Codex Temple

First crack at building an Unreal "diorama-style" space. I haven't tried building a right proper "level" before so this was as a fun experience that was incredibly educational. The inspiration was from a webcomic that I occasionally write and draw. In the comic, there is a "McGuffin" called the Codex so I decided to work from that, sketching out an idea for some funky "temple" or altar. For the execution, I wanted to explore avoiding either trim sheets or hi-to-low texturing workflows and instead trying building a bank of materials, and slapping said mats on midpoly models; from there, using vertex paint and RGB masks for layering. For layering, I used the newer(ish) layered materials in UE. This is a really neat system that allows you to easily drag and drop not just materials but also whatever blending "logic" you want to use. And it still supports the usual bank of parameters and options you would usually create, and per instance as well.
What I ended up really digging about this approach was that it got me into the Editor as fast as possible and kept me out of DCC apps as much as possible. Is it efficient for shipping a game? I have no idea. But it was fun :-)
While I still have lots to learn, for a first go it worked pretty well.