AR Foundation 2.1 Now Available

Awesome, will check it out! How do we handle LWRP now? Is the workaround of setting it to 5.6.1 still valid? Is it working with higher versions?

 

Great, glad more of AR Core is now integrated!

 

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

 

@mdurand Could we get a working link to the documentation? Also, when will ARExtensions come back out? Extremely important for most things.

 

Super excited about this! Thanks!

I just don't know what documentation I should be reading.
None of the links in the package manager are working in 2019.1.2f1.

Should I read the documentation for version 2.0 instead?
eg.
https://docs.unity3d.com/Packages/com.unity.xr.arfoundation@2.0/manual/index.html
https://docs.unity3d.com/Packages/com.unity.xr.arcore@2.0/manual/index.html
https://docs.unity3d.com/Packages/com.unity.xr.arkit@2.0/manual/index.html

Sorry for my confusion.

 

This is exciting news but both the documentation (error 404 as of May 16 !)am) https://docs.unity3d.com/Packages/com.unity.xr.arfoundation@2.1/manual/index.html
and the migration guide need work.
For the latter it seems the only option is to scrap your existing 2.0 project and start from scratch.

 

How to deal with missing XR.ARExtensions? We used it very often for camera permission checks.

 

@Saicopate Same. I downloaded the last one from : https://bintray.com/unity/unity-staging/com.unity.xr.arextensions/1.0.0-preview.8 dropped the assets into my project and changed a few name spaces to be UnityEngine.XR from UnityEngine.Experimental.XR and it seems to work

 

Excited!!!!! Is there any planned update of the foundations remote so it works?

 

@mdurand Unity 2019.2 beta, running 2.1.0- preview -- None of the extension classes were working. Just downgraded to 2.0.2 and my extension methods are working fine now

 

Looks like the documentation sites are live now

https://docs.unity3d.com/Packages/com.unity.xr.arfoundation@2.1/manual/index.html
https://docs.unity3d.com/Packages/com.unity.xr.arcore@2.1/manual/index.html
https://docs.unity3d.com/Packages/com.unity.xr.arkit@2.1/manual/index.html

 

Oh, god finally! Thank you.

 

This is awesome news, thanks Unity Team, great work!

One thing that would give it even more power is, youtube content. A lot more quick tips and short intro's in video format from the Unity Team would be great please, then keep the videos updated please.

 

It's great news! But I found one problem - when I use ARSession.Reset() method, then camera is frozen. It occurs not only in my project but in AR Foundation Samples too.

 

Hi guys, How to create a prefab from «baked lights», exactly?!

I saw a lot of tutorials that they used realtime lights in their scenes and I know they have no idea how to solve this damn basic problem!!
(same question link)

 

Ya I can *definitely* imagine its a large undertaking ( I even began trying to write my own, but gave up as soon as I realized just how many layers of difficulty it woudl be :/ )! I would say that for me ( and the large majority of other AR / XR developers I chat with ) a working, stable remote is by far the most important feature for Foundations, as it takes iteration cycles from minutes to seconds! If theres any way to move this up the list of priorities, I would love to know!

Anyways, great work / congrats to you and the team on all the ARFoundations stuff. I'm very excited to see whats next and thank you so much for your work and effort!

 

So can we easily test in the editor now, like we could back in 2017 with ARInterface? Its frustrating to watch you guys pour so much energy into new features, while leaving core usability fixes to the way side... Maybe have someone on the team actually try and ship a game, so you can fix some of more realworld issues devs have (like not being able to quickly iterate in the editor). There's no reason we should be deploying to device all the time when its just a camera in space, and some planes, that is all very easily simulatable in the editor.

 

Quick question
Should the Environment Probe demo have a black background? Or should we see the camera image in the background? Just the former for me right now.

2 related questions
1. For the Camera should a Custom Material be enabled in the ARCameraBackground component?

and
2. Should the LWRPAdditionalData component be added to the Camera?

 

Where is the documentation about object tracking?
How do I generate object tracking models? (ARKitReferenceObjectEntry?)
Or should I install the ARKit Plugin from Bitbucket and then use the object scanner from there??

EDIT: I suppose I should use Apple's XCode project to make a scanner: https://developer.apple.com/documentation/arkit/scanning_and_detecting_3d_objects

 

Some feedback on the new object tracker
- It seems like ARTrackedObjectManager.trackedObjectsChanged gets called every frame? it doesn't respect if there actually has been any change?
- ARTrackedObjectManager.trackedObjectsChanged -> removed doesn't get called when I remove the physical object?
- Is there a way to set the tracked object as the scene's root? I'm creating a multiplayer experience around an object, and syncing the location of user's avatars would be much easier with the tracked object as root location..
I can't just move ar session origin to the tracked object's location can I?

 

For those looking for a workaround for LWRP, I have put up this project https://github.com/StigOlavsen/LightweightARFoundation that works with the latest versions of the Lightweight render pipeline (project uses 5.13). Only tested with ARKit, but I see no reason it shouldn't also work with ARCore.

