World Building EasyRoads3D v3 - the upcoming new road system

Hi Eduardo,

In the additional free demo package:

/Assets/EasyRoads3D/Prefab Sources/Additional Prefabs/ERMarkerSnapConnector

This type of connector can be added to any prefab in the scene that is not generated by the road network, like the highway crossroad prefab example in the demo package.

It can be used to quickly align road markers with this object by snapping the road markers to these connectors.

Here is more info: https://easyroads3d.com/tutorials/bridges.php

Thanks,
Raoul

 

Great! That was what I was looking for. I don´t know how I missed it on tutorials and documentation.

Eduardo

 

Hello, is there an easy way to know if a point falls on a road? Or do I need to sample the spline points in the center of the road and figure it out from that?

 

Is this point on the surface, or above?
Depending on your performance target, you can do a vertical raycast (filtering by your road layer), and can also test for specific tag.

 

Hi Discord,

My initial thoughts were also in the direction of using raycasting for this.

If you do not want to use raycasting, in theory this could also be done by finding the nearest two spline points to this point and calculate the distance to the line between these two spline points. If this is within half the road width, the point is on the surface.

Thanks,
Raoul

 

Perfect, thanks Ward101 and raoul, that's very helpful!

 

Hi Raoul.

Still dealing with the posibility of use the road sections as a independent prefabs changing the pivot point of the road section and storing the mesh in the scene. The thing is, when change the pivot point of the road section, the vegetation lost his line mask position reference to the road:


I can fix it easily just rebuilding the terrain or refreshing the vegetation reference in ER TerrainManagement but, in both cases I lost the reference of the road mesh and the pivot point:


Also tried to add the vegetation instance in the scene after the roads but keep geting the position reference far away from the road.
Also tried to deactivate the vegetation instance in ER Terrain Management and install the all vegetation package after the roads but again, when have to go back to edit mode to activate VSP, roads lose his meshes references

Any idea of how (if can be) to solve it?

Thanks,
Joan

 

Hi Joan,

What exactly do you mean with this? How is the reference with road mesh and the pivot point lost?

I can see how making changes such as resetting the active state of Vegetation Studio support refreshes the road network which means the pivot point is set back to the default position. If CenterPivotPoints() is used, it should be used at the very end when work on the road network is completed.

I don't know the inner workings of Vegetation Studio, but it seems the Vegetation Mask Line component data is relative to the parent object, the road objects in this case instead of global. The script /Assets/EasyRoads3D/scripts/ERVegetationStudio shows how EasyRoads3D passes data to the Vegetation Studio asset. If you do coding, you could check these scripts and use similar code to update the data so it is relative to the new pivot point.

In any case, I will check what exactly happens with the Vegetation Studio data and see if a fix can be integrated in CenterPivotPoints().

Thanks,
Raoul

 

I'm trying to use EasyRoads 3.3b6 with Unity 2022.1b16. When I import the two packages (First the 2019.3+ one then the 2021.2+ one), it asked whether I want to update deprecated API calls. If I say yes, and try to "Build Terrain(s)" it crashes Unity. If I say no and then press "Build Terrain(s)", it gives me this error:

MissingMethodException: Method not found: void UnityEditor.Unwrapping.GenerateSecondaryUVSet(UnityEngine.Mesh)
EasyRoads3Dv3Editor.OQQQCQCDCC.OnInspectorGUI ()​

Furthermore, loading EasyRoads scenes that have EasyRoads already in them from a previous version of EasyRoads and Unity seems to throw the following d3d11 errors:

Assertion failed on expression: 'GPUWidth == m_DataWidth'
Assertion failed on expression: 'isTexDataAllowed'
d3d11: failed to create 2D texture id=590 width=750 height=200 mips=1 dxgifmt=72 [D3D error was 80070057]
d3d11: Failed to create 2D texture in GfxDeviceD3D11​

Do you know when you will have support for Unity 2022.1b16 in EasyRoads and what those d3d11 errors are? Thanks!

 

Hi ted_paradox,

I just replied to an email with a similar question and similar contents, I guess that was you?

Unity 2022 requires a different package. EasyRoads3D v3.2.1f3, released last week, does support Unity 2022. The current v3.3 beta 6 does not.

