Environment Gator

Thank you and I am TRULY looking forward to the update!

 

Hello does this work with Skyshop?

 

Hi,

i'm currently preparing ( in some part, rewriting ) the EG in order to be ready for Unity 5.
There's a lot to do ( see the Beta's change-logs ) and things are going to change, a lot for certain aspects,
and Global illumination will be one of them. IBL and PBR are more than a topic, and i'm definitely looking
for a solution to implement them in next releases.

Sorry for this a bit "cryptic" answer, but at this stage i can't tell more.
Let's say that, regarding your question, i'm optimistic!

Regards,

 

Hi, just bought EG and am impressed with the overall look of this. Only problem is it is crippling my FPS.. Can you help diagnose the problem. I have tried turning off all terrain too bu my frame rate drops from 55+ to less than 20..

 

@Redrag
Hi, thanks!
sure i can help, but i need further info.

• Did fps die in every "situation"?
• There's only the EG inside the scene?
• Are you running Pro?

Keep an eye on the particle system that generates "mist" during precipitations, i've noticed that , with an high number of particles, it could be a frames killer. ( i'm on it ). You can tweak or disable it inside the ElementsGator inspector panel.

Let me know a bit more, and i'll be glad to help!
( you can also use the mail at this link ).

Best Regards,

 

Any tips for optimizing for Unity Free? I will test out reducing particles but should I tweak GDome etc?

 

Hi to all,

@treshold
optimization is not strictly related to the version of Unity you are using ( apart from some feats available in Unity Pro ).
Anyway, in terms of performances, you're approach is correct.
Please, describe the situation in detail, so that i can give you precise directions on what to do.

I take advantage of this topic to say that there will be soon news about the next release of the EG and his porting to Unity5.

Best Regards,

 

Hi to all,

i wrote just some infos about the current state of development and future ( aKa Unity 5 ) plans and features
of the next release of the EG.

Here is the link : The Waiting

see you all soon and happy coding!

Best Regards,

 

I'm eagerly awaiting the Unity 5 functionality. I do have one small suggestion. The button for speeding up time should be something else. Right now it is right mouse button. I use the time speedup during development a lot for testing but I also use right mouse button for gameplay. I've remapped it to be +/- keys to speed up/slow down time on my machine and I also added a x16 multiplier which I find useful.

Thanks!

 

Hi to all,

@breakspirit
thank you, that´s a good suggestion!
i´m doing a lot of "minor" refinements in order to avoid this kind of issues.

I´ll take this opportunity to tell what happened this week.

First of all, Unity Beta 21 was released and every time a new beta comes out i start making some ancient rituals.
But everything went right!! The implementation of two new components inside the EG is done and they are the AmbienceAudioGator and the EGEventsManager.
The AAG is coming up as a pretty cool component, that uses pretty much every new goodies offered by the new audio engine features. I´ll write something about it soon!
The EGEventsManager will be very useful for quickly subscribe events ( it will internally use static events instead of public multi delegates for dev reasons but they are very similar ) in yours scripts which are triggered by the EG according to Time and Weather. There are also some programmable events, called Timed Events, of which we can set some parameters as the Repeat-Mode ( EveryDay or only at a selected day ) and the exact Time ( Hour and Minutes ) at which they should occur.
I think this will be pretty useful in many situation and gives to the EG another simple but cool feature ( imho ).

I have also put the focus on code refactoring. All the scripts inside the EG are under rework, some parts were totally rewritten and the overall layout of the scripts will be more compact and clear to read and understand.
That´s it for this brief update.
Have a nice weekend.

Best Regards,

 

Now that Unity 5 Personal edition includes all dat previous U4 pro's graphical stuff, I'm super excited to see EnvironmentGator on Unity5
Any status updates?

 

i agree. i wasn't going to bother changing to U5, but after the live show yesterday i couldn't resist

 

Hi to all,

yep, that was a good news... i was waiting till the release in order to be more sure on what is in and what is not, before making a status update. What can i say at the moment is that the EG v5 is almost ready , fully working inside the release version of Unity 5 and close to be released, how much close..i can´t tell it right now, but close, still needs some refinements to the new features, some more tests and also the doc is under rework.

