb but when you move inside the cave, the light will get brighter as you move towards the center of the cave and the water sound will have a reverb to it.

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