Probably tomorrow a v3.3 beta update will be available on our website. Because this involves both Unity beta and EasyRoads3D beta, it was not yet plannend to include a package for the Unity 2022 beta. But if this is important for you, that can be done.

Thanks,
Raoul

 

Raoul let me know if it is not ok to post this but my game Turbo Sliders Unlimited was released to Early Access today and apparently, it is one of the first games to heavily use the ER3D API so you and others here might be interested. Here are some tracks made by users with the in-game editor (and ER):

If someone wants to test the editor, here is the link to the game: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1478340/Turbo_Sliders_Unlimited/

 

Hi Antti,

Congratulations, good to hear that!

Yes, we have been in touch frequently. You created a runtime interface for pretty much all the features also available inside the Unity editor. More users are doing that but indeed, so far, I have not seen that to the extent as what you have done.

And it is looking great

Raoul

 

Just downloaded EasyRoad Pro and demo scene (latest versions). The problem is - i can't get it working with URP.
I tried importing both
\Assets\EasyRoads3D\SRP Support Packages\DEMO_URP_7_3_1.unityPackage
\Assets\EasyRoads3D\SRP Support Packages\URP_7_3_1.unityPackage
but mpst of the assets remain pink...what's wrong and what can be done ?
Unity 2020.3.28f1

 

Hi astanid,

After importing the URP package there will be a new SRP readme file in the EasyRoads3D root directory. Could you check this file?

In short, URP and HDRP support was added in v3.2. Your screenshot shows the older v3.1 demo scene which is not optimized for URP and HDRP.

That said the pink materials in the screenshot includes assets that use the Unity Standard shader. This shader is upgradable through the Unity material conversion tool. It is mentioned in the SRP readme.

The v3.2 demo scene is optimized for URP and HDRP. And after running the Unity material conversion tool, the assets that use Unity built-in shaders will also be updated. The only assets that will not be updated are some third party tree assets and the water material which are not road network related. This is also mentioned in the readme.

Could you try that?

Thanks,
Raoul

 

@astanid To update Materials, in Unity, select the material(s) you want to update, then select the EDIT menu, then RENDERING, then MATERIALS, then select UPDATE SELECTED MATERIALS

The ER3D materials are not 'special", so you can apply whatever material you want

 

v3.3 beta 7 is now available on our website

This update includes new side object features.

Side object support on intersections. When the same side object is active on both sides of a corner or straight section it will also be generated on the intersection.

So for example guard rails and walls will now continue on Intersections and with adjusted terrain deformation for retaining wall types.



This behaviour can be controlled in the Side Object Manager: General Settings > Generate on Connections

This should also work well for Custom Connections based on your models when the models are imported with clean edge detection on the outside, only black dots on the outer edges in the Custom Connection Editor. When this is not the case the side object will also be generated on "inner" edges which is not what you want. So this is known and will be improved.

The implementation of this was complex and is the reason why this is first released in beta state. Feedback is very much appreciated.


Beta 7 also includes new alignment options by setting anchor points for the "Mesh Object" side object type, which is based on spawned instances of the prefab.

This can be used to create, for example, these typical construction fences with a base connector. Random rotations on the base connector are supported.



The beta package includes the above provisional example.

The "Construction_Fence" prefab shows the setup.

"_base" represents the pivot point of the base component, the origin of the random rotation controllable through Min Max values.

"_baseConnector" rotates with the "_base" object and will be the start point of the next instance.

That's it for the prefab setup.

The Side Object Manager will auto detect this setup and show additional controls such as the Min Max "Base Rotation Rotation" slider.

As always, please backup your project first before importing the update.

Thanks,
Raoul

 

I can't fix materials in my scene
Tried importing URP support packaged. tried converting project materials to URP - no luck. half of side objects are pink

 

What trees are used in this demo ?

 

@astanid

I can't speak to those SPECIFIC items, but be aware that some materials cannot be converted to URP or HDRP. Depends on how that material was made.

Just in case: Make sure to find that material and see if you can covert just that one (as opposed to converting entire project. I prefer to update materials specifically just in case) If that still doesn't work, then make your own new material and apply it to that object and you SHOULD be fine (again, some objects have special materials; ie: water)

 

Hello astanid,

Can you provide full details of all the packages you have imported and also which steps you took so far and which materials are still pink?

