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[COMING SOON] Rove3D: Interactive Production Quality Pathtracing

Discussion in 'Assets and Asset Store' started by rove3d, Sep 27, 2016.

  1. rove3d

    rove3d

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    Edit: You can sign up for the beta now: https://www.rove3d.com

    Edit: The beta will be released December 13, at $349 USD, available on https://www.rove3d.com

    Hey guys, hope you're all doing well. This is Chris Morris, some of you may remember me from the earlier days of Unity where a few of my plugins were among the first ever to be released on the Asset Store. Time flies!

    Just a quick announcement of the Rove3D beta - an interactive production-quality pathtracer for creating photorealistic interactive applications, integrated fully into Unity as a plugin.

    Note: This is a progressive renderer; images become less noisy over time with respect to the power of the GPU.

    Here are some screenshots taken directly within the Unity editor in play-mode:


























    * Runs in Unity Indie and Pro.
    * Renders directly to DirectX or OpenGL texture.
    * Integrates with any existing GUI.
    * Works with most image effects and post-processing.
    * Runs on Linux, Windows, and Mac.
    * Supports fully dynamic lights and geometry.
    * Built-in dynamic physical sky environment.
    * Multi-layered materials supporting isotropic/anistropic roughness.
    * Uses OpenCL, running on AMD and Nvidia cards.


    Get the latest updates from Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/rove3d

    Latest video:

     
    Last edited: Dec 14, 2016
    customphase, nuverian, aj1176 and 5 others like this.
  2. rove3d

    rove3d

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    Additionally, the renderer will be available on the Rove website shortly after release on the Asset Store: https://www.rove3d.com
     
  3. one_one

    one_one

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    Looks pretty cool! How does performance scale with the complexity of a scene? Would outdoor scenes be feasible?
     
  4. rove3d

    rove3d

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    The renderer scales well to millions of triangles, and is actually more performant outdoors where light is easily reached. Even so, the renderer uses bidirectional pathtracing, so even complex indoor scenes render well.
     
    one_one likes this.
  5. WHKS

    WHKS

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    will this work in webGL as well?
     
  6. rove3d

    rove3d

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    Not at the moment; Rove runs as a native-code plugin written in pure C, with OpenCL for compute. In the future, we may see something like Khronos' WebCL in Unity's webplayer that allows OpenCL to run in a browser, but as of today it is not supported.
     
  7. Waterlane

    Waterlane

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    Looking very interesting...
     
  8. garyhaus

    garyhaus

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    I am excited to hear more! This is really looking sweet.
     
  9. rahuxx

    rahuxx

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    any pre-purchase testing version available?
     
  10. rove3d

    rove3d

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    I've considered releasing a watermarked demo version, so that is a strong possibility. Also, next week I will get some video up walking through some basic usage and features, so that people have a better idea of what the first version of the renderer will look like.
     
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  11. crackfox

    crackfox

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    this is mindblowing. cannot wait to put my mittens on it.

    how is the compatibility with other unity assets? any general limitations?
    is this compatible with deep haze for example?
     
  12. rove3d

    rove3d

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    The initial release will be compatible with most basic elements: scene objects and transforms, physics components, sun and sky, camera fov/depth of field, etc. Camera post process effects like bloom, tonemapping, etc. are also supported, but advanced post effects that require things like depth buffers will need to be added in a future release. Particle systems and skinned animations are also not yet implemented, but are a priority.

    No doubt, the goal is to support every feature possible in Unity, but it won't all be in the initial beta release.
     
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  13. crackfox

    crackfox

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    thank you for the detailed reply.
    this will be a gamechanger.
     
  14. zelmund

    zelmund

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    cant you tell, that solution for screenshots capturing in scene? or its something like special effect on camera for runtime render in game?
     
  15. rove3d

    rove3d

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    It does render interactively at runtime in play-mode, so it is not just a screenshot tool. You can build runtime applications that are fully interactive using Rove as a progressive renderer.

    P.S. - I am looking to make a video showing the tool so that it is easier to understand, should find the time Friday or Saturday. It'll be announced on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/rove3d
     
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  16. zelmund

    zelmund

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    still waiting. hope its not a black hole and dead project.
     
