Mesh Animator - Highly efficient animated crowds, fully animated GPU instancing, and more!

I intend to publicly release it before July 13th. If you would like to join an early test beta program, email or PM me directly.

 

Dear,
I found that enabled "Pre Generate Frames" for animation will eat much more memory.
Does "Pre Generate Frames" provide more FPS?

 

How to recycle memory?
It looks like even I destroyed the gameobject, the memory won't be release yet.

 

This setting generates all frames for the animation. With it turned off, frames are generated as they are needed. It will preallocate memory for the frames, but not provide much FPS boost

Are you using crossfade? I have a fix for this available in the new 2.0 version(July 13th release), but can send you an updated script if you cannot wait for the release.

 

Thanks for your quickly reply.
No crossfade there.
Glad you fixed the issue^^.

 

I was looking to buy this asset, but no forum activity in 4 years. Does anyone know if this still works?

 

Yup still works! The forum post was created 4 years ago... But there's 12 pages of activity since then??

 

Hum. Maybe I wasn't on the last page like I thought I was. Last post is different. Thanks

Happen to know if it's working in 2019.4?

 

So I picked it up. I was able to bake a mesh for testing. I made a test scene that spawns the prefab over a grid. I have two problems. 1) The character is black, mostly. I can see some color flicker in occasionally but that doesn't look right either 2) All of the prefabs appear in the same position.

The docs don't mention either of these. Any ideas? I'm using Synty's low poly characters, not sure if that makes a difference. Tripled my FPS, now if only I could get them looking right.

These are the settings I used:

And the result:

 

I'm not familiar with those assets, but if it's all black it sounds like a material didn't get assigned correctly. Or more likely, does that mesh/asset use vertex colors to color the mesh? It may not have copied them correctly

 

I have no idea about the vertex colors thing. Not sure how to check that. I'll start digging though
Thanks

 

looks like the MA2.0 will comes after two days. Please add the HDRP lit shader for HDRP project.
can't waiting...

 

Very excited to announce Mesh Animator 2.0 has been submitted to the asset store!

This includes new documentation, and a new walk through video showing some of the new features and example scenes.

 

I thought I could download it today.
So, how long does the asset store review would take?

 

It is now live! You should see 2.0 in the asset store

 

Hi, I've got the 2.0 and run it for my project.
I have 2 issues here.
1、 when I enabled Fast Normal Calculation the charactor shows as this:
the origin :


2、 the expose transforms looks like not work.


Could you please help?

 

If I disabled the Fast Normal Calculation , I got this:

 

I will release fixes today for these issues

 

Nice. 2.0 fixed the issue I was having earlier. Now to figure out how to animate these. 10k on screen at 25 FPS is nuts

Edit: Done. I am VERY impressed

 

Hi, the new version looks good, but it breaks my MA stuff. Even rebaking doesn't make shader technique to work.. What would be the best transition method?

 

It's very likely upgrading meshes from an older version won't work. What exactly is happening when you re-bake in shader mode? Have you also changed your materials to use the shaders included? Or converted one of your own shaders?

 

Whoops, forgot about changing materials. Will try again and I hope it won't be too difficult to transition from the previous version.

 

Managed to make tree move but for some reason, editor becomes extremely laggy and getting errors:

IndexOutOfRangeException: Index was outside the bounds of the array.
FSG.MeshAnimator.ShaderAnimated.ShaderMeshAnimator.SetupTextureData () (at Assets/MeshAnimator/Scripts/ShaderAnimated/ShaderMeshAnimator.cs:239)
FSG.MeshAnimator.ShaderAnimated.ShaderMeshAnimator.Start () (at Assets/MeshAnimator/Scripts/ShaderAnimated/ShaderMeshAnimator.cs:63)

IndexOutOfRangeException: Index was outside the bounds of the array.
FSG.MeshAnimator.ShaderAnimated.ShaderMeshAnimator.SetupTextureData () (at Assets/MeshAnimator/Scripts/ShaderAnimated/ShaderMeshAnimator.cs:239)
FSG.MeshAnimator.ShaderAnimated.ShaderMeshAnimator.OnEnable () (at Assets/MeshAnimator/Scripts/ShaderAnimated/ShaderMeshAnimator.cs:58)

Really excited to use the new version as my project contains a lot of MA flora

 

The only way that would happen is if there aren't any animation textures in your baked animations. If you look at the MeshAnimation asset, does it have a drop-down next to it to view it's child textures?

 

Don't remember seeing any. It might be because I want everything to stay as it were. If I drag freshly baked asset everything might be as it should but I want to save lots of hours by not placing everything again in my scene.

Can I simply add what's missing to my existing MA prefabs?

By the way, the component on MA objects changed to the new one smoothly, nice

 

I've changed shader to MA standard, the object looks good and animates but those errors appear and editor becomes unusably laggy. Can't find textures. I tried deleting old baked AnimatedMesh together with animation and baking again and can't find textures dropdown anywhere either.

