Hey everyone!
I had an idea for a healing/ nature effect inspired by a post from @Scoles about a lightning material.
Over the last week I created the effect and put everything together in a blueprint. I wanted to see how a cast of that effect could look like. I will link my iterations below!
The blueprint works fine but I dont like how the effect turned out. I think the parts on their own are ok but the whole picture feels not right at all.
Do you have any idea on how to improve the effect? I would love to get some feedback from you!
1: “more hellfire than heal”
2:
3:
4: last update: “casting the effect in the third person project”
I hope Syncskech is ok for everyone. I could post most of the iterations on youtube aswell.
Thank you all so much for your help!
I don’t think any one component is at fault - it feels to me like the animation across the effect is very linear and too even. To a player, it would be unclear when the ability has actually started healing, and when it would have ended.
I would suggest trying to apply more animation principles to the timing - think about the phases of your effect; activation, buildup, release, and aftermath, and ways you can clearly indicate where one ends and the other begins! If some parts are calm, the others can have more punch and explosiveness to them.
Once the timing is where you want it, you can spend more time adjusting the color scheme of the effect to make sure that it’s legible and has a clear identity.
Thank you! I will try that!
I thought about adding a Beam to indecate the effect cone.
The problem I’m having there is, I don’t know how to create a Beam that looks volumetric. I found some tutoriels for super simple Beam particles and some reals for awsome looking ones. I tryed to work something out but they always are looking flat and not moving at all.
What are your thoughts about this idea and do you have any tips on that part?
Thank you again for your feedback and sorry that I responded so late!
I would say some of your shape language don’t work well together.
I really like the plant blooming that really indicates something is growing and you could link that to healing.
same for your expanding ring it really conveys energy being pushed outwards.
When creating healing think about BPM and your heartrate, if it’s lower you’ll get a calm feeling. so generally minimaze the particle amount, remove any hard edges and sharp shapes lower the speed etc.
take a look at all the WoW healing effects and how they do it
Thank you, I will watch that video a few times more! Wow and blizzard in general have a lot of cool references.
I also liked the flower on it’s own a lot more than the “final” effect. The problem is, I don’t really known how to fit it into a Spell. Just put it in the middle of a circle? I was afraid of it being to big and clunky, and might obscure the character to much.
I really like these swirling lights around the character, but I don’t know how to make them effectively. I tried to replicate the effect with ribbon particles but they seem to break a lot.
Maybe it would be better if I changed it to a targeted effect and let the flower bloom over the character with some leaves falling down.
What do you think would be the best approach?
And again: thank you so much!
I’d say use your second video as base, rework some of the timing and storytelling.
Compose your effect in what is most convincing way possible.
What’s the purpose of the effect e.g. Deal damage, heal, stun players etc.
What is the core element e.g. Big fist, giant ice spike. In your case use the blooming flower.
what are the metrics of the effect, scale, time, amount of healing that i does etc.
all that should tie into your animations and composition.
Have a simple story for example, flower blooms, healing petals come off.
Do they linger or give of energy very intensely and rapidly?
Maybe they give a damage buff or armor buff aswell?
These are all secondary actions that you can convey aswell, but focus on the primary for now
For me what helps to think about these things is to take a step back, take a break and come back or rebuild everything depending on the situation and the amount of time left.
Yeah I didn’t really worked on it since my post. I have a few ideas, but I started to lern how to make projectiles and didn’t had the time to come back to it.
Nevertheless I really liked your feedback! When I get back to it I will try to put all of it to use.
Thank you again, it’s helping a lot!
