Highlighting System [Released]

IMPORTANT
To prevent producing lots of RenderTexture garbage (may cause out of memory issues, especially on mobile devices):
In HighlightingBase.cs change all occurrences of

Code (CSharp):

1. RenderTextureReadWrite.sRGB

to

Code (CSharp):

1. RenderTextureReadWrite.Default

To fix highlighting materials not being destroyed on loading scenes:
In HighlightingInternal.cs script please remove this line:

Code (CSharp):

1. _opaqueMaterial.hideFlags = HideFlags.HideAndDontSave;

In HighlightingBase.cs script please remove this line:

Code (CSharp):

1. material.hideFlags = HideFlags.HideAndDontSave;

These fixes will be included in the next version of the Highlighting System.

Sorry for the inconvenience!

 

Hi,

We have run into a problem with using LOD groups with the highlighting system. We have the highlighter script on the base game object and a number of LOD renderers underneath. After the character has moved the highlight will also cover the original position.

I assume this is because the LOD renderers are still there, but not rendered or updated, so remain in the original position and act like another visible renderer.

Moving the highlighter into the closest LOD renderer gets around this (as long as we are close enough that it's the one that's used).

Here's a couple of screenshots attached to show that I mean.

 

Hi Slice3d,

I was wondering if your highlighting system will work with layers? For example, if my unit/character is behind my terrain layer, I want my characters to be highlighted (or any other specific layer). Is this possible?

Thanks.

 

@SillyBilly
Hi,
This fix should help.

@Velo222
Hi,
I guess you're asking about something like this (works the same way with Highlighting System 4).
Though it will work independently of the occluder layer.

 

Any progress on this? Does this look possible? I still have my integration in but disabled. I would love to turn it back on if this gets solved.

 

I've just submitted v4.1 update for a review to the Unity Asset Store.
I support and develop this package for 3 years already, so I've decided to take additional fee this time to be able to continue working on further updates.
As soon as v4.1 will appear in the Unity Asset Store - it will cost additional 15$ for those who have purchased Highlighting System before mid-May.

Changelog from the upcoming 4.1 update:

• Implemented see-through mode for highlighting occluders (occluder in this mode won't receive any highlighting on it's area)
• SpriteRenderers highlighting is now rendered on both sides. Makes highlighting visible if used on sprites with negative scale (mirrored sprites)
• Fixed producing a lot of RenderTexture garbage (previously causing out of memory issues on mobile devices)
• Fixed highlighting materials not being destroyed on loading scenes
• Fixed disabled / invisible renderers uninitialization
• Fixed improper highlighting offset on Android and iOS devices for solid highlighting modes (when HighlightingRenderer Downsampling property set to None)
• Fixed improper highlighting when emulating OpenGL ES device (Android or iOS) in Unity Editor on Windows
• Fixed improper highlighting on Xbox
• Fixed artifacts when used with bloom image effect
• Other minor fixes and improvements

Known issue in Highlighting System v4.0 and v4.1:
Highlighting doesn't work properly on iOS devices when Metal graphics API is enabled (you can find the list of Metal compatible devices here).
To make sure that highlighting will look equally on all iOS devices - please go to the Player Settings > Other Settings > Rendering, disable Automatic Graphics API here and move OpenGLES2 and/or OpenGLES3 above Metal.
Metal graphics API compatibility will be added In the future versions of the Highlighting System.

@DirtyHippy
Yes, I've done working on this. For the availability - please see above.

 

I upgraded to 4.0 and its broken!!!!!! I don't get any highlighting, instead I get my entire sprite covered in the Highlighting Color (See attached image)? How do I fix this? I've followed the instructions to the T.

 

@savgrace
Have you applied this fix?
You develop for Android or iOS?

 

I found out what the problem is. I'll leave this post here in case anyone else stumbles across this but its because my platform was selected as Mobile under Build Settings... Apparently because of the way Unity emulates this platform, the Deferred Shading/Rendering order stuff with the Highlighting System gets screwed up.