  17. rove3d

    rove3d

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    Project is fully active, it was just announced 2 weeks ago for the first time. I had some optimizations I wanted to finish this weekend which took priority over the video, but you should fully expect the beta release before November 1. I know people want the video though so I will try to put one together this week, sorry for the slight delay on that.

    P.S. - If there's anything anyone wants to discuss about the project you can email me as well: chris@rove3d.com
     
    Last edited: Oct 17, 2016
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  18. kenshin

    kenshin

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    Hi @rove3d any news about the video? :)
     
  19. rove3d

    rove3d

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    @kenshin - Yes, the video will be available tomorrow. I'll post a link here and on my Twitter when it is uploaded.
     
  20. kenshin

    kenshin

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    Great!!!
    Thanks for the quick answer. :)
     
  21. rove3d

    rove3d

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    Finishing the video today and it should be uploaded tonight. Going to be showing a basic scene setup, with high performance on a laptop with a mobile GPU (AMD m275).

    We've also decided to build in a CUDA back-end in addition to OpenCL before the beta release, to squeeze the most performance out of every system. Will be working on that this week.
     
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  22. rove3d

    rove3d

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    Video is up:



    Just kept it basic to show the process of setting up a mesh, adding a material, and editing properties. More involved videos to come in the future.
     
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  23. zelmund

    zelmund

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    cool ))
    can you tell, its 1 material per scene or we will see different materials on objects in future?

    also will be nice to see rove3d in sponza scene to feel difference between renderers and watch on shadows play =)
     
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  24. rove3d

    rove3d

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    @zelmund - You can add many different materials to a scene, I just wanted to keep things simple in the first video with a single object and a single material so that the process would be very clear. In the next video, I'm planning to do a more complicated scene, with multiple objects and materials.
     
  25. kenshin

    kenshin

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    The first video is cool and very useful, but I agree with zelmund, a more complex scene will help to appreciate how the render will improve.

    A couple of comparative screenshot will be very useful too.
     
  26. TechDeveloper

    TechDeveloper

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    Hello Chris. did you release a GI plugin for unity?
     
  27. rove3d

    rove3d

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    @kenshin - Thanks for the feedback, I will make sure to use a more complex scene in the next video.

    @TechDeveloper - It is not released yet, but I am wrapping up development of the beta and it won't be very long before that is released. Twitter is the best way to keep up with when the release will be: https:www.twitter.com/rove3d
     
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  28. TechDeveloper

    TechDeveloper

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    ok but you never released a GI solution for unity 4 before?
     
  29. rove3d

    rove3d

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    @TechDeveloper - no, I haven't released anything GI related before. Years ago I released some free tools for terrain, rivers, roads, sky/clouds, shaders for parallax mapping, etc. but nothing for GI.
     
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  30. NERVAGON

    NERVAGON

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    I was excited about this, but the material workflow kills it for me. I would prefer something that can parse standard realtime PBR shaders.
     
  31. rove3d

    rove3d

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    @nervouschimp - that's exactly the kind of feedback I'm looking for, the beta is subject to change depending on what users want the most. In most ways, the Rove material editor is much like a Unity material editor, a series of texture maps defining the components: diffuse map, opacity map, roughness map, normal map, etc. So you're interested in some kind automation, where Rove reads the currently assigned Unity materials and creates a likewise Rove material automatically?
     
  32. kenshin

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    This would be a very interesting features but seems that standard shader has less parameters than your path tracer materials...
    in some way you have to "extend the standard shader".
     
  33. NERVAGON

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    Well, ultimately, it would be fantastic if rove could read and render the same shaders that Unity's deferred engine can. Who wants to go through and reassign custom materials that don't even appear to follow the same PBR conventions that we are all now comfortable with. If you must use a custom material/shader, please model it after the renderman pxr_disney principled shader, as that is like Unity and UE4 but with additional properties for offline rendering.
     
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  34. rove3d

    rove3d

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    Great feedback, I will look into it. There will be some differences between PBR shader parameters and even Renderman shaders due to our material model, which is based on physically accurate microfacets, but I can tool the interface in a way that more closely resembles what Unity users are used to, and do decent job of approximating an existing Unity built-in material with some kind of automation process.

    However, Rove can represent a much broader range of materials than a normal Unity or PBR shader, so it won't be an exact 1:1 matchup, there will be additional parameters available as a result of the more realistic methods involved in pathtracing.
     