Stay tuned, i´ll be back soon ( probably early next week or the weekend ) with less cryptic sentences and more clear info.

cheers,

 

I tried to send in a support email but I got an instant delivery failed message back. I was just wondering if EnvironmentGator does support or will support SpeedTree assets now or in the near future. I haven't subscribed to their program yet but from what I've seen, SpeedTree really is a game changer for environment assets.

 

+1 for speedtree support.

 

Hi to all,
yesterday i've had the same thought, so i took the free package for a quick test and to grab a pause from beta-testing.


and the first test was a success!!
SpeedTree is an awesome piece of software, the results are amazing, even the mobile versions of their trees are good for a nice environment!!

I apologize for the slight delay of the status update but since Unity´s Betas were not so stable and reliable, real testing started the day of the release. I need a couple more days of testing, then i can give you more precise info and maybe some leak about the release date. What can i say at the moment is that the EG is working fine inside Unity 5 and his new environment system, as well as many other projects, so , don´t be scared about the "transition" between 4 & 5, it will be smooth and painless in most cases.

I´ll leave you with some other leaked screenshots and i´ll be back in a couple of days ( probably during the weekend ) with the status update.



Thanks for the support!!
Regards,

 

Excellent, looking forward to latest update.
Those clouds are looking unreal.

 

+1 Yeah can't wait to get hands on the update

 

Extremely impressive work. Can't wait to begin work with your asset on Unity 5 again.

 

Hi to all,
as promised here it is the Status Update.

Before we start i would like to clarify a couple of points.

There will be 2 versions/packages of the EG, one for Unity 4 and the other one for Unity 5, called respectively:
EG v4 and EG v5.
New customers will buy the Environment Gator and the asset will contain both versions.
If you already purchased the current version of the EG ( EG v4 ), same thing, you will find the EG v5 as new package to download and you will need Unity 5 to in order to do this, doh!
The 2 packages will have different version numbers and will follow different stages of development.
EG v4 will be updated as well , first let me release the v5 version, i´m already confused by all this!!

Inside the EG v5 we will find the same amount of assets ( also some brand new ones ) as the previous releases , all ready to be tweaked and used with EG as always, but since this time HDR textures are more “involved” and they are usually huge in size , i´m going to reduce the amount of this kind of assets inside the package and i´m working at a “Free for All” download section on my website that will contains downloadable assets exclusively made for the EG as well as links to free resources on the web and some useful tutorials on how to create new assets to use inside the EG, this will include Textures, Clouds and Audio creation.

Note :
I don´t now if it will be possible yet ( aKa allowed by Unity Asset Store rules ) , but i´m also working at an Asset Bundle system that will download and manage some assets directly from the EG component inside the Unity Editor.

So, the Status Update, right?!

Where to start from? From the good news , obviously!
The EG v5 has entered a sort of Beta stage during these days, this means that no new features will be added.
The Beta stage should be quick, hopefully we will have a release candidate in less then one week!
The “not so good news” are about the release date, since i do not have one yet.
As i said, the component could be considered “ready” but the problem is that in order to be published on the Asset Store, an asset must be complete in all his components, this means demo-scenes, assets refinements and the lovely user-doc.

I´m rushing on all this aspects as well, but i don´t want to shoot a date just to say something.

Do i have an approximate release period?
Yes, somewhere in time around the end of this month will be a good one .
I´ll try to do all my best to maintain this schedule!

Ops, i lied..no, don´t worry, it´s not about the release date but about the fact that “no new feature will be added” thing..I´m currently working at the sync between the Gator and the Probes ( reflection Probes for the moment ) inside the scene. Ok, having a probe to refresh according to Weather and/or Time is easy to do , especially now using internal EGevents but what i´m not yet able to achieve is a smooth transition when the probes refresh. Any idea is super welcome !!

Another thing i´ve added today is a Landscape feature that adds a surrounding circular low poly mesh that we can use as a far away landscape in order to quickly “close” our scene at horizon. This will be useful in many occasions, especially when we have a small Terrain or we have no terrain at all in our scene.

The new and complete feature list in under construction.
I´ll make another update during this week.
Questions or suggestions are welcome as always!
( especially about “the Probes at runtime darn thing” !! )

Stay tuned!


