How I learned UE4 in ~3 months [And how You can too!]

Hello everyone! Today is a bit of a different video than usual. Instead of learning about Unreal directly, I just thought I'd sit down and have a chat about my learning process and the 8 factors that I think are crucial to learning efficiently. If you're learning Game Development or any other creative skill it doesn't matter where you learn from - whether it's YouTube or by simply Googling every issue you run into - it matters that you complete the learning cycle and maintain a mental state that is primes for absorbing information!

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Computer Specs:
Ryzen 3900x 12-core CPU
MSI Geforce RTX 2080 Super
64GB Corsair RAM
One of those fancy nvme m.2 SSD's

Programs of choice:
Unreal Engine 4 - (Game Dev)
Blender 2.8 - (Animation and Modelling)
OBS - (Video/screen capture)
Davinci Resolve - (Video editing)
Adobe Photoshop - (Graphics and Texturing)
Quixel Mixer - (Texturing)
ProTools 11 - (Compositions and mixing)
OldSchool Runescape - (Chillax time)

Filmed using:
Sony A7s2 body
Sony 24-70mm f/2.8 GM lens
Yonguo YN360 LED's for colour
Yongnuo YN760 chip LED w/ Godox softbox for key

My lovely cats names are Boycat, Girlcat and Ladycat :)

[musigool]

I am now 62 years old when I started learning Unreal Engine 5. At first, I found it difficult, but day after day, hour after hour, I find myself learning something new, and this is thanks to God and your efforts in YouTube tutorials. So everyone who taught me something I thank from the bottom of my heart. To this day, I am still learning new things.

[Charly_Chive]

Patience for Unreal shaders to compile, is a real skill.

[svnayak]

Charlie's 8 Ps
1.Proof/tests - Experiment after the tuts
2.Passion - You know what it is
3.Patience - Even shitting takes time
4.Purpose - Reason to learn a particular thing
5.Presence - Put your work out there
6.Persistent - Can be even mental. No need to destroy your fingers
7.Prevention - NO BURNOUTS ALLOWED. Work on a different aspect of the project
8.Perseverance - Just sit down and work. U started this for some reason right?

[JayCreationsDev]

This is nothing but facts. When I started my first game I bought every asset I could because I told myself 3d modeling was too hard, 1 year later and I was selling 3D models on various stores. Just takes a different mindset :)

[KillerBearsaw]

You are a treasure to the Unreal indie dev community and gave us a great life lesson too!

[warpdrvn]

Thanks man, I really needed to hear this. I've been through the ringer trying to get back on my feet and re-learning game dev properly ever since dropping out of a game-dev course in uni back in 2013. Since then practically every tool i've used has been either updated into something totally unrecognisable or replaced by something greater, all the while feeling really bummed out as I was struggling to learn multiple fields (2d art, 3D animation/modelling, VFX, Game engines etc) leading to burnout while being outpaced by peers who go on to work in the industry.

Your video has definitely re-aligned my perspective about the learning process, personally I feel the parts about purpose, patience and accountability clicked with me the most, though presence still scares the shit out of me, community forums/discords are still very daunting for someone like me trying to improve.

[rauljaramillo]

I am a veterinarian, started learning unreal 8 months ago (as a hobby). I actually have more fun doing so than playing games or working :) While performing other activities I constantly think about ways to enhance the unreal-project hehe. You are right, everyday you learn a bit more!

[ZedEdge]

Wonderful breakdown of it all. The Ps themselves make a lot of sense, but the way you said it was extra encouraging - made it feel totally attainable. Well done to you, and thanks for helping us out.

[Tkonpk]

Your best video yet. So glad the community has you.

[itsMBWAAA]

Proof has always been my biggest hurdle, but thankfully I've recognized that and now take notes throughout each tutorial or class I do, and then, as you said, re-do the tutorial on my own the best I can. I also will watch tutorials and anything Unreal related when I'm not working in Unreal just to stay engaged with it. Especially with the new stuff UE5 is doing... games in the next 5-10 years will be unbelievable and learning how to make them yourself is only getting more and more accessible!

[rodroeq]

😶 the cycle of burn out and gaming, It was fucking spot on.

[nielcaffery]

This is amazing advice, well done. I didn't really learn character modelling and texturing until I did a tutorial then completely reworked everything without the support of the tutorial. In 6 months I was at a stage where I could model almost anything and quite quickly.

[BelfrostStudios]

I'm honestly overwhelmed. I'm a great designer and I am currently doing level design, graphic design, 3D Modeling/Texturing, lighting, marketing, video editing, and more. Going to be learning 2D Animation and possibly 3D and now going to have to dive into Programming as well. It's a lot.

[Skeffles]

Fantastic video! These are just a great set of tips.
Also I love the background music. You're clearly a man of culture.

[beYOndd]

Had a AHHA moment the other day working with animations that i realised i stopped looking for tutorials and simple started seeing what worked. After struggling for months tryna figure out which path to start in. Took a step back and worked on something new and man. It just clicked. Having so much fun now.

[xabunoxx]

Another amazing video 👍
I know I am guilty of sidestepping the first P and that needs to stop.
Thank you for making this! I’m going to link this to every person that ever asks me about learning UE, or even becoming a game dev in general.

[TilW]

A mistake I made while trying to learn UE4 was just watching lots and lots of tutorials without applying gained knowledge.
This lead to me forgetting how things worked after a while and not really learning much.
When I learned the basics of Javascript, I chose a very direct approach that worked better: I didn't watch / read any tutorials at all but just searched for a solution on the internet whenever I ran into something that I needed for my project and didn't know how to do.

[thegreendude]

I've been going at it for 2 years now as a thing I do in my studies, so I didn't expect this video to be for me but there was still a lot to take away and interesting to see how you started

[fse]

Bro you talked about everything thing that can break us, I really appreciate your efforts and your experiment with passion is really useful I didn’t find that in any video

[leanbeaudriuk]

Thank you, this is one of the most important videos I've seen on your channel, really good message, thank you again.