TATO Studio x ZibraVDB: Creating the Valor Mortis Cinematic Trailer

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Original article published at TATO Studio website. 

This is an edited and enhanced version created for Zibra AI Blog. 

There’s a unique moment in every project when we get to introduce new worlds, characters, and storylines to an audience — when the camera becomes the bridge between imagination and reality. 

For Valor Mortis, the upcoming game from the exceptionally talented team at One More Level, that moment arrived with the making of its first cinematic trailer.

TATO Studio worked hand in hand with their partners at The Hungry Beast to craft a teaser that would give players their very first look at this dark and intriguing alternate history.

A Dark Twist on History

The story of Valor Mortis reimagines history with one brutal twist: what if Napoleon had won at Waterloo, but at the cost of releasing a substance that awakened deadly supernatural powers?

Players step into the boots of a young soldier caught in the chaos of brutal battles — facing not only the horrors of war, but something far more terrifying. Survival becomes the only mission.

Building the Vision

The creative process began with deep historical research, storyboarding, and developing an advanced animatic. These early steps allowed TATO Studio to transition quickly into previs, testing ideas in real time before moving into full production.

The game’s story team challenged TATO Studio with key lore elements they wanted highlighted. Thanks to the real-time workflow in Unreal Engine, it was possible to explore multiple narrative directions, ensuring every shot felt authentic to the world they envisioned.

Designing the World

One of our major goals was to create a setting that felt both cinematic and grounded. TATO Studio chose a small-town marketplace with a church in a far eastern region, covered in late-winter snow and mud — a cold, harsh environment that adds weight to the story.

Reallusion’s Character Creator gave us the flexibility to design a wide range of soldiers, each with their own unique look and personality. The main hero, Fencer, came directly from the game assets, but for the trailer we pushed his design further: a more natural face, detailed hands, and high-resolution textures to make him truly cinematic.

The transformation scene — where Fencer’s arm mutates and his face becomes monstrous — was one of the most challenging sequences. TATO Studio refined every stage of the transformation to ensure it felt visceral, seamless, and terrifying.

Bringing Characters to Life

TATO Studio recorded over 100 unique movement sequences with professional mocap actors to capture the chaos of large-scale battle scenes.

Using Unreal Engine’s Animation Sample for previs, TATO Studio experimented with shot compositions and movement variations early in the process.

ZibraVDB: Pushing Technical Boundaries

TATO Studio relied on Houdini for procedural modeling of veins, ice, and other effects, giving us flexibility for multiple iterations while maintaining realism. Cloth simulations, integrated seamlessly with Unreal Engine, added another layer of authenticity to every shot.

To handle demanding VFX like smoke and explosions without losing performance, TATO Studio turned to ZibraVDB technology. Thanks to it, we can play back complex simulations in real time, keeping the creative process smooth and efficient. The team has been using ZibraVDB to seamlessly integrate the Houdini workflow with real-time rendering in Unreal Engine.

TATO Studio created multiple effects in Houdini, and without ZibraVDB, using VDBs for smoke and explosions would have been impossible. The old workflow, based on flipbooks, was far less convenient and limited our creative flexibility. Now, in almost every scene, we can place large volumes to generate local fog, fill the environment with natural haze, maintain full control over the look, and even add animations — something that height fog simply doesn’t allow.

“Integrating Houdini with Unreal through ZibraVDB makes our workflow faster and more efficient.”— Szymon Śniegocki, Technical Director at TATO

The Final Result

The making of the Valor Mortis trailer was a fusion of creativity, history, and cutting-edge technology. From character transformations to large-scale battle chaos, every element was designed to give players a haunting first glimpse into One More Level’s new world.