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Advanced Surface Shaders - RELEASED

Discussion in 'Assets and Asset Store' started by MattCarr, Jul 23, 2011.

  1. MattCarr

    MattCarr

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    Version 1.5.2 is now available on the Asset Store. The focus of this version and of 1.5.1 was enhancing the volumetric objects and adding the cone volume type. The cone volume is a really great way to create high quality spotlight shafts and with the world space texture lookups, you can have great looking smoke and/or dust effects inside them.


    Click for higher resolution image

    The next planned version of the package will be 1.6 and will focus on a new range of shaders for mobile platforms. It will most likely be about a week off because I'll need to do some backend restructuring first to make it easier to create the many combinations :).
     
  2. bravery

    bravery

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    Hi MattCarr,

    I want to ask a simple question: Can I use the Advance surface shader in-order to get a transperant + self illuminated effect in a single material?

    Thanks in advance
     
  3. MattCarr

    MattCarr

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    Sure. There are a number of emissive alpha shaders or emissive alpha cutout shaders in the package. If you just want emissive alpha with nothing else then it has that, or if you want emissive alpha and another effect or combination of effects (e.g. specular, spec map, bump map, rim lighting, relief mapping, etc) then those are all there too.
     
  4. bravery

    bravery

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    Hi MattCarr

    Thanks for the quick answers, really apprciate it.

    Actaully my situation is I have an enemy character, and that character have some parts of his body covered with glass, and some other parts of have illumination, besude the usual (specular + normal map), so is there a ready shader for this senario in your package? or can I achive such a shader?

    Question two: you are mentioning that you have in the package 150 shaders, so are my requested shader exist there? or should I do some customization to achvie my requested shader?

    Question Three: is there a way to blend differnt shaders in your package? if the answer is yes can you please specify how? (I'm really worry about that because I'm still dump in writting shaders code and writing shders code can be a pain)?
     
  5. MattCarr

    MattCarr

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    From what it sounds like you're talking about, yeah, there should be a shader already in the package that will do what you need.

    Yeah, the shader already exists. The 150+ shaders are existing shaders in the package that are combinations of the different effects. I don't expect people to have to write their own shaders to achieve these effects after purchasing the package.

    As said above, the combinations of shader effects are already in the package and I'm happy to add any more that you'd require :).
     
  6. bravery

    bravery

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    will that's great.

    Then consider me a customer then :)
     
  7. MattCarr

    MattCarr

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    Absolutely. I'll make sure the package supports Unity 4 as soon as I get access to the Beta and will make any optimisations Unity 4 allows. I'll also make sure backwards compatibility is maintained with Unity 3 for any existing effects through this process. Beyond that though I'll be taking a good look at what new effects can be achieved with the DX11 support in Unity 4 and also compute shaders to provide new cool high end effects to the package.

    Right now I'm working on version 1.6 of Advanced Surface Shaders which will be a fairly major release. Primarily at the moment I'm working on backend improvements to make the workflow of adding new shader combinations more efficient, but it will also be the first release with clearly defined mobile optimised shaders and will feature a number of new shader types. Considering I'm expecting the number of shaders in the package to increase to around 500 or more, I'll also be modifying the folder structure so that it's easier to just import the set of shaders you require for your project so that you don't have to wait as long for Unity's initial shader list load (when you first try to select a shader in a material).

    With 1.6 I'll also provide more demo web players and information on platform compatibility per shader type.
     
  8. bravery

    bravery

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    Hi MattCarr,

    Actaully after my first importing to the package I got the following warning:

    "There are inconsistent line endings in the 'Assets/AdvancedSurfaceShaders/ExampleData/Scripts/SwingingLight.cs' script. Some are Mac OS X (UNIX) and some are Windows.
    This might lead to incorrect line numbers in stacktraces and compiler errors. Many text editors can fix this using Convert Line Endings menu commands."

    IS this Ok?
     
