Graphics Azure[Sky] - Dynamic Skybox

Hi!

The error messages are saying that there is already a name definition for some classes and methods.

It is likely that you already had an old version of Azure installed in the project and updated it without first removing the plugin completely.

Generally in new versions of the package, some script names can be changed to improve the syntax and better describe its functionality.

When importing a new version of some package without remove the old version, Unity replaces the old files with the new ones if any changes are detected. But if the name of any file is changed, Unity treats it as a new asset and just adds it to the project without removing the old file because there is no way to know if that is a new asset or just an old file that has been modified. If this happens with scripts, we will have some duplicate classes and methods and the console will show a lot of errors.

Try to remove the plugin from the project and install it again, this should fix the error messages and make everything work as it should.

 

Hi everyone!

Just showing off a new software I'm currently working on, the software is designed for texturing pixel art style on 3D models.

The purpose of this software is to speed up the texturing process of 3D models by painting the pixel art directly on the 3D model, or painting the pixel art on the image and see the texture change on the 3D model in real time using the same software. Currently you need to open the texture for editing in Paint and use Blender or similar software to check if the texture edits looks good on the 3D model.

The texturing process will be somewhat similar to Substance Painter and Blender Texture Painting, but with the painting tools targeted for pixel art. In the screenshot below, you can get an idea of what the development environment will look like.


You can follow the development of this software on Twitter: Link

 

Hi @DenisLemos !!!

I was wondering if you could remove the sky from Azure and leave only the part of the scripts that control the rotation of the sun and moon, light intensity, to be able to handle the skies and fog that come in HDRP with Azure scripts .. .
In addition to the system that Azure has to control third-party parameters through the Output System, you could make a simple version of Azure for HDRP that does not have Sky or fog and the only thing it does is control the sky volume parameters in HDRP . At least for customers who already have it ...

I think it is a very good idea that would take little work and you could have a simple HDRP version of Azure ...

Regards

 

This is a good idea, it can be used not only to control the HDRP skybox and fog, but to control anything in the scene influenced by the time of day or local-global zone volumes by using the output system.

 

I want to change the texture of the moon(full moon, meniscus, no moon) by the number of days , how can I do it?

 

Hi!

You don't need to change the moon texture if you want set different moon phases. Just set on the "AzureTimeController" component the "Time System" to "Realistic", this way the moon phases will be defined automatically based on the time, date and location you set in the component. So just choose a date and location that you like the way the sun and moon behave in the sky.

 

I want to control the cycle of the moon, and there are some events in my game that are only triggered on the day of the full moon. I hope that the full moon is once every seven days.Can I specify the moon phase in the script?
thank you very much

 

Try this:

• Set the "Time System" to "Simple".
  
  
• Remove the two lines of code shown in the image below located in the UpdateTimeSystem() method of the AzureTimeController.cs script. These lines are responsible for always positioning the moon on the opposite side of the sun when the "Time System" is set as "Simple".
  
  
  
• In the sky prefab, drag the "Moon Transform" into the "Sun Transform", so the transform of the moon will rotate along with the transform of the sun, but now you can also change the local rotation of the "Moon Transform" by the Inspector or custom script and thus modify the moon phase.
  

Now you have full control of the moon phases just by changing the rotation of the moon transform.

 

Thank you! I will try it out.
Two other questions, how do I pause the passage of time? How to specify the time of the timeline in the day and night cycle? timeController.timeline is only useful when time is not flowing.

 

After a mess, I seem to have solved half

public void StartStop()
{
if (isMoving)
timeController.StartTimelineTransition(timeController.timeline,0.0f);
else
timeController.StartTimelineTransition(timeController.timeline,dayLength);

isMoving = !isMoving;
}

 

StartTimelineTransition() is used to apply a linear transintion from a time to another, for example, move the time from 14h to 19h. Look at the "TimelineTransition" example scene.

To pause the time and move it again, just add this 2 methods to the "AzureTimeController.cs" script:

Code (CSharp):

1. /// <summary>
2. /// Pause the time progression.
3. /// </summary>
4. public void PauseTime()
5. {
6.     m_timeProgressionStep = 0.0f;
7. }
8.  
9. /// <summary>
10. /// Starts the time progression again.
11. /// </summary>
12. public void PlayTimeAgain()
13. {
14.     m_timeProgressionStep = GetTimeProgressionStep();
15. }

Call one of the methods above whenever you want to pause or restart the day's progress. PlayTimeAgain() will only work if on the Inspector the "Day Length" property is non-zero.


You can specify the value of the timeline just by setting it:

Code (CSharp):

1. timeController.timeline = 12.5f // Sets the time of day to 12:30

 

Hi!

