Understanding and working with the Foliage mode

In this section, we will learn what the Foliage mode is and how to use it. The Foliage mode is an Unreal Engine 5 mode that includes tools to place foliage assets on Landscapes, but also on Static Meshes. By using a brush tool, very similar to the brush that we can find in Landscape mode, we can place assets randomly on our surfaces. Foliage mode is very useful for placing repeatable assets such as trees, bushes, grass, or debris to make our environment rich in detail.

We can enable Foliage mode by changing the Viewport mode. To change mode, you can use the drop-down menu in the main toolbar. You can also use the SHIFT + 3 keyboard shortcut to enter Foliage mode. The first time you enter Foliage mode, the dedicated panel looks like this:

Figure 9.41 – Foliage mode options panel

In the first part of the panel, we can find the different tools the Foliage mode has. The middle part of the panel is dedicated...