  9. MattCarr

    MattCarr

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    Thanks. The skin shading is a fake subsurface scattering effect based on elements of Real-Time Skin Rendering in GPU Gems 3 and Fast Skin Shading in ShaderX7, as well as the skin shading used in Uncharted. It uses blended normals weighted differently for the red channel vs green and blue between the surface normal and the normal map to simulate light scattering effects in the layers of the skin.

    Metallic surfaces can be better simulated with spec map shaders in this package to achieve effects like brushed metal. In version 1.6 the shaders will also be combined with reflection mapping which will allow for even more metallic and plastic surface recreation. In either 1.6 or shortly after, a new shader type will be added based on effects often seen in Maya and present in Saints Row 3 that allows for some great artist driven shading effects that is great for metallic shading.

    That's fine, it's just an issue in one of the example scripts where some lines are ended with the Unix format and some with the Windows format. I thought I'd cleaned all that up, but I must've missed that newer example script. It's not going to cause any problems and you can ignore it, fix it or delete that script if you'd like. I'll remove the warning in the next update.

    Thanks for letting me know :).
     
  10. NathanWarden

    NathanWarden

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    Matt, I bought a copy earlier today and I must say that it's really awesome having some nice volumetrics in my scenes. To top that off it has really good performance too. Great job and thanks!
     
  11. bravery

    bravery

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    Hi MattCarr,

    really thanks for all you support, I'm digging more into the shaders right now, but there is a lot and because of that I feel like I'm lost, and I do not know aht really fit more for me, I was appreciating if there is a small decription or even a screenshot for the shaders.

    will somthing like this will be great: http://docs.unity3d.com/Documentation/Components/shader-SelfIllumFamily.html

    I know it's not easy but in next version the 500 shaders will for sure need something like this.

    anyway quick questions:
    1- What is the differenace between Spec Map, and specular?
    2- What is the differenace between Parallex occulation (D3D) and Parallex?
    3- Does D3D mean it will work on windows only?

    that's if for now.

    Thanks in advance
     
  12. MattCarr

    MattCarr

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    It's definitely the intention to provide more extensive details about the different shader types in version 1.6 with more documentation with screenshots describing each effect.

    1. The difference between Spec Map and Specular is that Spec Map uses a texture map to determine the colour of specular highlights at points on the model as well as the glossiness intensity, whereas Specular shaders are just the same as the built-in Unity Specular shaders in that the material will have specular highlights with control of the shininess via a slider and gloss via the main texture alpha channel, the same as Unity's built-in shaders.

    Spec Maps are useful when you have different types of surfaces within a material (e.g. some wood, some metal, some plastic) and need to give each of those areas different specular properties. Using colour in spec maps also makes some new artist effects possible. Through the spec map texture you can also give the impression of surface damage, dirtiness and scratches on a surface.

    2. Parallax Occlusion mapping samples the heightmap a number of times in the shader to ultimately give a far greater impression of depth to a surface. With Parallax Occlusion mapping or the Cone Stepped Relief Mapped, you're able to make a flat surface look truly 3D from most angles except when parallel or near parallel.

    Parallax mapping is a simpler and faster effect that uses the heightmap and view direction to determine an amount to offset the uv coordinates for pixel. It also gives the impression of 3D depth to a flat surface, but not to the same extent. This is the same effect as in Unity's built-in Parallax shaders.

    3. D3D does mean it will work on Windows only. There was an issue with the Parallax Occlusion shaders on certain Mac GPUs and before opening support for that shader effect on Mac I want to be sure it will work without issue. This may be the case in version 1.6. The Relaxed Cone Step Relief Mapping effects work fine on both Windows and Mac and I would recommend it over Parallax Occlusion Mapping in most circumstances as it generally produces a better result. You can create the required Relaxed Cone Step maps with software like xNormal.

    Version 1.6 will be released within the next couple of weeks. Before releasing it I will be producing extensive documentation and demos to make sure the quantity of shaders is not overwhelming :).
     
  13. ZJP

    ZJP

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  14. MattCarr

    MattCarr

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    Not currently. That's a post processing effect and at this stage I haven't started adding post effects to the package. That effect would not be difficult to create though and is quite useful, so when I add post processing effects (aka Image Effects) to the package I'll include a good art driven glow effect similar to that. I can't give an ETA at this stage, but I'd expect it within the next month.
     