Kind Regards,

 

Ok.. This part confuses me. Does this mean that the main download will be updated to EG v5 for us to update but will contain a package inside the asset for v4 also? Or will their be a v4 and v5 download? At one point it sounds like they are going to be in the same package, but then it sounds like v5 is going to be a new download that requires Unity 5 to download which would make packaging v4 inside it kind of pointless since Unity 4 people wouldn't be able to download. If v5 is going to be a separate download, are we going to get vouchers so we can update it via asset store instead of the v4 version that we already have access to?

 

Nice one can't wait to get this up and running.

 

I understand your confusion, since is also mine ( a bit ).
This is an extract of the Submission Guidelines:

What is sure is that there will be no upgrade of the current version of the EG .
EG v4 and EG v5 are two separate versions of the same package that will probably be available for download as usual, with the option to get/download the Unity 4 or Unity 5 version as needed. We will see in which form soon.

Thank you John!!
I'm thrilled about this release too.

 

Does your system need a big mesh (box or spherical) or can it be set up to use unitys skybox material slot?

Maybe your reflection probe problems will be solved with that, too.

 

Hi,

Nop, no big mesh is needed. All the skies are made using one or the 3 skybox types available in Unity 5.
With the EG we will have a total of 6 skybox modes:
Procedural.
2CubeMaps Blend ( by ToD )
3CubeMaps Blend ( by Weather and/or ToD)
Static BubeMap
6x6 Static
6x6 Blend

All of them built around the three main ones. There´s also the option to have spherical big meshes surrounding the scene ( GSpheres ) but they are not used for skies.

Regards,

 

Just wanted to check in and see how things are going. Will you be publishing RC1 for those interested?

 

Hi,
@Alexander_DeLarge
I hope so, the package is almost done, it´s just a matter of few refinements , the UserDoc & DemoScene are pretty much done too...

I´ll be back in a couple of days with a more accurate Status Update..

Spoiler: Teaser Trailer

http://sixteenleft.com/showcase.html

Kind Regards,

 

Ooh exciting! I love that aurora borealis effect at the end of the video. I've been taking a break from EnvironmentGator and weather as I've been updating my project to Unity 5 and working on other parts, but I'm going to be working on weather again soon and I'm looking forward to seeing what I can do with the upcoming version.

 

Teaser trailer sure looks good!

 

so excited that I have to bump this thread ^^

 

lol!! I was just coming to ask about the possibility of adding auroras.. Guess I missed the teaser trailer!

 

Any idea what could be causing this? The sky is black at the top, and the only way to remedy the clouds problem seems to be to physically move the environment gator prefab in the scene up in elevation to the elevation of the player.

 

Hi to all,

@Shawn67
mmhh, i think i´ll need more infos to figure out what´s going on.
From the screen that you posted it seems a "scale" problem.
How large is your terrain?
How the EG has been set in terms of scale? ( world radius and skyscale settings ).
Please send me an overall image of the scene at runtime. Something like this:

@treshold
hehe, thank you for the bump.

P.S.
I´ll make an EG v5 status update soon, last 3 days i was sick like hell..

 

Hey just a quick question, as a long time EG owner - I always have loved the system although not finding a way for it to mesh with my other work - Screen space reflections and physically based everything is helping this become more practical - One main thing that was preventing my use of EG was the implementation of horizon clouds

They looked excellent but the problem was they didn't work well with VR/stereoscopic vision as their somewhat billboarded nature was betrayed when viewed this way. Have issues regarding the sensation of depth to a cloud volume been approached? The new system looks a departure from the original but in very nice ways, theyre very convincing atmospheres

 

@lazygunn
Hi, I totally agree with your thoughts, since they are also mine, and i understand the limitations that you may have encountered in some circumstances.
It is true that now Unity 5 offers greater expressive possibilities and some goals are more easy to achieve and the new version I'm trying to exploit them as much as possible.
I believe that both problems you exposed can be solved once the new system of clouds will be implemented.
I was working at the new clouds system just before Unity 5 Betas started , then I put them on hold to try to hurry with the release. Having a system of procedural clouds ( aKa adding more volume to them ) is not difficult, but to have one that is both beautiful to look at and light enough to run It is a big problem, at least for me. Still do not know what will be my final decision, will take up to experiment with RayMarching as soon as the new version will be published, hoping to develop something interesting. Like always suggestions and why not some help is always appreciated.