 

Thanks for the fix as well! =]

 

Hi there,

I'm having some trouble with the highlighting system wrt iOS. The visual is the same as savgrace posted earlier.

I get the following output in the console:

My relevant player settings are as follows

• Rendering path: Forward
• Static batching: OFF
• Dynamic batching: ON
• GPU skinning: ON

My main camera, which has the highlighting system attached, has the highlighting system first in its list of components. Its rendering path is also forward.

On an iOS device, the program apparently crashes. I don't have access to one at the moment to observe the behaviour myself. I have sent a message asking whether or not the device is using Metal, if that would be relevant to the issue.

I have also applied all of the fixes outlined earlier in this thread. I'm using HighlightingSystem v.4.0 on Unity 5.1.1. When the build is set to PC, the plugin behaves normally.

If you could help me debug this issue, I'd be very thankful!

 

Hello!
Just picked up the asset, and a little confused how i may get some behaviour i'm looking for.

I'm trying to 'pulse' a highlight... maybe 'flash' it once.
Any thoughts how to do this with your system?
It didn't seem obvious from any of the public APIs provided.

The previous system i was using (hand baked, but pretty bad, i could control the width of the outline on each object, so i just lerped that a bit when i needed to flash.)

Thanks!

 

Highlighting System v4.1 has been released in the Unity Asset Store.

@jessica_paquette
Hi!
iOS Metal graphics API is not yet supported by the Highlighting System - please use OpenGL ES 2 or 3 instead.
As for the crashes - please try out the latest 4.1 version of the Highlighting System and let me know if your issue persists - we will resolve this together.

@roydor
Here's the easiest way to implement that:

Code (CSharp):

1. using UnityEngine;
2. using System.Collections;
3. using HighlightingSystem;
4.  
5. public class PulseController : MonoBehaviour
6. {
7.     public Color pulseStartColor = new Color(0f, 1f, 1f, 0f);
8.     public Color pulseEndColor = new Color(0f, 1f, 1f, 1f);
9.     public float pulseTime = 0.5f;
10.  
11.     private Highlighter h;
12.     private float t = -1f;
13.  
14.     //
15.     void Awake()
16.     {
17.         h = GetComponent<Highlighter>();
18.         if (h == null) { h = gameObject.AddComponent<Highlighter>(); }
19.     }
20.  
21.     //
22.     void Update()
23.     {
24.         if (Input.GetKeyDown(KeyCode.P))
25.         {
26.             Pulse();
27.         }
28.  
29.         if (t > -1f)
30.         {
31.             pulseTime = Mathf.Max(0.01f, pulseTime);
32.             t += Time.deltaTime * (1f / pulseTime);
33.             if (t >= 1f)
34.             {
35.                 t = -1f;
36.                 h.ConstantOffImmediate();
37.             }
38.             else
39.             {
40.                 float s = 0.5f - Mathf.Cos(t * 2f * Mathf.PI) * 0.5f;
41.                 Color c = Color.Lerp(pulseStartColor, pulseEndColor, s);
42.                 h.ConstantOnImmediate(c);
43.             }
44.         }
45.     }
46.  
47.     //
48.     void Pulse()
49.     {
50.         t = 0f;
51.     }
52. }

 

Updating from v4.0 to v4.1 is a $15 upgrade?

 

?

 

Thanks for the quick response!
Any thoughts how I could increase the 'width' of a highlight?

It looks like my only option is playing with the alpha?
(edit, replaced strength -> width)

 

@jposey @ZJP
Correct:

I'm sorry for any inconvenience this may cause, but I've never meant to sell this package with free lifetime upgrades.
For those who have purchased Highlighting System after approximately May 22nd (just before the 4.0 update) upgrade to v4.1 is free.
For those who don't want to purchase an upgrade - please make sure to apply these fixes after upgrading to 4.0:
one, two, three

@roydor
Yes, this is post-processing effect, so the same blurring amount is applied to the whole image (i.e. each highlighter). But by increasing number of iterations you can increase available width range, which you can control for individual objects by changing highlighter alpha value.