  15. ZJP

    ZJP

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    Thx
     
  16. KRGraphics

    KRGraphics

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    Hey Matt, I am considering purchasing this shader pack (I am using Strumpy and not sure how optimised my shader is) and I am wondering if I will be able to make materials like silk or metals like gold... and also how well does this work with Beast?
     
  17. I am da bawss

    I am da bawss

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    I am very interested. Do you have any benchmarks (eg. Angrybot) running on mobile platform? I just want to know roughly how expensive this is on a mobile platform.

    Also, I have a suggestion - would be it possible to implement an option to extend the fog volume (and shape) to conform to the volume where it is in? eg. if you place it in a let's say pyramid shape room with the tick of an option, it will automatically conform to the shape and size of the room. Also does it support different fog/texture effects? Eg. can I load custom fog textures?
     
  18. Sparty

    Sparty

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    Quick question...Do the volumetric lights react to obstructing objects? Cast shadows?

    Thanks!
    -eric
     
  19. MattCarr

    MattCarr

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    Sorry for the late reply. No benchmarks at the moment. The volumetric effects are not really intended for mobile and require depth texture support which I think is going to be supported for mobile in Unity 4.

    The fog volumes are currently one of the 3 shapes (box, sphere, cone), but I suppose making them at least do some raycasting to scale to approximately the size of a room would be possible if not necessarily ideal. I think instead a more versatile solution for the current shapes will be to add better gizmos for scaling. I'll look into that for an upcoming release.

    The texture effects are just a standard 2D texture property for the shader. You can use any texture in your project as the volumetric object's texture.

    The volumetric objects aren't lights although they can be used to portray light effects, particularly the volumetric cone. Only the cone and sphere would make sense in this situation as they could have a light origin (center of sphere, tip of cone) and then a shadow-like effect where the origin is occluded from the volume could work. This is currently not supported, but I do have a new cone effect that does just this in the WIP directory in the project :). It is not the immediate priority, but it should be available in an update soon. The sphere effect would be much more costly to have this shadow effect in, but I may add it as another high end option later.

    Otherwise, the volumetric objects as they are now react to obstructing objects as you would expect without that effect. The visibility of objects partially intersecting or contained within a volume will be correct based on the distance the ray from each pixel to the camera travels through the volume.
     
  20. Sparty

    Sparty

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    Great. Thanks for that Matt. I'm not so worried about it not casting shadows, I just need it to react to geometry the way you explained it would.
    If you have a sec, I'm thinking of purchasing this and replacing my characters light with your volumetric cone, please have a look at my games trailer and let me know If you think your volumetric cone would be a good replacement to the one I'm currently using on the players head.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4I6YV_EqqCQ

    No worries if you don't have time though, as I hate having to ask you to spend time watching the trailer.

    ThAnks!

    -eric
     
  21. MattCarr

    MattCarr

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    Cool trailer. It looks like you have the light occlusion/shadowed stuff in your light cone at the moment which the current cone volume in this package won't replicate. As mentioned though that is an effect I'm working on for a future update, but I don't have an ETA on when that will be available. Besides that the current cone volume object should work nicely.

    Considering your game seems to have pretty much constant rain, you might want to consider the triplanar running water shader that is part of the package. I haven't had a chance to do a good demo of it yet, but essentially it can give the effect of water running down (Negative Y World Axis) any surface. With the right texture it could be a great subtle effect to have on the objects in your scene. At the moment it would be best to use the shader in the package on an additional material on the objects, but soon there should be support for running water as an additional effect in other shaders in the package.
     
  22. Sparty

    Sparty

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    Awesome. Thanks so much Matt!
     
  23. bravery

    bravery

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    Hi Matt,

    any updates from the new version 1.6 when it will be released?
     
