Lookdev is a relative newcomer in real-time graphics. It’s been established in VFX for a long time already, and we can learn from their techniques to achieve proper realistic responses from materials.
Lookdev is a way to eliminate guesswork when referencing the real world. The only way for you to accurately recreate a light or surface is to completely own the reference pipeline, from initial shoot to final material.
The primary reason we want this is so we can build materials that respond similar to light as they would in real life.
Lookdev is an umbrella term that refers to a series of complicated steps with many facets. There are many layers to these steps and depending on time and budget you can go deeper.
Games like Callisto Protocol, Forza, and Senua’s Sacrifice all used lookdev processes to make their assets look super realistic, increasing believability.
Lookdev is not a way for you to validate the values used in a PBS material. This can be done by building PBR checkers and referencing a PBR database.
There are many more uses but most seem to revolve around these two use-cases.
The team at Sledgehammer Games focused mostly on capturing real-world measurements and feeding that back into their lighting system.