One more:

NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object
FSG.MeshAnimator.MeshAnimatorBase.OnEnable () (at Assets/MeshAnimator/Scripts/Common/Core/MeshAnimatorBase.cs:163)
FSG.MeshAnimator.ShaderAnimated.ShaderMeshAnimator.OnEnable () (at Assets/MeshAnimator/Scripts/ShaderAnimated/ShaderMeshAnimator.cs:57)

 

Can you PM or email one of the assets you're trying to bake? I can investigate further

 

Sure, thanks.

 

When can we get the shader animator for HDRP?

 

Hi. I upgraded my project to use the new version (2.0) but I'm getting a lot of errors and I have no idea where to start with. I deleted the whole folder of the old version (MeshAnimator folder) to start fresh. I re-baked all the animations for all the units/prefabs. But once I start playing the animations, it starts tho throw a lot of warnings, and once the warnings are thrown to the console, the animations are no longer playing and they freeze in whatever frame they were at.

It is fair to say, that my project didn't throw any warnings/errors before switching to MeshAnimator 2.0
I'm using Unity 2018.4.22f1

Here's what it throws to the console:

(Filename: C:\buildslave\unity\build\Runtime/Allocator/ThreadsafeLinearAllocator.cpp Line: 537)

To Debug, enable the define: TLA_DEBUG_STACK_LEAK in ThreadsafeLinearAllocator.cpp. This will output the callstacks of the leaked allocations
(Filename: C:\buildslave\unity\build\Runtime/Allocator/ThreadsafeLinearAllocator.cpp Line: 539)

Internal: deleting an allocation that is older than its permitted lifetime of 4 frames (age = 5)
(Filename: C:\buildslave\unity\build\Runtime/Allocator/ThreadsafeLinearAllocator.cpp Line: 311)

Internal: deleting an allocation that is older than its permitted lifetime of 4 frames (age = 5)
Unity.Jobs.JobHandle:ScheduleBatchedJobsAndComplete(JobHandle&)
Unity.Jobs.JobHandle:Complete() (at C:\buildslave\unity\build\Runtime\Jobs\ScriptBindings\JobHandle.bindings.cs:20)
FSG.MeshAnimator.Snapshot.CrossfadeJobData:ReturnFrame() (at Assets\MeshAnimator\Scripts\Snapshot\SnapshotMeshAnimator.cs:187)
FSG.MeshAnimator.Snapshot.CrossfadeJobData:Reset() (at Assets\MeshAnimator\Scripts\Snapshot\SnapshotMeshAnimator.cs:109)
FSG.MeshAnimator.Snapshot.SnapshotMeshAnimator:Crossfade(Int32, Single) (at Assets\MeshAnimator\Scripts\Snapshot\SnapshotMeshAnimator.cs:487)
coreanim:Attack() (at Assets\scriptology\coreanim.cs:34)


[C:\buildslave\unity\build\Runtime/Allocator/ThreadsafeLinearAllocator.cpp line 311]
(Filename: Assets/MeshAnimator/Scripts/Snapshot/SnapshotMeshAnimator.cs Line: 187)

Internal: deleting an allocation that is older than its permitted lifetime of 4 frames (age = 5)
(Filename: C:\buildslave\unity\build\Runtime/Allocator/ThreadsafeLinearAllocator.cpp Line: 311)

Internal: JobTempAlloc has allocations that are more than 4 frames old - this is not allowed and likely a leak
(Filename: C:\buildslave\unity\build\Runtime/Allocator/ThreadsafeLinearAllocator.cpp Line: 537)

To Debug, enable the define: TLA_DEBUG_STACK_LEAK in ThreadsafeLinearAllocator.cpp. This will output the callstacks of the leaked allocations
(Filename: C:\buildslave\unity\build\Runtime/Allocator/ThreadsafeLinearAllocator.cpp Line: 539)

Internal: deleting an allocation that is older than its permitted lifetime of 4 frames (age = 7)
(Filename: C:\buildslave\unity\build\Runtime/Allocator/ThreadsafeLinearAllocator.cpp Line: 311)

Internal: JobTempAlloc has allocations that are more than 4 frames old - this is not allowed and likely a leak
(Filename: C:\buildslave\unity\build\Runtime/Allocator/ThreadsafeLinearAllocator.cpp Line: 537)

To Debug, enable the define: TLA_DEBUG_STACK_LEAK in ThreadsafeLinearAllocator.cpp. This will output the callstacks of the leaked allocations
(Filename: C:\buildslave\unity\build\Runtime/Allocator/ThreadsafeLinearAllocator.cpp Line: 539)

Internal: deleting an allocation that is older than its permitted lifetime of 4 frames (age = 14)
(Filename: C:\buildslave\unity\build\Runtime/Allocator/ThreadsafeLinearAllocator.cpp Line: 311)