I am asking this because the assets in the new screenshots are all from the "EasyRoads3D Pro Add On - HD Roads" package.

The URP materials / shaders for this package are located in: /Assets/Naturemanufacture/HD Roads/SRP Support Packages/

This is mentioned in the short PDF documentation in the /Assets/Naturemanufacture/HD Roads/ folder.

Thanks,
Raoul

 

Hey raoul,

I have a feature request. I would like to use texture atlases for my road textures to improve performance. Since I have a lot different road types they mostly all have individual materials.

My problem is that the UV settings of a road type are very limited. Would it be possible to add settings like offset and uv scale, so I could use one material for multiple different roads?

Thanks

 

@astanid,

This is the previous v3.1 demo scene.

The readme file includes info about the trees related to Speedtree. These were free copryrighted trees on the Asset Store by Speedtree, but I belief the package is no longer available.

The tree prefab visible in the image is part of the demo package. But again, these are tree / vegetation prefabs not road network related. EasyRoads3D does not provide vegetation shaders / materials for URP or HDRP.

For that, you could look for example at the free Vikings Village package of Unity Technologies, https://assetstore.unity.com/packages/essentials/tutorial-projects/viking-village-urp-29140 This is an URP project with vegetation materials.

Thanks,
Raoul

 

Hey @marcell123455,

A texture Atlas for built-in road types is possible in v3.3 where you have more control over the road shape and UV settings per road type. Have you tried that?

Thanks,
Raoul

 

Hi raoul,

No, Im using v3.2.1f3 I guess v3.3 it´s on the beta downloads on the website?

thanks

 

Hi Marcell,

Yes, at the moment the beta is available on the website. A new update was released today https://forum.unity.com/threads/eas...-new-road-system.229327/page-212#post-8083241

There will be one more update. After that the beta will also be added as a separate package to the Unity Asset Store download for final testing.

Thanks,
Raoul

 

Those are materials that i can't convert to URP. It's dust for example, some bridges

 

any chance to get the scene from the video ? I'm looking for those tress and can't find it Other solutions are high poly. And i'm looking for 200-300 poly european trees.

 

Thanks Raoul.
I have trying to replicate the VS code to update the ER data after center pivot point but definitely I'm not that good with scriptableObjects.
If you finally do add the functionality to use VS also with centered pivot points, let us know. Maybe if just would be possible activate/deactivate VSP once terrains are build.

Perhaps, How do you call ERVegetationStudio scriptableObject? Just activating a bool?

Regards,

 

Hi astanid,

This shader is an older v3.1 shader, hence the error message in the URP project. Can you try the v3.2 "ER Road Detail" shader?

Also, can you give more feedback on what you did after seeing my previous reply? Did you meanwhile import the HD Roads URP package, that package will update the dust side object material. And did you meanwhile use the Unity material conversion tool?

Thanks,
Raoul

 

EasyRoads3D is a road network tool, not a vegetation package

The trees that are not copyrighted are part of the package. We cannot share other trees, like the Speedtree trees, they are copyrighted. They were always free, I don not know why the package was removed. But since you mention 200-300 poly trees. The speedtree polycounts are well in the thousands.

Thanks,
Raoul

 

Hi Joan,

In my previous post I mentioned the ERVegetationStudio scripts as a way to see how data is passed to VS and what data VS requires. The idea is to adjust the positions to relative to the new pivot point. But I do not know if that can be done through code in VS, you will need VS access to the current positions.

Internally these calls are made after a road is updated. What I will do is call these VS scripts again after calling CenterPivotPoints() through the API.

Thanks,
Raoul

 

That would be nice.
Appreciated,

 

Hi Raoul,
could you elaborate why ER does not place side objects prefabs in the scene as actual prefabs, i.e. with their prefab connection intact? We currently have a problem where we want to quickly iterate on some settings like LODs for these objects and it is a little bit painful to always go through the road network.

Thanks!

 

Hi,

That changed in v3.2 for the Mesh type of side object. The instances are now spawned using the Unity PrefabUtility class unless the "Combine" option near the bottom in the Side Object Manager is active.

