[Coming Soon] SpectraGI Advanced Real Time Global Illumination For Unity from Livenda

You're welcome, SpectraGI does not utilize the conventional pathtracing that you would have seen. Screen grain or convergence noise is not an issue with our method. This will become more clear as we release further details in the next coming weeks.

Cheers

 

Well Livenda you might be the last man/woman standing...

Brilliant Games has given the ole "we have to stop development so we can pay bills statement" (not too brilliant) which is a death nail to any future sales IMO.

And has left in its wake a bunch of upset and disillusioned folk. (This will be VERY hard for them to recover from this)

This is the second real time GI solution that has ran through the asset store only to fade out (pun intended) while still in beta.

Don't be surprised if not a lot of people jump on this asset when you first release it, I for one will be looking at it with a bolder of salt nor will I purchase while still in beta or missing core features.

Those other assets have made your job of validating your system that much harder.

Just felt I should share...

 

@Licarell I can agree with you, between DGI and Brilliant Games that have stoped after selling a beta version of their asset, a lot of trust has been lost in GI solution ( not that yours will be bad ^^ ) . Plus we have now the Unity 5 enlighten system which is coming ( still need to be tested this said ^^ ).

I keep i eye on your product but i will wait the other customers opinions .

This said, since you have already released assets, and aren't a one man team ( i'm right ? ) , i don't expect the same ending ^^ ( i hope it for you and us )

 

As I can see of candela ssrr i am really anxious because they look like pro's, and I am putting all my cards on this before changing unity to unreal, ( I REALLY LOVE UNITY3D, I AM CRAZY FOR THIS ) BUT i really need better light solutions, i am sure that this solution will be wonderful!

 

Amen brother. Beast is a nightmare using the tweak and repeat technique, plus the bake times are horribly slow compared to unreal. Unity 5 may be coming soon but how long will it take for all our favourite asset store purchases to update or for unity to iron out the kinks post release? Moving to unreal or cryengine is always an option but we all know what happens when it comes to actually getting work done (Dealing with LUA, cryptic licensing and dodgy support).

it would be nice to know whether you can study the lighting effects in editor or only through game cam. Its not a deal breaker but im sure its one of the myriad of facts we'd like to have.

 

So those reflections in the pool we see in the video are done by your path tracing or is it just ssr?

 

Thanks everyone for your enthusiastic comments. Just a few thoughts, I'm sure everyone is well aware that GI in real-time is a notoriously difficult problem, multitude of methods have been tried but did not meet expectations or failed. All proposed solutions have their pros and cons and some are gross simplifications or hacks to fake GI. SpectraGI is based on culmination of the most effective methods available including our new novel techniques, which integrate well with Unity methodology and workflow.

SpectraGI essentially breaks the problem of GI into two separate processes (It's actually three processes if you include the screen space path tracing) , i.e. Low frequency long distance GI and High frequency local GI. By doing so we are able to achieve true multi-bounce radiosity solution which is amortized over multiple frames for high performance. SpectraGI is real-time, that being said there is a small one time only pre-processing (Light transport/visibility analysis) step which is required for High Frequency local GI. During development of your scene, this pre-process can be disabled for fast iterative changes using Low Frequency long distance GI which provides almost final quality visual feedback.

In regards to Unreal Engine, AFAIK it does not provide a Dynamic GI Solution. Anyways, we are working hard to bring SpectraGI to Unity as soon as possible, please note that there is a lot more we will be providing with SpectraGI which we will talk about in the next coming weeks as we progress in our development.

You will be able to visualize GI in editor and/or game cam.

The reflections in the pool seen are a combination of Candela SSRR and Box-Corrected Cubemaps which will be included in the next update to Candela.

 

Is this pre-processing step an editor function or can it be executed in run-time?

 

I'm looking forward to read and see more of the solution I've to say.

Unlike others I do not see it as dark as others, as Briliant Games solution for example as simply bad and wrong to a degree where it was obvious (as pointed out elsewhere, even the window reflected on the table in the office video was totally wrong).

Also, until SpectraGI is around and testable, its not like there is nothing Marmoset Skyshop 2.07 just learned boxprojection and other neat tricks that remove quite a few of the headaches, but its naturally static and not remotely comparable to really working realtime GI a la SpectraGI or CryEngine

 

Yes this is possible however it is unnecessary, all dynamic objects will correctly catch the GI solution, we will clarify this at a later stage as there are multiple options.

 

CryEngine can do two light bounces on directional lights and one on spot/point lights, also screen space local reflections. But it doesn't need any pre-computed process, it's entirelly dynamic. If you need more precisition and fidelity you have IBL + light propagation volumes but that requires manual setup which is out of question for me. We are currently working in a multiplayer game where tons of stuff gets instantiated at runtime, baking and pre-processing it's out of question.
I've implemented an one bounce light GI (only Albedo), while isn't near as good as others solutions you don't need any setup or pre-procesing.

 

pre-processing isn't a big problem in my opinion since you can get a decent grasp of the final result in real time. A big question that doesn't seem to have come up yet is shader support however. Does spectra play nice with physically based shading solutions or are you relying on custom shaders?