 

@slice3d Thanks for the tips!
It doesn't look like there is an alpha piece on the Highlighter class, so i'm assuming you meant colour.

I'll have to play with the global settings later to see if I can achieve the effect I want.
Thanks again for all your quick responses.

 

hi is there a way to check whether an object currently highlighted or not?

 

Thanks for the reply.

 

IMPORTANT
Highlighting System v4.1 stops working after re-enabling HighlightingRenderer component (with Null Reference Exception spam in console).
To fix this - in HighlightingBase.cs script please change the beginning of the UpdateHighlightingBuffer method to this:

Code (CSharp):

1.         //
2.         protected virtual void UpdateHighlightingBuffer()
3.         {
4.             int aa = GetAA();
5.  
6.             if (highlightingBuffer != null)
7.             {
8.                 if (cam.pixelWidth == cachedWidth && cam.pixelHeight == cachedHeight && aa == cachedAA) { return; }
9.  
10.                 if (highlightingBuffer.IsCreated())
11.                 {
12.                     highlightingBuffer.Release();
13.                 }
14.             }
15.  
16.             cachedWidth = cam.pixelWidth;
17.             cachedHeight = cam.pixelHeight;
18.             cachedAA = aa;
19.  
20.             highlightingBuffer = new RenderTexture(cachedWidth, cachedHeight, 24, RenderTextureFormat.ARGB32, RenderTextureReadWrite.Default);

 

@roydor
Yes, I meant alpha component of the highlighting color.

@reale
Yes, use highlighted public boolean on the Highlighter component instance.
But please note that this property will also return true for highlighters in occlusion mode.

 

I'm sorry, I couldn't find the public boolean variable "highlighted" on the Highlighter script
or... did you mean that I have to create and set the value myself everytime i turned on the highlighting?

 

@reale
Please make sure to use Unity 5.1.1+ to be able to download the latest 4.1 version of the Highlighting System from the Unity Asset Store.

 

Hey Slice3d,

Have just updated to the newest version and really pleased with the results in VR - thanks man.

One quick question, sorry if this has been asked and answered but I couldn't see it, how do you prevent child objects of a Highlighter from being included in the final outlined render? I would only like my parent renderer (which has the Highlighter script attached) to be outlined.

Thanks dude

 

The new occlusion works great and solves my use case. I admit I find it odd I have to add a Highlighter component to something that doesn't highlight but only occludes.

I do see weird situations with meshes with some particle emitters, where it is highlighting the edges of the particles, which is not what I would want, and I can't imagine anyone else would either (I would just want the mesh renderers to be highlighted).

 

Hi,im extremely interested in your asset, but i need to know if your assets can do this



i would imagine that there is a way, since looking at the web demo, i see it can do the contrary, i want my object to get highlighted when is behind an object, and only when is behind an object.



if you asset can do this, i would buy the s*it out of you asset as soon as i have money.

 

Just got your highlighting system and it looks great! But I've been having a slight issue with highlighting transparent objects. When I select a group of transparent objects using the transparent diffuse shader and a main texture with no alpha mask, the transparent objects behind the front most object get culled in its screen space. Do you know how I could possibly fix this? Thanks for any help!



Edit: never mind, Unity crashed and the problem figured itself out... I'll let you know if things get messed up again though!

 

Would there be any way to be able to set some sort of default occlusion mode? We want all of our highlights to use the new see-through mode, but it seems silly to have to put an occluder on every possible thing that can occlude a highlight.

We're also running into an issue where occluders that are behind highlighted objects are occluding the highlight. Is this intended? And, if so, is there a way we can change this?

 

Hi Slice3D!