But since there has been some changes recently to side objects, I will check that. Which version are you using?

Thanks,
Raoul

 

What can i do to make that dirt track look more natural ? is there some dirt textures i can paint around to hide that line between terrain and road ?

 

Hi astanid,

This is all material related, matching the road material with the terrain.

Is this one of the dirt tracks in the demo package with the default settings? In that case, the dirt material includes an option to change the color and match it better with your terrain textures. Or the color of the texture itself can be changed.

Regarding the "line" between the terrain and the road. Is that related to the sharpness of the dirt texture blend with the terrain? The images is zoomed out so this is not clearly visible.

For dirt tracks the "ER Dirt Road Fade In - Out" shader can be used. It supports the option to blend the dirt track with the terrain at the start and end and it will use the texture alpha channel to blend the road on the left and right edge with the terrain. So if you prefer a smoother blend on the edges, the blend in the alpha channel of the texture can be changed. That is standard for Unity materials, textures and transparency.

Another way to improve this is to add a terrain texture to the terrain that will blend well between the road and the other terrain textures. Then in both the road and road type settings look for the "Add Shape to Terrain Splatmap" option. This will bake the road shape in the terrain using the specific terrain texture layer. Tweak the values to your preference.

So that can be used as a transition between the road and the original terrain. It is often used on the asphalt roads in the v3.2 demo scene.

Thanks,
Raoul

 

yes. It's default dirt track. I want to create countryside map with a set of dirty roads
And i would like to blend it somehow in the terrain
Maybe there's a demo with this features working ?

But how ? I only see that i can replace the texture...

road just disapears...

again - no results

 

These are older v3.1 presets in an URP project. As mentioned before in previous posts, v3.1 presets are not optimized for URP and the material setup in your images shows missing maps.

Can you look at the dirt track presets in the v3.2 demo scene assets and look at the materials? For example:


For v3.1 materials the texture "/Assets/EasyRoads3D/Textures/Roads/default_M_S_AO" can be used for the "Metallic (R) AO (G) Smoothness (A)" slot when no matching texture exists.

This is terrain splatmap baking related, I see that you assigned "Splat 1- Terrain_Dirt_Dried" as the Splatmap texture for the road shape.

Looking at the image I see mainly one terrain texture which could very well be the same "Terrain_Dirt_Dried" texture. Blending the same texture will not have any result, is that what is happening? What result were you expecting to see, which terrain textures are involved?

Also, just in case, the terrain splatmap update is done when switching to Build mode through the middle mountain tab in the Inspector, the state where the terrain is adjusted to the road network.

I mention this because in your screenshot the highlight surfaces for the selected road are visible which only (optionally) happens in Edit mode state, not in Build mode state. But I can see the screenshot perhaps was made this way, in Edit mode, to show the Inspector settings.

Thanks,
Raoul

 

Hi @raoul ,

I tested out the beta version, but I could not find the UV options I needed. What I think I need is a tiling and offset x and y option to manipulate the generated meshes UV, simelar to the textures tiling and offset setting of a material.

thanks

 

Hi @raoul,

after updating to the lastest update I get a compiler warning that
ERRoadNetwork.GetRoads() is obsolete but I can't find any info in the manual at
http://unityterraintools.com/EasyRoads3D/v3/html/ERRoadNetwork.html

It's still working, but what's the new correct way to receive the pointer to all road objects?

Thanks and best regards,
Marco

 

OK, it seems like it was replaced with GetRoadObjects()
Can you please confirm that, thanks!
And an update of the according docs would be nice

Thanks,
Marco

 

Hi @marcell123455,

V3.3 includes new custom shape road type features. Part of that is the ability to set UV coordinates for the shape nodes. This is done through a similar UV Editor window as available for Shape type of side objects and for Custom Connections based on imported models.

In the v3.3 beta, near the top in "General Settings > Road Types" you will see a "Road Type Profile Editor" tab. This displays new options in v3.3 The "Road Type UV Editor" button is located near the bottom in the "Road Shape" tab.

Have you tried that how that works? Since most left and right road shape nodes are not locked to 0 respectively 1, it is possible to set this to any value on the U axis. So if you create a texture atlas with all your road textures next to each other, it is possible to match coordinates for each road type.