On a side note, Unreal apparently does still have light propagation volumes GI available but you really have to jump through hoops to enable it. Once enabled however there is a chance it will melt your CPU and set fire to the curtains. Im glad spectra will be a tad lighter on the resources.

 

i guess SpectraGI will erase the line between off-line renders and traditional game renderers.

We can use those images in our archviz portfolio - seriously..People wont believe it is game engine anyways..

Also you guys may consider 3D app plugins as well. Every 3D software user will get crazy for having that technology in their editors.... lightwave in my case

Is there an AREA52 in Australia somewhere?

Will there be a bundle sale ? Spectra and Candela together How about - buy Candela now - and join beta Spectra..(or reduce price)

 

So is it safe to say the GI handles radiosity but reflections will still have to be done with ssr and cube maps?

Also, is AO handled with this gi at all?

 

SpectraGI does not rely or require any custom shaders to make use of the computed GI solution. SpectraGI will provide beautiful dynamic GI lightmaps in multiple formats (Directionless, Directional such as HL2 and/or spherical probes) which you can easily utilize in all types of shaders such as PBS or others. More on this later.

3D app plugins is a great idea which we are considering it, however our priority is to have SpectraGI available for Unity first.

Is there an AREA52 in Australia? Where do you think our offices are (Google pine gap Australia)

And for your last question, this may be a possibility however cannot say anything definativly at this stage.

This is not a straight forward answer, regular reflections will still need to be handled via SSR and/or Box Corrected cubemaps, however SpectraGI is also capable of specular reflections from indirect illumination and another thing to note is the AreaLights provided are also able cast glossy specular reflections independently.

In regards to AO question (Good Question!) This naturally is computed with the path tracing method and is provided to you to make use of within your shaders. The quality of the AO solution is also much better than the current Unity method.

Cheers..

 

Just to satisfy my curiosity until the next video
I'm guessing y'all are doing something like the PowerVR devs with hybrid ray tracing http://blog.imgtec.com/powervr-developers/implementing-hybrid-ray-tracing-rasterized-game-engine
I.e using the g-buffer for path tracing

 

Hello congratulations for this job
I wanted to ask if Spectra will support IES lights?

P.S.
It's time to put a new video where we can see spectra in action.
For now only a presentation, and if you really will be released in July or August, I think a video is possible!

 

Hi,

Just want to compliment you on how absolutely amazing this looks. I just have like two quick questions cause I have no idea how path tracing works. How good do dynamic and animated meshes look, unity light probes often just make the characters look washed out and bland, will this actually make them look as good as the rest of the scene? Other question, would outside scenes be able to look just a good as indoor scenes?

Thanks, and man it looks awesome from those screenshots.

Cheers

 

SpectraGI has no relation to hybrid-ray tracing and is a completely different concept. The article talks about a new raytracing hardware for mobile devices. even so, you would have noticed it is used for reflections, AO and shadows, not for a full blown Global Illumination solution. This is actually not possible (well not at meaningful speeds) with their current g-buffer method, GI requires irradiance info from each surface. (they emit the rays from the screenspace g-buffer info to the 'entire' geometry stored in the rasterizer )

Hi, Thanks for your great comments, the initial version will not have IES lights, we are concentrating on proving the best possible quality dynamic GI solution first It is important to mention SpectraGI, GI in general is for indirect lighting at multiple bounces which transport luminance/ Occlusion and Color information, the IES profiles are primarily for the look of the initial 'Direct' light falloff and shape, which has no significant quality impact on the GI solution. We do have a few videos coming soon, cheers.

Thanks for your great comments and questions. We will have multiple methods available and will provide more information soon, thanks again.

Cheers.

 

A quick question while we are waiting for the videos - Have you set a price point yet? I know you may not want to give an exact figure but can you give us a ballpark figure? Will it be close to the price of candela?

 

Hi, we do not have pricing information at this stage however it will be very reasonable, especially considering the quality and performance we are aiming for, which is well beyond anything on the market including Enlighten.

Cheers.

 

I'm eagerly whaiting to see more sample stuff, seeing what they've achieved with Candela SSR I know this G.I stuff is in good hands but hey>> a couple exta captures can calm a bit the patio...

 

Awesome work.
Are you using this method ?

 

Good god its quiet around here. Hows it going livenda? Anything to share with us, perhaps some images or a more detailed workflow? I can totally appreciate what a giant undertaking this is but im sure we're all pretty psyched to know more about the plugin.

 

Yep I wanna go on vacation with a cool image in my mind. A gray scenario screencaps with GI etc... nothing final, only cool WIP stuff.

 

I do find it rather curious this is now the third (fourth?) 'real-time' GI solution that was enthusiastically announced and enthusiastically received...

...and subsequently barely talked about again.

Mind you, I completely understand the complexity, I just find it curious that in all three (four?) cases the announcements ended up being premature, and in all but Livenda's case (so far) the GI solution fell short of expectations and development abruptly halted.

Hmmm...

