Animal Planet: Episode One

For English - use subtitles (available in both English & Russian)
Есть субтитры и на русском, и на английском.
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Four months ago, I first opened Unreal Engine 5's editor to try to create something resembling the main dream of my life - a movie about dragons. I didn't particularly believe that I could make even remotely acceptable animation alone - especially since I had no experience in 3D. As it turned out, I was wrong :)
All these months, I practically didn't leave the house, studying Unreal Engine from early morning till midnight. Many times I wanted to give up; everything was too difficult, unfamiliar, and didn't yield results. But gradually, it started to work out, and the better it turned out, the easier new techniques and scenes came to me - I spent less and less time on trial and error, reading documentation, and searching for tutorials, and more on actual creativity... But I definitely didn't expect to be able to create something like this.
The movie you will see (or have already watched) was created entirely by me alone. The only help came from my acquaintance Kess, who read a few dialogue lines for the role of Tilana. All the other voices in the movie are also mine, with filters and processing, so don't judge harshly, I'm a dragon, not an actor :)
The 3D dragon models were created by artist Ariel Fain and refined to 4K and animated by me using Motion Capture technology; I transferred their control structure (rig) to the Epic Mannequin model, allowing me to work with dragons fully in Unreal Engine.
The music - "Northern Wind" by Linda, "Breathe" by ILLUMNATION, "Winter" by Victor Argonov, and others. The basis of the plot is my favorite story, although within the framework of the first episode, the characters haven't reached its plot yet :)
At the moment (Cosmonautics Day 2024), this movie is the main work in my creative life. I hope you enjoy it. I will start the second episode after a short break, in just a few days, and it will be ready much faster.
P.S. About English title; exact translation would be "In the World of Animals", but Russian title refers to the legendary & well known in former USSR educational TV show, so in order to keep similar reference for English-speaking audience, I changed translation to "Animal Planet".