I got a lot from GDC’19, but it seems I might have overdone it.
Hello! I’m @Mez & I’ve not been able to give as much time into this as I would have liked for this little project of mine. While that would be true anyway, 'cuz I gotta eat, for this last week, most of my time was also weighted towards other responsibilities; Things like sleep & getting some fluids into my system. That there “convention flu” variant hits like a TRUCK. No joke. As a result, when I haven’t been in a delirium, I’ve been watching movies and asking my self questions. Things like; What do I want this to be now? What do I want to convey with the Overall “Evolve” effect? What do I want to convey with each stage of the character? Is there a feeling I want? A look? A shape? With these questions, I already had a vague idea, but in this last week with my sudden downtime I wanted to sure up those thoughts I already had. No harm in double checking ones work. As it turns out, this convention flu might have helped. SEE! GDC’19 still handing out them dividends! 
Of the movies I’ve watched, these examples I’ve embedded here are the ones that are relevant for inspiration. The order of these starts with things that reminded me of the final stage of the character (with Sevarog), and progresses backwards to the very beginning character. Well… except that last one.
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Christmas Carroll – Spirit of Futures to Come
Lord of the Rings – The Nazgul
Lord of the Rings – The Black Riders
Lord of the Rings – The Nazgul at Weathertop
Harry Potter And The Order Of The Phoenix Main Battle
… and not a movie… but as with all their CG stuff THEY make … should be!
WoW: Wrath of the Lich King CT
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After watching these scenes, I ultimately had two sets of words on my lips. Summaries of a visual idea; “Black Wind” & “Duplicates”. This has changed my initial concept slightly, but instead of taking the time to make an updated “V0.2” of my concept idea, I just went and started to make the darn thing. Sorry if this causes confusion for those of you following along. But – if I’m able to do as I in-vision, you’ll still be able to see exactly what I pulled inspiration from. You should still be able to see the broad strokes of my “V0.1” Concept, or the finer strokes of detail inspired from these embedded videos here in this update.
But Wait! There’s MORE! Got to build that ansitapa-
…I updated Unreal to Version 4.22.0 which has Sequencer Updates to it. I already knew this would break things and it did. But this is ok, as I’ve learned more about Sequencer, and want to do some things that will help make controlling my effects easier with timing and ansitapa-
-tion
As you can see in the little clip above, thanks to a finer understanding of how Sequencer works, I was able to pull off some effects to help sell the “Weakened State” and the start of the “Evolve State”. Don’t know if I’ll keep this as is… but I’m likeing the jest of this.
In the previous update, I mentioned some smoke sim stuff. Fortunately, rendering works even if you’re sleeping (and nothing crashes). These here are some preliminary-WIP-1stVersion-Don’t-Taze-Me-Bro smoke flip books. All of these are SOOOOOOOOOOOO alpha. These are NOT efficient in the least, or at least I don’t think them to be. I’m still playing around with styles and techniques - as well as working on finding if new ones exist. (Which I’ll edit this post with links to if I do)
I can’t say this enough – I have NO IDEA what I’m doing… but I’m getting there. I understand metaphorically what you use the hammer for, and the screwdriver, and the saw. I can see (or atleast I think I see) the steps I might need to take and the fear is replaced with the excitement of possibilities. I don’t know if that’s zen, but it’s nice.
Enjoy it while I can.
Anywho… SMOKE! Let’s get into what I have with the smoke!
From Left to Right-ish:
Far Left in set of Three (as well as the .gif below) - This uses Frames 40 - 250 from my smoke sim. It is 8k - yes I know - and has had all light information from this render removed. Silhouette Only. Want to play with some shader tricks.
Middle in set of Three - This uses Frames 40 - 95. I wanted to see the difference. Don’t see much - yay learning! 8k. Light information is baked in. I’ll be playing around with Motion Vectors. Thanks @simonschreibt. I feel like motion vectors would be over my head to things that already feel over my head but… eh! If I’m already drowning, whats a little more water? (LOL! Aw man… please don’t quote me on that.) 
Far Right in set of Three - This uses… I don’t know. It’s about 34(?) frames, 40 frames as I recall. I made this by clicking random rendered frames and turned the winners into a flip book just so I could see what it looks like. 8k. Light information is baked in, and you better beleve I’ll be playing around with Motion Vectors on this one.
Then there are the “Jets of Smoke” group on the right. These are me testing what might look best with the Sevarog mesh when it appears from out of the floor. These were actually some of the first “direct idea” renders. What I mean by that is; I need the smoke to make “this” motion, can I do that? I do not recall the particulars in their creation as I do for the first group.
Up next… no idea. There is one thing I need to figure out that I can declare though. For my swirly renders here there is this 11 O’Clock angled “+” seam in it, and I’m not sure why. It’s more obvious on the renders with the baked lighting information, though the compression makes it harder to see unless you look for it.
So if I use these, I’ll have to fix that.