Is that in the direction of what you want to do?

Thanks,
Raoul

 

Hi Marco,

GetRoadObjects(), that is correct.

It is in the docs, at least the online version, I just checked. http://www.easyroads3d.com/v3/html/ERRoadNetwork.html

Thanks,
Raoul

 

I'm having problems using 3.2 demo scene - it's too heavy
dirt tracks looks awefull in it

I'm trying to make countryside/forest map with some dirty roads. I made a terrain with 2-3 textures (grass, dirt, rock)
then i added some roads. including dirty road... But i need to blend it into terrain somehow - make sides semi-transparent or add similiar texture (or some sand) to nearby terrain. How can I do it with EasyRoads ?

I have one manually drawn map - that's the effect i'm trying to achieve. blurred edges

 

Oh, there seems to be an old version of your docs available (which I bookmarked) check the url
http://unityterraintools.com/EasyRoads3D/v3/html/ERRoadNetwork.html

Thanks and best regards,
Marco

 

Hello astanid,

From the original demo scene:


In the v3.2 demo scene the connectors and dirt tracks, both use the same material "Dirt Sand". This is the same material as in the image with material settings in this post https://forum.unity.com/threads/eas...-new-road-system.229327/page-212#post-8085968

So this is material related. In your image the connectors and dirt tracks look different. That would be the first thing to check if you see materials that do not match.

We are running a little bit in circles at the moment

As mentioned before, this is not so much EasyRoads3D related, it is more Unity material / texture related.

Your new screenshot is still from further away. I cannot see if there is actually transparency on the edges or not?



See above how the road blends on the edges with the terrain in the v3.2 demo scene. Do you see this blending on your end? In that case, it seems you want more blending. As mentioned before, that can be achieved by adjusting the alpha channel of the specific texture in a paint program.

What I mentioned before in that same post is the EasyRoads3D feature to blend the road shape in the terrain splatmap for smoother transitions. But this is the next step for further blending roads with the terrain.

First you want to have the correct color balance between the road texture and the terrain textures which are project specific. EasyRoads3D cannot do that for you, but the shaders do have the option to change the color profile / balance. That is also something to look into for better results if the color balance of the terrain textures in a project are significantly different then the provided road material examples.

The next step is to setup your terrain texture layers so there is a texture available for the transition. In the v3.2 demo the Terrain_Grass_Dirt layer is used for this.

Thanks,
Raoul

 

Hi Marco,

Yes, this changed, the main link to the docs is redirected to the version on www.easyroads3d.com.

I will check this and see if all doc requests can be redirected.

Thank you for reporting that.

Raoul

 

Yes, i want more blending. I was hoping that with that asset i have everything i need to paint goog looking roads

ok. looks like I need terrain texture that can fit to dirt track. I need 'a pair'. dirt_HB is road texture. I believe i have latest ER but i can't textures youo are talking about

 

As mentioned this is primarily material / texture related. Good looking transparency / blending with the terrain is texture alpha channel related. And the level of transparency is personal preference.

Are you familiar with paint programs? Adjusting the black/white alpha channel is not too complicated.

And as mentioned, EasyRoads3D does provide alternative options to blend the road with the terrain directly in Unity through the terrain splatmap option. Here is another example from the v3.2 demo scene in another area of the terrain:



By baking the dirt road shape in the terrain, and using the Terrain_Sand_Pebbles terrain texture layer, the dirt road blends more with the grass. Without the splat layer it will look like this:



So it all depends on preference, but yes, the starting point is to balance the road textures with the terrain textures. Unfortunately that is not something EasyRoads3D can do for you automatically.

Do you mean the terrain textures used in the v3.2 demo scene? If you select the terrain object and in the Inspector go to the "Paint Texture" option in the "Paint Terrain" tab. You will see all the terrain texture layers. Selecting a layer shows the texture layer name, and selecting one of the texture maps of that layer will show the location of the texture in the project folder.

Thanks,
Raoul

 

So I've recently run into an issue, where I have street lights set up as my side objects.
But when I try to turn the lights on, they don't exactly work.
Any reason for this, are the side objects static ?