LUT stands for color lookup table. It is a small image file that contains color information of your scene.
You can create and use these LUTs in UE5 within Post Process Volume to change the look and feel of your environment.
Here is everything you need to know how to create and use LUTs in Unreal Engine 5.
Prior to doing any color grading or color correction to your environment - make sure your scene and its lighting is finished.
Using LUTs to adjust brightness, contrast or colors will not fix bad lighting.
Insert Post Process Volume into your scene and adjust the following properties to disable auto-exposure inside yours scene.
The LUT property will be found under Color Grading/Misc Section:
You need a screenshot of your environment to use to adjust colors, contrast, brightness and other image properties.
Position your view or camera inside your environment and either use Print Screen, take a screenshot with F9 shortcut or se High-Res Screenshot tool:
All of these options will work. You just need a screenshot of your environment.
Open the screenshot in Photoshop.
Use ONLY Adjustment Layers to adjust the brightness, contrast, saturation and colors of your screenshot.
The Adjustment Layers I usually use:
Use only the ones you need to get the job done.
After making Adjustment Layers you can toggle on/off state of original image and all the adjustments with the following shortcut by clicking on Eye icon of the Layer:
Save the PSD file with all adjustments so you can come back to it and make further changes later if you need to.
Once you've made all the adjustments, you then need to create an LUT image to use in UE5.
First you need a neutral LUT image.
Right-click on this image below and choose Save As:
Here is the original location of this image from Unreal Engine Docs.
Open this LUT image in Photoshop.
Take all the Adjustment Layers from your PSD file and drag them into the LUT image:
The LUT image will now have all the adjustments applied to it. Next is to save this PNG image as new LUT.
Go to File > Export > Export As (Ctrl+Shift+Alt+W):
Export it as PNG:
This final LUT image will be 256x16 and hold the color information that can be used in UE5.
Import the LUT image into UE5 by left-click and drag right into the Content Browser.
Double-click on the LUT to open up its properties and change the following:
Select Post Process Volume, enable Color Grading LUT and use the imported LUT image:
Your scene will now look exactly how you've adjusted it in Photoshop through Adjustment Layers.
Before/After:
You can control Color Grading LUT Intensity by lowering this value:
If you need to make adjustments, go back to your Photoshop file. Re-export the LUT file as PNG again and re-import it into UE5.
You can re-import quickly by right-clicking on the LUT image in Content Browser and choose Reimport:
Epic Games recommends that you use Color Grading Tools in Post Process Volume rather than Color Grading through an LUT.
This is due to different monitor outputs that are inconsistent in how LUTs work.
From Epic Games:
Now I still use LUTs and like the results they provide. For stand-alone environments that you are using for portfolio and showcase this is completely fine. But if you are going to publish a game then it's best to use LUTs as a way to get things going but then use new Color Grading Tools instead.
To learn how to use the Color Grading Tools in Post Process Volume within a completed final environment, take a look at this in-depth tutorial course...
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