First thank you for creating and supporting such an amazing package. I wanted to ask you if you had any updates / info about supporting Depth of Field in Unity 5. I know you mentioned you were working on a fix for it a couple months ago, but I would like to know if you had any news about it, or any idea of how to get it working.

Thanks!

 

@silentslack
Great! Nice to hear that it works well in VR!

To prevent particular renderers from being highlighted:
1. Add empty HighlightingBlocker component:

Code (CSharp):

1. using UnityEngine;
2. using System.Collections;
3. public class HighlightingBlocker : MonoBehaviour { }

2. Open HighlighterInternal.cs script and right after these lines:

Code (CSharp):

1. // Do not cache Renderers of this childTransform in case it has it's own Highlighter component
2. if (h != null) { continue; }

add this:

Code (CSharp):

1. HighlightingBlocker hb = childGameObject.GetComponent<HighlightingBlocker>();
2. if (hb != null) { continue; }

Now Highlighter will ignore all renderers on a GameObject and it's children starting from a GameObject with HighlightingBlocker component.

@DirtyHippy
Great!
To prevent particles from being highlighted by default - simply remove these lines from the Highlighter.cs script:

Code (CSharp):

1. typeof(ParticleRenderer),
2. typeof(ParticleSystemRenderer),

@LunaTrap
I guess you're looking for this.

@dburden1
Unlike default occlusion mode (where scene depth buffer is used to occlude highlighting) - all occluders in see-through mode rendered twice. There is no way to make it work like this by default.
You can make a script, which will automatically add see-through highlighting occluders to all renderers in scene, but I wouldn't recommend that since this might hit your performance, so you should set this up by hand.

As for this thing:

Yes, this is intended and unfortunately there is no way to change this for see-through highlighting occluders (shown on the left side of this image). Highlighting halo itself doesn't have any depth information, so there is no way to perform depth-test to figure out what is closer to the camera view (i.e. to determine what should occlude what).

There is always a trade-off between features and performance especially if we're talking about graphics and post-processing effects. And I'm always trying to find and implement the best option possible for the Highlighting System.

@Khalekmegil
Thanks! Highlighting System works well with Depth of Field effect as of version 4.0

 

Hi slice3d,

This plugin works in WebGL?


Greetings.

 

Just updated to 4.1.

My project has 2 cameras (1st and 3rd person, not that it should matter). Highlighter only works on 1 camera (1st person), and when switching between cameras, the glow is only updated when using the working camera.

Correct glow (1st person camera):


Switch to other camera (3rd person):


Old, outdated glow still seen. The glow is set ON for all characters right now to aid testing, so the green character shown in the second shot should also be outlined.

I have the same 'Highlighter Renderer' script on both cameras.

Any ideas? When changing main camera, should I be making a call somewhere?

Thanks in advance! (I also emailed your support address a couple of days ago, thought I'd try here).

 

I'm having a similar problem. I have two cameras in my scene as well that I'm switching between. It is very intermittent, sometimes it shows, sometimes it doesn't. I have the Highlighting Renderer script on both.

 

Hello Slice!

Thank you for your prompt reply. I am not sure what I am doing wrong, because if the HighlightingRenderer is in the camera with the Depth of Field (the new one DX11 with Unity 5), the DoF effect makes everything blurry and out of focus, regardless of the settings for DoF. I am emailing you a sample project showing the problem. Here is a screen shot, just in case other people have similar issues. The setting for DoF are the same in both images.

This is the view with HighlightingRendered On:


This is the view with HighlightingRendered Off:


Thanks!

 

Since 4.1 I've also had the occasional glitches on hitting 'play', with the camera showing the image from the last run, or weirdly, the editor scene view showing in the play window. Stopping play mode and rerunning fixes these, maybe related to the multiple camera issue.

 

This plugin works in WebGL?

 

Hi there!
Got a problem with the code snippets slice3d provided here.