@Shawn67
Did u had any luck with your issue?

Now i go back to work at the new user doc. I hate this stage but it's necessary, i'm trying to do a better job than the previous, huge wall of text , type of documentation.

 

Glad to see you've been busy working on the updates, EG is the BEST asset for the job, you do amazing work!!! Rock on!

 

Hi, Karlbovsky

Do you planning make two type different settings(global and advanced) of cloud and other? Your weather complex is the best of all another assets, but very difficult to set up.

 

Hi to all, this will be a very telegraphic status update about rushing on Docs, tests and assets refinements.

As I said, the package is ready ( 99,99999% ready ).

I´m still working at some assets refinement.
I´m testing the EG in differents projects and Unity 5 versions ( Pro / Personal ).

The main UserDoc is almost ready, just need to check a few sections.
The AmbienceAudioGator will have his own Doc, and i´m working on it as well.

SixTeenLeft website may go up/down, randomly, during the next days.

This will be a very intense week , i guess.
I´ll be back around Thursday with a new status update.

We are close to release, thank you all for the patience and support !!

@seansteezy
Thank you, i really appreciate!!
@Morfeuskiev
Thank you too !!
IMHO, I don´t think the EG is not easy to setup. I mean, the first setup can occur in few clicks, i agree if you mean that "there´s a lot to setup", but anyway, you´ll find the Unity 5 version easier to setup in general ( cloud system included ), i´m trying to have a more concise documentation.
I´m sure that when i´ll be able to finally release some video tutorials to support the Doc, all will become even easier !!

Karlbovsky. Out.

 

Hope everything is good and we will see Unity 5 release soon so anxious to get it rollin'

 

In most situations to help set up - visual workflow. If we have to see all change in scene view - give us to simple set up your weather system.

When release?

With Best Regards, Leonid.

 

Hi to all and sorry for the slight delay..

Lets start saying that things are going on pretty well. With todays tests passed, i guess we have a release candidate and also all the rest of the package has been added ( docs,demo,etc )

I´m still testing the package though, since i've noticed some strange behaviour in Unity V5.0.0f4 especially when it s time to build something. I just want to investigate these a bit more ( a couple of days ). I´m pretty confident that they are not related with the package, since these just happen, randomly, in any project, even in an empty one.

Sooo, you know, let me see what´s going on under the Unity 5´s hood, again..

So far a release date still vacant but more or less is "between the lines" ( the above lines ).
Not promising though.

Thank you all for the support!!

See you on wednesday..

@Morfeuskiev
Yep, i´ll do my best.

Kind Regards,

 

Hi to all,

Brief Update.
I´m going to publish the update tomorrow or on thursday morning.
The additional slight delay was due to the new Unity 5.0.1f1 update since i had to test the component on it.

While i was testing..
I´ve worked at a couple of features that should be considered in Beta so i´m not sure if they will be inside the first release.
The coolest ( imho ) is about a new way of generating surrounding/distant clouds but i´ll show you something as soon as the first release will be published.

I´ll be back tomorrow.

Kind Regards,

 

Karlbovsky

Waiting for a big EVENT =)) I have hope that everything will be the same as in the trailer )

With Best Regards, Leonid!

 

hehe i was just going to bumpity-bump this thread but it's great to see we are very close to the release awesome news!

 

Ok, here we are. The package has been uploaded today, waiting for the review.

Keep in mind that, since it´s a new version, something might go wrong with the first review, so no ETA on when it will be available.

I´ll be back when the package is online, with further info.

Thank´s to all again for the support !!

p.s.
The website needs a clean up and may go down at random intervals during the next 5/6 days.

Kindest Regards,

 

Great!
Let the F5-frenzy on Asset Store -page begin

 

Wheee , it's released ^^

 

Yes it is! I didn´t receive the, usual, email notification, so i´m rushing updating things around the web.

I´ll be back soon.

 

Quite curious about EG. The clouds are stunning.
(Been experimenting with Unistorm for quite a while.)

If i use my own terrain, have you got a rough idea of how many megs an EG web player would be for the core EG functions?
Same question for a standalone player.

thanks!

 

Just saw the teaser trailer, it looks awesome!