Can you Graphics.DrawProcedural without a MeshFilter ?

Hi unity,

I just spent a half of a day trying figure out why nothing is shown in the scene when i'm using
Graphics.DrawProcedural. Then I figured out that I need to add a MeshFilter and create a mesh with the same amount of triangles I'm drawing. I don't understand why I need that.

I'm generating geometry in a Compute Shader and drawing the geometry from a ComputeBuffer. So all my triangle and vertices data inside the ComputeBuffer. Why do I need to add a MeshFilter with a mesh?
Is there a way to draw procedural without using a MeshFilter?

Best,
Vladimir.

 

If you're working entirely on the GPU, I would suggest going the indirect route instead;

https://docs.unity3d.com/ScriptReference/Graphics.DrawProceduralIndirect.html

 

wow / cool / thank you. ill try.
just wonder how can i get current reflection probes there and texture behind to make refractive shaders. - is it possible to get those textures inside frag/surf pass when you use Graphics.DrawProceduralIndirect ?

 

Well, certain Graphics.Draw* methods operate outside of the normal rendering pipeline in what's called "immediate mode" (please see docs). They are not fully integrated with lighting, shadows (depth) and render queues etc... Command Buffers were introduce to allow better integration here and Unity have kindly proved us with similar methods which I recommend having a look into;

https://docs.unity3d.com/ScriptReference/Rendering.CommandBuffer.DrawProceduralIndirect.html

 

So, I just tested some scenes and apparently you can use Graphics.DrawProcedural without a MeshFilter and MeshRenderer.