It works like charm until i use some more complex meshes - like the meshslice3d provided in the example project: the robot. I copied one example object from the Occlusion scene and changed the Mesh to the robot.

Spoiler: I also changed one camera setting - Rendering Path

This are my results:

Spoiler: Results

With the simple Meshes it works kinda fine as you can see
I marked two spots of the robot here, which are more visible in the next image.


Here you can see the model is outlining itself.

Is there any solution to fix this? I mean the outlining behind walls is fine but in case there is no wall the model is outlining itself which looks really weird.

 

I'm disappointed to see that I now have to pay an upgrade to get the bug fixes. This asset was never working well in U4, and it was a write off for me. So now miday in U5, I have to pay again to get bug fixes. I won't be supporting this author again.

 

Hello we're trying to achieve the effect in Occluder Modes demo scene pictured above on this page, but we don't have that demo scene to de-construct? Does it exist somewhere? (We have the latest version for Unity 5). Thanks!

 

@Onsterion
Hi Onsterion,
Just checked with Unity 5.1.1f1 and Highlighting System v4.1 and it doesn't compile due to an error "ImportError: No module named _multiprocessing". I assume this is only because Unity WebGL is currently in the preview stage, and it will be fixed before the official release. I'll keep my eye on it.

@deab @Joshua_Bogart
At first - please make sure to apply this fix.
If this won't help - that means you are using multiple Highlighting Renderers simultaneously and/or some specific camera setup / clear flags. Proper multiple cameras support is currently in development. I will let you know once it will be available. You can also help me by sending your example project(s), so I'll make sure that Highlighting System will work for your case.

@Khalekmegil
Hello Khalekmegil,
I've replied to your email - you've been using old version of the Highlighting System. To be able to download and use the latest version (4.1) where this issue has been fixed - you should use Unity 5.1.1f1 or higher.

@ModoX
Hi ModoX,
Oh, right! Thanks for pointing this out to me. I'll try to think of a better solution for this and get back to you.

@imtrobin
Sorry to hear that!
I know you had some issues with the Highlighting System before, but it doesn't means that "This asset was never working well in Unity 4". There is a already a lot of games released with my package, and a considerable part of them is on the Android platform. Maintaining compatibility across vast majority of mobile devices is not an easy task, and I'm trying to do my best to provide that (and each device costs money). In some cases it's possible to implement workarounds, but in other cases it's not, and only Unity Technologies can fix such issues, since stated engine features not working as intended on all mobile devices. There is no point in blaming me in such situations.
You're not paying for the bug fixes - I'm constantly adding new features to the package, and bug fixes are always going free of charge. I have a lot of grateful customers which does understand, that paying 15$ more for another several years of support and development of such package is incomparably cheaper than developing it from scratch.
Again, I'm sorry if it's unacceptable for you - I never meant to disappoint anyone.

@Anderz
Hello Anderz,
You should use Unity 5.1.1f1 or higher to be able to download and use the latest version of the Highlighting System.
If you want to use Unity 5.0 to 5.1.0 for some reason - please let me know. I'll send you Highlighting System v4.0, which is compatible with this range of Unity engine versions.

 

Hello i have bought this package.
But i am facing a issue right now, is it possible to set different iterations on differents objects?

My goal is :

to be able to have multiple line size in different highlither
1 for mouse over, 1 for mouse click etc...

is there a solution for this?

thanks

 

Hi Slice3D, thanks for the reply.

Pretty sure I tried the fix you mentioned and it didn't help. It occurred to me I didn't really need 2 cameras (only one was enabled at a time) so I removed one and that of course solved the problem. I did have the Highlighting Renderer on both cameras if that's any help, but now with a single camera I'm working fine.

 

Hello,

My company just bought your asset and found it was easy to work with so thank you for it.

