StaticMesh actors are the meshed geometry in the scene used by designers to represent fixed environment components. A large library of these comes with the content provided by Epic Games in UDK. In this recipe we'll look at ways to bring that content into the scene, shift it around and adjust it, and make sure that lining it up with other content is no problem. We'll also look at converting a StaticMesh for other uses. In the previous recipe we set up a small scene just using BSP elements. This time we'll only use meshes from the Browser.

How to do it...

1. Open the Content Browser (Ctrl + Shift + F). In the Packages List, make sure UDKGame is the selected folder. You can click on it to expand the sub-folders it contains.
2. Click on the Object Type filter for Static Meshes and, under Tags, click on Building.
3. Scroll down the assets (or type in the search field) to find S_NEC_Roofs_SM_Tiled_Solid.
4. Drag this into the perspective viewport. While it is selected, press F4 and expand the properties section Movement | Location. Adjust the XYZ values to 0,0,0. This ensures the StaticMesh is situated at the world center or origin.
5. Alt-drag a copy of this up to about 300 in Z (you can fine-tune this, as before, in the Movement | Location section of the mesh's properties). This will be a ceiling. Having the floor at Z = 0 and the ceiling at Z = 300 will ensure the default character can easily walk in between.
   
6. Select and rotate the lower mesh 180 degrees. We'll use it as a floor. Press Space to cycle the transform mode, and make sure the wood boards face up. In Move mode, Alt-drag both meshes sideways to create a string of them. Repeat this to form a passageway about five blocks deep, as in the previous screenshot.
7. Following the same image, where it is shown highlighted, drag into the view from the Browser the mesh called S_NEC_Trims_SM_Plain_STRb. Place it along the edge of the floor, and then Non-uniform Scale [ ] it to match the dimensions of the first floor piece, effectively creating a wall. This is shown in the next screenshot. It can help to set the Scale Grid Snap [ ] to 1% so it is easier to fit the two pieces to the same dimensions. The values I used for scaling were X=4, Y=1, Z=4.2 but yours may differ. The values can be set in the fields at the bottom of the screen.
8. Note that the scale along the X axis that I used was 4, an even number. Because the asset is modular, that is a safe amount to scale it up by and still have the ends touching without crossing into each other. It is okay to have meshes penetrate each other at an angle, but not at the same angle (co-planar) because then you'll see Z fighting (flickering) in the overlap. Also you want to avoid gaps.
9. When you are happy with the scaling, move copies along to match the entire floor, and reproduce this on the other side too using Alt-drag on the set again.
   
10. At either end of the passage we've made, add the StaticMesh called S_NEC_Walls_SM_Archwalls_01 and then fit a pillar called S_NEC_Walls_SM_CASup1 on either side, into the corners.
11. In the Content Browser, turn off the Building tag filter which was set before. Then search for LAMP to expose the asset S_NEC_Lights_SM_TurkLamp01. With the asset highlighted, select a right-hand side wall in the viewport, right-click, and choose Add Static Mesh: S_NEC_Lights_SM_TurkLamp01. Note that if you added the light based on the left-hand side wall, the object might be facing through the wall, so in that case choose Rotate and turn it 180 degrees to face the correct direction, into the passage.
12. Press F4 with the light selected and expand the setting Static Mesh Actor | Static Mesh Component | Lightmass | Lightmass Settings | Use Emissive For Static Lighting. Turn this on. What this does, since the mesh has a Material with an active Emissive channel, is cast light into the scene based on its Material.
13. Distribute copies of this lamp at regular intervals. To select all the lamps, right-click one and choose Select | Select all with matching Material. Now right-click on this set and choose Create Prefab. This encapsulates all those assets into a single one for easier handling. When creating the Prefab, you'll have to name it. Set the Package to YourPackage, the Group to Prefab, and the Name to TurkLamps. You'll be asked if you want to replace the source meshes with an instance of the prefab, which you can, but you can't edit the lights' properties after having done so. A way around the problem of editing prefab constituent parts is to right-click on the prefab in the scene and choose Convert Prefab to Normal Actors. Then you can edit the component lamps' properties. Prefabs are discussed in greater detail in the first recipe of Chapter 5, It Is Your Destiny!
14. Right-click one of the lamps and Select | Select all with matching Material. Changing the Emissive Light Falloff Exponent to 1, the Emissive Light Explicit Influence Radius to 0, and the Emissive Boost, at 3 should illuminate the passage adequately. Those values accumulate together to control the brightness and range of the light cast by the lamp's texture. You can hold your mouse over each property to get a tool-tip explaining what it does. The effect of the emissive lighting from the lamps is shown in the next screenshot, where there is a yellow glow constrained around the walls around each lamp:
    

Moving on, let's delete the middle piece of the passage floor to create a hole. Place a point light in the scene and move it into this hole. Fill the black void by extending the walls down with a stone foundation made from S_NEC_walls_SM_CAWall_STRc and at the base of those, add the mesh SM_GEN_Ruins_512Block04 and scale it so it fits two by two into the lowered floor space.

Tip

Note that if you have an actor selected in the scene, you can press Home or the new Go To Actor icon [ ] on the left-hand side of the editor, to jump all viewports to it. You can press End to align a mesh to the surface directly below it, though this works best if both surfaces are flat, and aligned. On a slope, it has limitations.

The intended result is shown in the next screenshot.