  24. MattCarr

    MattCarr

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    I've pushed it back a little because I decided I should incorporate a few things I wasn't planning for another couple of updates. Primarily providing a shader generation window that lists the effects and allows you to create the shaders that you need by selecting the combination of effects. This is because I'm not comfortable delivering a package containing the massive number of possible shaders and having it significantly impact import and shader list load times for people when only a small percentage of the shaders will be used per project.

    Once the shaders have been generated the file will exist until deleted so it will be possible to generate hundreds of shaders straight away and never need to touch the shader generator window again. Also the most common shaders will be included as pre-generated files.

    Another upside to the generation is that there will be no inconsistencies between shader effects in terms of things like property placement and values.

    I'm hoping to have the next version available within the next week, but no guarantees just yet.
     
  25. anadin

    anadin

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    That sounds very good - great great idea on the generation side, looking forward to this
     
  26. bravery

    bravery

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    good news Matt,

    also any update about the mobile shader specific? will it be included in 1.6 as well?
     
  27. KRGraphics

    KRGraphics

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    Shader generation? Such as could I create the same shader that I made in Strumpy with this, but more optimised? I am not a shader programmer so this would be helpful... Like I made a shader in strumpy that allows dbl sided polygons to have two different textures for diffuse/gloss/spec/normal/reflection mapping... i also have a property that allows me to have more control of how shiny my surfaces are...
     
    Last edited: Jul 23, 2012
  28. MattCarr

    MattCarr

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    Due to other work that has delayed things a bit and my decision to roll the shader generator into the next version, the next version will be version 2.0 and it will have mobile specific shaders that share the same characteristics as the built-in Unity shaders.

    The shader generation is just a means of creating the shader files that you need from the available effects. You'll be able to select which effects your shader needs from what's available in the package. At the moment those are: Specular, Gloss Map, Spec Map, Normal Map, Parallax Map, Parallax Occlusion Map, Relief Map, Rim Lighting, Cubemap reflection, Triplanar texturing, Emissive map, Lighting Ramp (for toon and stylised shading). Then there'll be options for Opaque, Transparent or Transparent Cutout, an offset for the rendering queue, blending mode, culling options, and whether or not the shader should be for mobile. More effects might be added before 2.0 is released and more will definitely be added in future. You might find the available effects allow you to produce the same type of shaders you created with the Strumpy tool.

    It's actually very simple and you'll very easily be able to select the effects you want and either generate a specific shader or all permutations of the selected options. You won't need to know anything about how shaders works to get what you need, you'll only need to know what effects you want or what types of textures you need a shader to handle. The more advanced options can be ignored. Common shaders will also be included pre-built in the package. Only generating the shaders you need will drastically reduce load times in the editor when working with shaders or recompiling shader code so in order to offer this amount of flexibility, this really is the only way. I don't know what the final permutation count is yet, there are some cases where certain effects will not be able to be combined due to instruction limitations or incompatibility, but the total would easily be 1000+ and theoretically massive with the ability to create the shaders with different queue offsets. So obviously I can't have a package containing that many shaders, but I also didn't want to limit what can be achieved and not allow people to get what they need out of this.

    I'll post a video as soon as possible showing how the system works and hopefully 2.0 will be available soon. I'm intending on providing extensive documentation on each effect and option, but I've had a number of users contacting me keen for the next release so I might delay the documentation until the following version to get it out quicker.
     
    Last edited: Aug 1, 2012
  29. KRGraphics

    KRGraphics

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    All of this sounds awesome :)... and I sure i will be able to replicate the shaders that I have now in 2.0.

    EDIT: Now about the cubemap reflection, which is a huge one, will I bet able to hook the alpha channel of a texture to drive the strength of the reflection?
     
  30. edgley

    edgley

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    Just got this package, and my, so many things :)

    I have been looking for a website, or a book, that can give me the knowledge to know what the keywords in the title of these shaders mean, so I roughly know which one to choose without have going through each one.

    Or, a good source of knowledge for a newbie :)
     
  31. anadin

    anadin

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    Hi Matt, is there any news on the update to your pack?
     