 

May be the short expectation is based on deceiving previous package results.
So far I will have my vote on them until the end of summer or so and then I'll decide, but considering the stuff they've created before I think these people have the skills to bring this to what they promise.

 

Oh no doubt, only they too were clearly a tad premature in their announcement.

Our next update was to come the week of E3 (June 9th - 13th)...

...and we're still waiting which clearly means they jumped the gun a teeny bit.

 

Lol, well, could be, considering that the promo video only comes packed with an image.... we'll see how this ends.

 

Call me optimist (or an idiot), if you wish but i've still got a lot of hopes pinned on this one. I just cant abide the horrendous noise my cpu makes when beast fires up. However! We all know how problems that may seem insignificant at first, can quickly snowball and leave your cornflakes all soggy when it comes to release.

Here's hoping chaps!

 

Hi Everyone,

We know a lot of you are anxious to see SpectraGI in action and we cannot wait to show it to you! SpectraGI is at Beta and going great, we will be starting to share further details on workflow, performance, integration and a multitude of further information, videos/screenshots very soon.

Cheers!

 

keep going lads, I'm so excited, just keep going btw will you guys combine your plug-ins in 1 or will keep it separate?

 

So do you need to generate lightmaps to use SpectraGI? The only reason I'm asking is because I'm wondering how normal maps will work with this GI solution on building geometry.

Directional lightmaps have a big limitation in Unity. You can't really use normal maps to smooth out hard edges with directional lightmapping, because Unity occludes the brightness of all angled pixels on the normal map for some reason.

 

I've send you an PM / E-Mail.

 

Can't wait to hear more

 

Hey guys,

I´m getting good quality stuff with using Alloys PBS, Shadows Softener and Livenda SSRR but I´m really looking forward to your GI solution..Is there anyway of being part of the beta phase?

But guys, please no more "coming really soon..." posts..

Best regards,
Oli

 

Hey Livenda, would it be possible to have physically accurate point lights as well...? This is something that I have often sought after in my own work with GI.

 

No need to generate Unity lightmaps for SpectraGI.

Are you referring to PBS / IES? SpectraGI is compatible with all Unity lights and also incorporates a next gen Uber PBS Area light system which should be used most of the time. All other third party shaders such as Alloy/ Lux etc. can also be used if you wish as SpectraGI is an indirect light solution. There are a significant number of options to explain or go into detail in a short post, we will be providing further technical information soon as SpecraGI is a vast package.

Cheers

 

Kinda, I was thinking of lights that have an accurate falloff. (If you're used MR or VRay you will have an idea.) I just can't wait to use Spectra, especially if it will end the tweakfest that is Beast.

 

Hi Everyone,

Here are the first two public screenshots showing the SpectraGI Area Lights ONLY and it is a WIP. Important things to note; There is No IBL and no GI being used in the scene and it is purely lit by the SpectraGI Area light system. There are four Physically correct Area lights and two have Textures for Luminance which can be seen in the Glossy Specular reflections. Please note these are early development screenshots.





It is important to stress that these are development WIP images and there is no IBL and no GI in the scene. It is purely lit by the SpectaGI Physically Accurate Area Light System with Texture based luminance on two out of the four Area lights. All Area Lights in Spectra GI are deferred and amortised for maximum performance and they all support full shadows, textures and projection.

This is only the tip of the Iceberg so to speak and we cannot wait to show you more very soon!

Cheers

 

Looks good livenda, keep it coming.

 

As a matter of curiosity, just how dynamic is the GI going to be?

For example, let's say I had a first person shooter with fully destructible environments (as in, you could reduce an entire building to rubble). Could Spectra GI handle this situation? I expect it would, but still, doesn't hurt to ask

 

Looks pretty
Looking forward to see the GI in a detailed environment with buildings and stuff

 

wow, looks very nice. I´m so excited about this like a little kid . Physically accurate area lighting + PBS (Alloy) = awesome sauce!
Keep the screenshots coming..

 

i am also eagerly waiting. It will be game changer for our humble business .. (BTW i just have purchased Candela - and all i can say is WOW! - great price too!)

Please show us more...

 

Please emphasize that this plugin, as well as the SSRR plugin, is only for UNITY PRO.

 

Now this is very tasty. And very clean. With just area lights, I wonder if they will be a huge performance hit if there is too many of them in a single scene. Looking forward to the next screenshots of eye candy.

 

judging by the early development stage you stated, i don't think you started the development long time ago(longer than the thread)
currently there are two assets with the same goals and they are both on "pause", i hope this asset don't face the same fate.

 

While the pics are nice, with all due respect to the quality of the software, people are here to see the GI in SpectraGI, not the area lights. We already have fantastic options for those in other assets.

Similarly, the other proposed GI solutions did the same thing. They showed us GI, got us excited about the technology and the quality, then started showing us other stuff that was not GI.

Again the pics look great, but my interest, as I suspect is everyone else's in here, is in a quality real-time global illumination system.

Cheers guys

 

I second this. While the area lights look great, 99% of the people watching this thread are here for the GI. And it's been a painful 2 months checking this thread daily to see it in action.