    Last edited: Oct 24, 2016
  35. NERVAGON

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    I think it is safe to assume most content will be set up for realtime PBR. Likely authored in Substance Painter or 3D-coat using the industry standard texture maps: base color, metalness, roughness/gloss, AO, emission, height.
     
  36. NERVAGON

    NERVAGON

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    Tough day for rove. Sorry man. What will you do?
     
  37. kenshin

    kenshin

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    ...Otoy will be released in 2017 but not sure when, may be also december 2017.
     
  38. rove3d

    rove3d

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    I was aware they were planning on bringing Brigade to Unity/UE some time next year, so it isn't too big of a surprise. Here is what I posted in regard to this on another forum:

    Competition is good for everyone. I have quite a bit of respect for Jules. Here are my thoughts, with a bit of speculation.

    Rove ships with the Unity builds for "runtime" rendering within the built application. I don't think OTOY will allow Octane to be shipped inside of other people's software. It looks to me that the Octane integration is just the offline renderer built into the Unity timeline workflow. The word "non-interactive" was actually used in the presentation. I think when Brigade is finally brought to Unity/UE is when I will have a more direct competitor.

    You can bet by the time they release we will be very competitive in speed and quality, so we'll see how things play out.
     
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  39. NERVAGON

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    Well, it is true, Otoy is always late. So it could push to 2018. Who knows with them. And if rove's target audience is not pre-rendered content, but rather real-time interactive, I guess there is room for both. Good luck. BTW, will rove use all cards installed in the system for path tracing? or just the primary GPU? I would love to see a realtime GI solution that could use a 2nd GPU for the lighting calculations. Did you ever consider a hybrid raster + path trace renderer?
     
  40. rove3d

    rove3d

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    Yes, Rove will use all available GPUs on a single machine. Networked rendering isn't really a priority since we're shooting for consumers.

    I've worked with realtime GI before, with the modern voxel methods. It was a nightmare, impossible to scale to large dynamic scenes without blowing up memory or reducing the quality substantially by increasing voxel size. I really think pathtracing is the way forward, particularly when we start talking about using realtime filtering of noise (we're working on that too).
     
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  41. NERVAGON

    NERVAGON

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  42. rove3d

    rove3d

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    The dedicated raytracing hardware is really interesting stuff. We've emailed with imgtec about getting an allocation for some test hardware.
     
  43. OCASM

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    Q: So we will be able to make Unity games and use Brigade as the renderer?
    A: One reason for Octane 4 integrating brigade and supporting PowerVR raytracing HW was to make this a possible in the (now publicly announced) Unity integration with an update in for the V4 release. That's still about 3 steps away, but it's an important milestone we've had in mind from the start.

    https://www.reddit.com/r/oculus/comments/5au90v/otoys_jules_urbach_on_octanerender_unity/
     
  44. rove3d

    rove3d

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    Right, the Brigade integration coming after the Octane integration will be closer to what Rove is. Essentially the same eventual goal, to move away from rasterization towards pathtracing for interactive applications.
     
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  45. kenshin

    kenshin

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    I am really interested to see your next video with a more complex scene! :)
     
  46. rove3d

    rove3d

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    I have a charity thing this weekend out of town, then will work on the video when I get back to work on Monday. Going to show an interior scene along with Unity physics integration.
     
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  47. unisip

    unisip

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    +1 on supporting Unity PBR materials out of the box. Ideally one would want to load a Unity PBR scene and have it render without doing any specific setup. Then materials can be enhanced for greater results, but there are many use cases where sticking with PBR materials is already good enough.
     
  48. rove3d

    rove3d

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    Thanks for the feedback, it's on the todo list.
     
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  49. kenshin

    kenshin

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    Any news about the new video and the beta access? :)
     
  50. rove3d

    rove3d

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    Yes, everything still going full steam ahead. I've tried not to update this thread too much unless I have major updates, leaving the smaller updates to my Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/rove3d.

    Had to do some debugging on the traversal code which has taken longer than expected (as software development usually goes, right?) but the video is still a priority and I will post it here when it is uploaded.

    Excited to show you guys more, the renderer is getting faster every week, about 20% faster since the last video. I've learned to try to keep my mouth shut about when certain things will be released because things always take longer than expected, but the beta feels nearly finished and I'd like to just add 1 or 2 features more before putting it out there.
     
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