  32. MattCarr

    MattCarr

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    Sorry about the delay, I've had so many different projects on at once that the recently opened projects list in Unity (which shows the last 25 projects that have been opened) frequently does not show a project I was working on less than a week earlier :S.

    That said, I've had a couple of people testing the new version and have written some basic documentation which I can expand on later so I'm pretty happy with it now and will definitely submit it within the next 48 hours :).
     
  33. stevej_old

    stevej_old

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    I'm sure I'm doing something stupid, but I'm stumped. I've just bought the package and I'm trying to create a volumetric box, sphere, etc. I've watched the video tutorial and when you create a sphere (for example) it immediately appears as a white volumetric shaded sphere. When I do it, it just creates a blue bounding box - there's nothing in it. I've tried a "Box Volume" too and it gives the same result.

    Any idea what I'm doing wrong?
     
  34. MattCarr

    MattCarr

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    It sounds like you're taking the right steps to create it, a blue bounding box suggests that the mesh is there, but it sounds like it isn't rendering. Volumetric objects require depth buffer access in shaders which isn't supported on mobile (although I believe it is in Unity 4), so if you're developing for a mobile platform in the editor then that would explain the problem.

    If that's not it then try replacing the material with one using a basic shader (e.g. Diffuse) in the MeshRenderer component and see if it renders anything.
     
  35. stevej_old

    stevej_old

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    That would be the problem. Are the rim shaders also not supported? They're not working for me either.
     
  36. stevej_old

    stevej_old

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    Actually - to make things easier, is there a list of what's NOT supported on mobile? :)
     
  37. MattCarr

    MattCarr

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    Rim shaders are supported, but for most of these effects you'll need OpenGL ES2.0 support enabled which you can set in the Unity Player Settings. The next update of the package has mobile specific versions of all shaders as well which should perform a little better.

    Edit: Mainly only volumetric objects and parallax occlusion mapping aren't supported on mobile. I believe I've outlined that a couple of times previously in this thread. It will be more obvious in the next version however as the shader generator will show which effects can be used (which is the vast majority) when generating mobile shaders.
     
    Last edited: Sep 17, 2012
  38. stevej_old

    stevej_old

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    Awesome - thanks for the help :)
     
  39. stevej_old

    stevej_old

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    I'm set to arm7 but not seeing those rim shaders within the editor (iOS platform setting).

    What's the timeline on the next version with specific mobile support?
     
  40. MattCarr

    MattCarr

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    Will be submitted to the store within the next 24 hours.
     
  41. gecko

    gecko

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    I see that 2.0 is in the store now. Is there a list somewhere of mobile-friendly shaders in that pack?
     
  42. MattCarr

    MattCarr

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    The main components of the shaders available in the package are:

    Specular,
    Color Specular Mapping,
    Gloss/Shininess Mapping,
    Bump Mapping,
    Parallax Mapping,
    Parallax Occlusion Mapping (no mobile version),
    Relaxed Cone Stepped Relief Mapping (no mobile version),
    Rim Lighting,
    Emissive Mapping,
    Cubemap Reflection,
    Lighting Ramp.

    These can be combined to achieve the desired shader and all effects except Parallax Occlusion Mapping and Relief Mapping work on mobile and are optimised for mobile.
     
  43. I am da bawss

    I am da bawss

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    So.... does it mean the volumetric shader is now mobile friendly?
     
  44. MattCarr

    MattCarr

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    No, sorry. The pre-built shaders that are not a part of the generator system are the volumetric effects and triplanar texturing shaders. The volumetric effects do not work on mobile platforms, but the triplanar texturing effects will.

    I've just submitted a minor update fixing a minor issue requiring some generator options to be clicked in a certain order. I've been happy with the results of the new generator system since 2.0.0 release so I'll now create a video showing how the system works and work on my updates for it.
     
  45. bigzer

    bigzer

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    Hi, I was waiting for this and I'm really happy to see the implementation :)

    I found a bug you might want to fix ^^:
    When you create a transparent shader with Normal Map and Rim, the transparency doesn't work.

    Also may I recommend you some features/tweaks?

