Video summary

Unreal Engine 5.3 Displacement Tessellation Tutorial - THE CORRECT WAY! #unrealengine5

Main summary

Key takeaways

Technology

Summary of the Tutorial (Unreal Engine 5.3 Displacement Tessellation)

  • Goal / Key feature: The tutorial demonstrates UE 5.3 displacement tessellation—using a material’s Displacement input to transform a surface from a “normal” appearance into a visibly displaced one.
  • Important requirement: The setup must be done in Unreal Engine 5.3. The speaker warns that UE 5.2 and earlier don’t work for this method.

Steps / Setup (Render Configuration + Enabling Tessellation)

  1. Open UE 5.3, then close it (needed to edit config files).
  2. Navigate to the project folder:
    • Configuration → DefaultEngine

  3. In the Render settings, add these console variables:

    • r.Nanite.AllowTessellation=1
    • r.Nanite.Tessellation=1

The speaker notes these are also included in the video description for easy copy/paste.

  1. Reopen the project so tessellation is enabled.

Creating a Material with Displacement (Megascans Workflow)

  1. In the editor, the speaker prepares a mesh (to compare results).

  2. Use Quixel Bridge / Megascans assets (rock-like surfaces are recommended for clear tessellation visibility).

    • Example assets mentioned: beach cliff, leech and covered rock, rock cliff

  3. Create a material and import the three texture maps, then connect them:

    • Base Color → color/albedo texture
    • Normal → normal texture
    • Roughness / Ambient Occlusion → connected from additional channels (channel routing is described in the tutorial)
    • Blue channel (B) → Displacement

  4. Apply the material and return to the viewport.

Visual verification / tuning

  • To make displacement obvious, increase Magnitude (example given: set to 20).
  • It can work at lower magnitude (example: 4), but the effect will be less noticeable.

Applying and Troubleshooting (Nanite Enablement / Console Commands)

  • The tutorial uses a comparison method:
    • Apply the new displacement material to one object
    • Apply the old/non-displacement material to another object
  • The desired result should appear quickly, but may not always.

If displacement/tessellation doesn’t show

  1. In the material, search for Nanite and enable “Enable Nanite support.”
  2. If it still doesn’t update, the speaker suggests console commands may be required.
  3. If needed, re-enter similar commands but remove the “equal” portion (the speaker explains how to rewrite the commands in the engine console), and confirm the tessellation variables are set correctly.

Where It Works

The speaker claims the approach works broadly for:

  • Landscapes
  • Static meshes

Main Speakers / Sources

  • Speaker: The tutorial author (speaks directly throughout the subtitles).
  • Primary external sources:
    • Unreal Engine 5.3
    • Quixel Bridge / Megascans (texture asset source)

Original video