 

Apolgies if I'm repeating my self but struggling to customize how the environment probes work
2 issues.
1. I need to control when and where the probes are updated, it seems to happen at arbitrary intervals right now
and
2. I need to soften the transition between maps when using the LWRP.


The official Apple ARkit documentation suggests both options are possible. ie manually placing of probes and softening the transitions. see here
https://developer.apple.com/documentation/arkit/adding_realistic_reflections_to_an_ar_experience

 

@steego Thanks for sharing but AFAIK, no issues getting LWRP 5.6.1 working with ARFoundation 2.1. I find simply updating the manifest works if it loads with latest 5.71

 

The problem is that 5.6.1 is a bit outdated already, this project works with LWRP 5.13 (should work with 5.10+ I think). I did this because I needed some features in the newer versions of LWRP.

 

Random info.

I've found a lot of "UE4 only" artists are starting to get more acquainted with Unity.

Why? Because of the shadergraph.

That one thing, is driving a lot of artists to unity and they wield the shadergraph like Poseidon's Trident.

praise be

 

On the other hand, it takes 2 seconds to transfer your 3d model and materials from a DCC app to UE4 via datasmith and everything gets converted for you for example from a 3ds Max scene with VRay materials.

Unity's current solution for this is either to import fbx (and loose any lighting and materials), or use the Pixyz solution, (and loose any lighting and materials). I'm my line most people use V-Ray or Redshift in 3ds Max. Until Unity comes up with a solution to this, more UE4 guys will stick to it and even some Unity guys move over to UE4 sadly

Some Artist are also coders, and those may choose to stick to Unity since C# is like childsplay compared to C++

 

@steego Thanks. Misread as 5.1.3 Will look into what new features were added between 5.6.1

At the very least would like to dynamically stop the updating of the environment probe.
Wish someone from Unity would chime in...

 

Hi,

Is there a chance that raycast in 2.1 is missing the option to specify the filter angle when detecting feature points?
This was working in the previous version and now raycast has no overload for this.

 

I've got the same problem...any solution?

 

Further update.
So I've attempted to stop automatic updating of Environment Probes via a double tap gesture.
Tried 3 ways so far
By
1 setting automaticPlacement in AREnviromentProbeManager to false;
and by
2 calling Stop on XREnvironmentProbeSubsystem.
and
3 calling Stop on ARKitEnvironmentProbeSubsystem

All result in crashing my application with
System.UnhandledExceptionEventHandler:Invoke(Object, UnhandledExceptionEventArgs)
(Filename: currently not available on il2cpp Line: -1)

I've modified the Script Execution order to make sure that this script runs last.

Code (csharp):

1.  
2. using System.Collections;
3. using System.Collections.Generic;
4. using UnityEngine;
5. using UnityEngine.XR.ARSubsystems;
6. using UnityEngine.XR.ARFoundation;
7. using UnityEngine.UIElements;
8.  
9. public class DoubleTapDetect : MonoBehaviour
10. {
11.  
12. XREnvironmentProbeSubsystem probeSubsystem;
13. AREnvironmentProbeManager probeManager;
14. ARKitEnvironmentProbeSubsystem arKitSubSytem;
15. public GameObject Panel;
16.  
17. void Update()
18. {
19. for (var i = 0; i < Input.touchCount; ++i)
20. {
21. if (Input.GetTouch(i).phase == TouchPhase.Began)
22. {
23. if (Input.GetTouch(i).tapCount == 2)
24. {
25. // double tap :)
26. //stop env probes from updating;
27. probeManager.automaticPlacement = false;
28. // probeSubsystem.Stop();
29. //arKitSubSytem.Stop();
30. }
31. }
32. }
33.  
34. }
35. }
36.  

 

Any news about a working remote control?

 

@steego Noticed a custom LightEstimator script in the sample session Scene.
What are the advantages over the ARCameraManager component with its Light Estimation Mode?

 

Oh I thought I didn't include that, it's just for setting the ambient lighting and stuff to the values read from the camera manager.

 

I want to modify ARPlaneMeshVisualizer,but finally i find it can not import the namespace of UnityEngine.UI,other scripts like AR Plane Manager has the same problem,How can i do if i want to modify some of those scripts ?? thank you .

 

How can i do if i want to hidden the detected plane ?

 

@steego Forgot to ask, is there any change in how Environment Probes are automatically updated?

 

Would appreciate some comments/clarifications here please:
https://forum.unity.com/threads/ar-foundation-2-1-now-available.678979/#post-4555579

What is your teams process when creating AR Applications? You deploy to device, every_single_time you need to test? Or am I missing something?

Previously w/ ARInterface, I would do 99% of development in the editor, using simple RTS style camera controls to move the camera, it was extremely rapid and effective.

Deploying to device can take upwards of 30s, whereas editor playmode is usually <5. Not to mention the hassle of actually having to pick up a physical device, and find a plane each time. Now you'r close to 60s / test cycle., This is a major difference in a real production project, vastly inflating the amount of time required to build your app.

 

Hi, I use AR Foundation 2.1 in my image tracking application, but tracking only works on Android, and iOS doesn’t catch tracking, doesn’t work in general.
Unity 2019.1.0f2