Just a quick clarification on the Event Controller, is "by minute" still a value between 0-60 regardless of the Day Length? For example, my Day Length is 60, is timeline 17.8 going to be equal to the 17th hour and 48 minutes? If I change my Day Length to 24, will 17.8 still be 17th hour and 48 minutes?

Thanks!

 

Hi!

Yes it is. Te hours and minutes from the Event Controller are based only on the timeline and converted from float to a Vector2 (hours, minutes). If you change the "Day Length", this will only change the progression speed of the day's cycle and will not affect the event system.

Just a note, if you want to change the value of "Day Length" at runtime, you will need to recalculate the value of the local variable "m_progressionStep" because it is only computed at the start. The best way to do this would be to create a new method in "AzureTimeController.cs" script like this:

Code (CSharp):

1. public void SetNewDayLength(float value)
2. {
3.     dayLength = value;
4.     m_timeProgressionStep = GetTimeProgressionStep();
5. }

 

@DenisLemos !! Are you planning to do "this simple version" for HDRP?

If so, I'll wait. If not and you just see it as a good idea, can you give me some tips or information for me to work on this Idea that I told you ...
Basically it would be that Azure did not introduce any Sky in the scene but that it continued having all the functionalities of calendar, latitude and altitude of the sun and moon, etc ...
I do not know if you understand me

Regards

 

I understand you, I will send you a version of the package by private message only with the scripts necessary to run the core system, I removed everything related to the sky and fog and kept in the profiles only the lighting, weather and output properties.

Perhaps the particles and their materials will not work in HDRP, so I can remove this feature too if you prefer.

 

Thank you very much!!! I'm traveling and I won't be able to try for a few weeks.

If I have any problem or doubt, I will answer you privately.

Thank you very much for your support.

 

for performance sake what lighting settings should i use ?

 

You must use the same lighting settings that you would use on Unity without Azure.
Some are:

• Set for the directional light the "Shadow Type" property to "Hard" or even disable the shadows if your game allows this option without losing the graphics.
• On the project quality setting, reduce the shadows quality.
• On the Lighting windown, set the "Evironment Lighting Source" to "Color", it should be faster than skybox.
• If you need the Azure Reflection Probe to be realtime, set it to "Via Scripting" and use a higer refresh interval.

 

so, do i need to bake the lighting ?

 

Only if you use static time of day, if your game uses dynamic time of day, then I think it is not a good idea to use baked lighting because it will not fit with the time of day changes.

 

Hello! Thinking about purchasing this asset, but have a few questions. My game will require flying from ground to high/outside atmosphere. I saw in one of the videos that flying at high altitude will reveal the stars, but are we able to use our own star skybox? Also, is it possible to reduce the height of the atmosphere to be able to fly to high altitude quicker?
How tall is the atmosphere?
Thanks!

 

Hi,

You're talking about the old version of Azure that had the precomputed sky system. Unfortunately the precomputed sky system has been temporarily removed from the package and is not present in the current version available on the Asset Store.

At the moment I can't maintain two different sky systems both with URP and Legacy RP support, so I chose to temporarily remove the precomputed sky system because it was not used by 99% of customers and it is still a work in progress and therefore with some bugs and performance issues that can be improved. One thing I learned as a lesson from Unity, is that you should not deliver a product with many incomplete features, but instead, you should improve and fix the existing ones and only release the new features when it is ready for production.

The precomputed sky system may be back with the 7x releases cycle. I am planning big changes that will make the system completely modular and that will make it easier for me to support different sky models and still gain performance.

I appreciate your interest in Azure and I am sorry that the asset does not yet have the features you need. But keep an eye on the 7x cycle releases.

 

Thanks for the reply! That's too bad, but I agree with your philosophy. I will keep an eye out for that feature in the coming releases.

 

Hi
Just one short question. Does it work in Unity 2020 VR?

 

Hi!

I never tested the asset with VR because I don't have a VR device here. If something is not going to work well in VR, it must be the fog scattering effect that does not support Single Pass Stereo rendering. When I wrote the shader I followed the manual instructions on how to implement Single Pass Stereo support for post-processing effects.

But now the manual is completely different and probably the old implementation should no longer be working, if it ever worked, because as I said, I had no way to test it.

So, if you only want to use the asset for VR projects, I advise you not to buy the asset because I will not be able to provide the proper support.

 

Hi. There is a bug in AzureComputeFogScattering. Fog computed here is grey because _Azure_FogScatteringScale not used, instead of screen space effect.

 

Hi,

Thanks for the info, but you are probably using an old version of Azure because this bug has already been fixed. Make sure you are using the latest version of Azure (v6.0.2).

 

Is there a way to change the clouds to be more stylized? They clash with the rest of my scene.


https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachme..._Added_Fog_Volume_for_slight_distance_fog.png

 

Hi!