    1.It seems that we can't change the Tiling factor of specular maps (and some others) independently, sad panda :(
    2.It would be great to see one or two "detail-map" options ^^ (with ability to independently change how much they tile too)
    3.Vertex color blending would be a really useful addition too (they are really annoying to write manually).

    Anyway, great work, I can't wait to see where this goes!
    Best regards
    David
     
    Last edited: Oct 16, 2012
  46. foosart

    foosart

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    Does your emissive shader actually emit light, affecting surrounding surfaces / shaders? If so, can you provide an example image or video?

    Looks like a great shader pack. I'm strongly considering this purchase.
     
  47. LukaKotar

    LukaKotar

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    Hello.

    The shaders included in the pack look stunning. Great job! I have a few questions about them:

    -Are any of the shaders unsupported by Mac OS X?
    -What shadermaps do "Relaxed Cone Stepped Relief Mapping" and "Parallax Occlusion Mapping" use? Heightmap?
    -Also, is there any webplayer demo of the shaders where I could test them?

    Looking forward to the answers!
     
  48. MattCarr

    MattCarr

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    Thanks, I'll look into that.

    I didn't include separate tiling properties for every texture because wanted to keep the number of attributes down, but if the most useful ones that are currently missing can be added without negatively affecting the shader then I'll add them.

    I'll add Detail Maps to the next version as an option.

    Vertex colour blending is definitely something I could add, but it would probably need specific shaders or have limited compatibility in the generator with other effects because blending between 2 different lots of values essentially requires doubling everything which won't be possible with some of the complex shader effects. I'll add something in the next version.

    It doesn't emit light, the emissive effects ignore light and shadow so that they are always the same output independent of scene lighting. It allows you to have elements glowing in the dark, but it won't light other surfaces. Strategic placement of lights on the surfaces near emissive texture elements, particular with deferred lighting, can give you that sort of effect though and would be much faster than some method in which the emissive shader itself was casting light.

    Almost all of the shaders are supported on Mac, Only "Parallax Occlusion Mapping" is not.

    "Relaxed Cone Stepped Relief Mapping" uses a special texture map of the same name that can be generated with certain tools like xNormal or the tool that comes with the book GPU Gems 3 which is what I use. "Parallax Occlusion Mapping" uses a heightmap the same as standard Parallax Mapping.

    There's not currently a web player demo, but I'll look to provide one when I release the next update.
     
  49. LukaKotar

    LukaKotar

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    Thank you for the info. Sorry I forgot to ask before, does the "Relaxed Cone Stepped Relief Mapping" technique in this package use the scene shadows or not, and if it uses self shadowing? Also, what would be the main differences between the "Relaxed Cone Stepped Relief Mapping" and "Parallax Occlusion Mapping"?

    Thank you!
     
  50. bigzer

    bigzer

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    Thanks,

    *Edited description of transparency issue*

    How about a "UV tiling ability" "yes/no" option per map so the user can manually chose which require this control? This feature is I believe easy to implement yet it's powerful in many situations imho.


    I just tried with "transparent" and "normal": it does the same: transparency doesn't work (using Unity 3.5.5).

    *Edit* sorry, what I wanted to say is that you can't change the "alpha" value of the color multiplier to change the transparency of the entire material. It's often required for particle effects, for example if you want to have a particle effect vanish slowly towards the end of it's life.
    (The transparency from PNG files for example don't work neither).

    Our game maps can't wait!

    Yeah exactly, it wouldn't be a good idea to go crazy anyway, but still for many situations simple and fast vertex blending shader design could help!

    Also if I may add a little option idea; In some occasions you don't want to have a texture input, but instead you want to just have a color input. This often occurs with emissive shaders. In other words in your shader editor you could have an option next to the "xxx map" "replace map by colorpicker", and even perhaps "multiply map by color picker" as extra tweaky feature ;).

    Alright, sorry for the flood, I'll stop here ^^.
    If you want some more ideas let me know ;)

    Thanks for all your tool is speeding up things every day!

    Have a great day,
    Regards
    David
     
    Last edited: Nov 5, 2012