I ran into a bug. Our Camera switches between orthographic and perspective and when it does so I am getting the following error:

Code (CSharp):

1. NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object
2. HighlightingSystem.HighlightingBase.RebuildCommandBuffer () (at Assets/Plugins/HighlightingSystem/Scripts/Internal/HighlightingBase.cs:543)
3. HighlightingSystem.HighlightingBase.OnPreRender () (at Assets/Plugins/HighlightingSystem/Scripts/Internal/HighlightingBase.cs:276)

 

Hi,

I'm having an issue on iOS (iPhone 6 and iPad Air 2) with Unity 5.1.1p3.

In Editor with iOS emulation "Open GL ES 2.0" it works as expected as shown here:


However, on the actual iOS devices instead of showing outlines around the meshes it fills them in completely like this:


Why does this happen on device and how can I fix it so that it shows the outlines like in the editor? Thanks!

 

IMPORTANT
iOS Metal graphics API support fix for Highlighting System v4.1:

In HighlightingBase.cs script find this line:

Code (CSharp):

1. if (version.Contains("direct3d") || version.Contains("directx"))

And replace it with this:

Code (CSharp):

1. if (version.Contains("direct3d") || version.Contains("directx") || version.Contains("metal"))

@van1984
Hello! This is a post-processing effect, so the same blurring amount is applied to the whole image (i.e. each highlighter). But by increasing number of iterations you can increase available width range, which you can control for individual objects by changing highlighter color alpha value.

@deab
Hi! The thing with multiple cameras support is that scene depth buffer is shared between cameras and it can be lost somewhere inbetween (by using specific camera clear flags or post-processing effects), so this is really tricky to find a solution which will work for all possible camera setups, but I'm working on this.

@Saevax
Hello! Please apply this fix.

@TinyMobGraham
Hi! Please apply a fix for Metal graphics API (on top of this message).

 

Hi,
I've just bought the plugin to use it with Gear VR, but unfortunately the drop of FPS is too significant.
Are there any methods, to optimize it to work with this device ?
Thanks !

 

Hello,

my name's Luis and I just bought your Highlighting System Asset.

I am developing an app on Unity 4.6.8 for Android and iOS devices and I needed the effect of your asset, but I can't get it to work at all. Freshly imported, I load up the demo scenes and everything works but there is absolutely no highlight at all in the editor. Building it to my android device had the same results, everything works but no highlights.

These are the error logs I'm getting:

HighlightingSystem : Image effects is not supported on this platform!
UnityEngine.Debug:LogWarning(Object)
HighlightingSystem.HighlightingBase:CheckSupported() (at Assets/Plugins/HighlightingSystem/Scripts/Internal/HighlightingBase.cs:239)
HighlightingSystem.HighlightingBase:OnEnable() (at Assets/Plugins/HighlightingSystem/Scripts/Internal/HighlightingBase.cs:190)

HighlightingSystem : Highlighting System has been disabled due to unsupported Unity features on the current platform!
UnityEngine.Debug:LogWarning(Object)
HighlightingSystem.HighlightingBase:OnEnable() (at Assets/Plugins/HighlightingSystem/Scripts/Internal/HighlightingBase.cs:199)

The only thing I found online mentioned the build settings should be set to deferred lighting, wich I tried with no results. I can't seem to find anything specific on the matter, what am I missing?

 

Hi there...I'm pretty new to all of this, but I'm wondering if you've checked yet to see if this is compatible with Unity 5.2. I downloaded the asset and loaded it into a blank project, but when I try to run the demo Unity just hangs forever and I have to force quit. I can't seem to get any of it to work.

But again, I'm new to all of this so I could easily be doing something completely wrong.

EDIT: I've tried it on a different machine with the same setup and version of Unity, but it appears to be working fine on that one. So perhaps there is some weird configuration on my other machine that is not working right. But in any case, it's nothing to do with this asset, as far as I can tell.

 

Anyone know how to fix this? i dont want to highlighter go over my player or the UI on top of it