Your screenshot looks very good, the sky in the background is matching with the stylized graphic and the scene has not lost its visual identity, this is something difficult to achieve when using assets made by different artists.

I think if you play with Unity's post processing effects, especially the "Color Grading" you can get even better results.

But if by "more stylized clouds" you mean adorned clouds with different shapes, then this is not possible with the current cloud system.

 

Will it be possible to change the clouds in the future?

 

Currently you can change the cloud to the static cloud type or also disable the clouds and use only the sky background with some other third party cloud asset.

But certainly, if I can make a better cloud with a better performance, I will. The problem is that making clouds better and realistic without destroying performance is very difficult and the current cloud system is very fast and works very well with the graphic style proposed by Azure.

 

Is it already possible that the shadow moves with it ?

I think this asset is extremely good, but unfortunately unrealistic because the shadows don't move at all : (

would be nice if that would work.

 

I don't really understand your question, the shadows will move when the time of day changes. Azure controls the rotation, color and intensity of the directional light and Unity takes care of the shadows automatically, the directional light should work and be configured the same way it would be if you did not use Azure.

[Edited]
Note that the shadows and lighting will not change if you are using a "Lightmap" or some kind of baked lighting. But this is not a problem with the asset, this is an Unity side scene setup.

 

Oh : o i just see it now in the "Gi" Demo, that's what I meant, i'm really sorry for making such a stupid claim ! I didn't do my research well.

 

How can I change the directional light without it being reset ?

 

aand how can i see the sun texture more ?

https://ibb.co/KN3st0V

 

or how do I get this effect away that covers it ?

 

No problem.

To change the intensity and color of directional light, you must customize the properties on the "Lighting" tab of each profile. Each climate profile has a different lighting setup.

You can increase the "Sun Texture Intensity" located on the "Outer Space" tab of each profile. The effect that covers the sun texture is called "Mie" bright and you can reduce it by editing the "Mie" property locatted on the "Scattering" tab of each profile.

 

Thanks a lot !

I love this Asset

 

hello again,

how can I change this transition from white to blue ? so that it looks sharper / thinner ?

https://ibb.co/jkGvtJN

 

aand can i move this folder "Azure[Sky] Dynamic Skybox" to another one without problems ?

 

Try changing the parameters from the "Scattering" tab of each profile, especially Mie, Rayleigh and Scattering. If you spend about 5 or 10 minutes playing with the parameters of each profile, you will figure out what is possible or not to customize/achive.

No serious problems will happen if you move the folder to another directory. The only detail to be agreed upon is regarding the implementation of the fog scattering support to transparent materials. You will need to fix in the transparent shaders with the fog scattering support the include adress of the "AzureFogCore.cginc" file using the new path.
By default, the path to the include cg file is set in the transparent example shaders as:
Assets/Azure[Sky] Dynamic Skybox/Shaders/Transparent/AzureFogCore.cginc

 

No serious problems will happen if you move the folder to another directory. The only detail to be agreed upon is regarding the implementation of the fog scattering support to transparent materials. You will need to fix in the transparent shaders with the fog scattering support the include adress of the "AzureFogCore.cginc" file using the new path.
By default, the path to the include cg file is set in the transparent example shaders as:
Assets/Azure[Sky] Dynamic Skybox/Shaders/Transparent/AzureFogCore.cginc[/QUOTE]

Will it improve in the future, so that it can be classified later ?

 

With this feature, you can set different values to the properties at any time of the day providing total control over all the properties of the sky system. bluestacks for windows omegle

 

Hi : )

Do you use Generate Lightning ?

 

Hello,

I have another Question: when I have a white ground (in the standard Unity Skybox) and then change to this sky Asset, then this ground turns blue and is no longer white : /

how can I do that he stays white ? and other objects also turn blue.

 

I don't want to change the materials of the ground & these objects !!

 

I appreciate that all the usual beta caveats apply, so consider this just an early warning- the Azure Fog Scattering render feature doesn't seem to work with 2020.2.0b2 and URP 10.0.0-preview.26. No errors or warnings in the console, it just doesn't show.

 

Hi, thanks for the advice!

I did a test using the Unity and URP versions you mentioned and got the same result, I also tested the URP 10.0.0 preview with the toon outlile example provided by Unity here, and the result was also the same. When I install the URP 10.0.0 preview everything stops working, so the problem is related with the preview URP package because Unity 2020.0.0b2 and Azure Fog Scattering Feature are working without problem when using the default URP package.

I think URP 10.0.0 is not mature enough and some features may be missing because it is also breaking the examples provided by Unity, this is normal because it is a preview package still in development.

 

Thanks for looking into it, will hold off updating for now!