Internal: deleting an allocation that is older than its permitted lifetime of 4 frames (age = 14)
Unity.Jobs.JobHandle:ScheduleBatchedJobsAndComplete(JobHandle&)
Unity.Jobs.JobHandle:Complete() (at C:\buildslave\unity\build\Runtime\Jobs\ScriptBindings\JobHandle.bindings.cs:20)
FSG.MeshAnimator.Snapshot.CrossfadeJobData:ReturnFrame() (at Assets\MeshAnimator\Scripts\Snapshot\SnapshotMeshAnimator.cs:187)
FSG.MeshAnimator.Snapshot.CrossfadeJobData:Reset() (at Assets\MeshAnimator\Scripts\Snapshot\SnapshotMeshAnimator.cs:109)
FSG.MeshAnimator.Snapshot.SnapshotMeshAnimator:Crossfade(Int32, Single) (at Assets\MeshAnimator\Scripts\Snapshot\SnapshotMeshAnimator.cs:487)
coreanim:Attack() (at Assets\scriptology\coreanim.cs:34)

In some lines of the log, you can read a call to the method "Attack" in coreanim.cs, here's the simply method:

public void Attack()
{
meshAnimator.Crossfade(1, 0.1f);
}

Need some help with this, please.

Thanks

 

Interesting... I will PM you a fix today

 

2 quick questions, transform expose, on somethings it works. And on somethings the value is 0,0,0. ??

using the shader, the transforms to the texture size is way off, like the transforms are .1 of scale. And just rescaling doesnt work

 

Can you PM/email me the model you are working with? I will help figure out what's going on.

 

@jschieck

Hi,

I requested my company to buy this for the project and they did.

I have two main issues:

1. The project has a crowd of enemies and improvement using snapshot was not significant so I want to use shader mode but I am stuck with URP. Are there shaders for URP for shader mode?

2. The model has three meshes and the animation does show/hide those in some keyframes. Baking convert those to only one model. Is there a way to get vertices for certain submodel to hide them when they should be hidden?

Edit:
3. Also does shader mode support mobile?

Thanks for advance.

 

1. URP/LWRP/HDRP is not yet officially supported. I'm working on converting those shaders, but it's taking time.
2. You cannot do this out of the box. You would have to implement your own shaders (use vertex coloring or textures) to make sections of the mesh transparent. Another option is to bake each part of the model separately, then sync the animations under a parent prefab.
3. It will support modern mobile hardware. It requires 2d texture array support (#pragma target 3.5) which most devices in the last few years will be support. https://docs.unity3d.com/Manual/SL-ShaderCompileTargets.html

 

i must of been super tired last night, I tried this morning, and it seems to be working fine on everything. haha damn 18hour days!

 

Hello,

Just bought Mesh Animator couple of hours ago. I'm trying to get the GPU animations to work. Everything is working great in the editor, but when I try to build for my test device(Samsung Note 10), mesh animator characters are not visible in the scene. I'm using mobile diffuse shader that comes with your package. I also tried adding the following to the shader but it didn't work.

#pragma target 3.5
#pragma require 2darray

 

Another user is also having issues on some newer android devices like this (works fine on older ones). What version of Unity are you using, and are you familiar enough with Android to get me the app bootup logs from the device using Android Studio or something like logcat or the monitor tool?

 

I'm using 2019.4.4.f1 . I sent the logs via PM.

 

Hi,

I switched to standard pipeline, baked to use shader animation then built and ran on my Huwawei Nova Lite 2.

It works on the device but the models are flickering too much.

In the editor it works very well.

Could that be because of the device GPU or the animation frames are too much?
I am running mainly 40 and 30 frames animations.

Thanks for advance.

 

Try adding

#pragma target 3.5

Into the mesh animator shader you are using. I have a fix submitted to the asset store but awaiting approval.

 

I am using 'Mesh Animator/Mobile/Diffuse'.
I added #pragma target 3.5 under the '#pragma surface surf Lambert noforwardadd addshadow' line.
But still I got the same flickering problem.

But I tried reducing the frames to almost the half then it worked without flickering.
But the animation's quality is now so bad.

Is there a better solution?
Am I adding the #pragma line to a wrong place?

 

No that is correct. Reducing the frame count causing it work is interesting, perhaps it's a math calculation happening different on the devices. I'll keep digging. Can you possibly PM or email the model?

 

Thank you very much for your reply.
It's difficult to send the model since I am under NDA.
Hopefully you can understand the problem without the model.
If I discover something I will post here.

 

Just for your info (in case it helps), I am having the same issue as above, in that I see no mesh animator models on an Android build.
using Unity 2018.3.12f1
Phone is a Huawei P30Pro,

This is just building your crowd example in a blank project,and I have tried adding the
#pragma target 3.5
#pragma require 2darray
without any luck

 

Objects are invisible for me too. But Only some. Couldn't think of the reason, as they are identical except for material. Both materials have MA shader.

Rebaking doesn't help. Some also look transparent and dark.

All these things happen only in play mode.

Figured out that only one material is shown correctly. How do I use 2 different materials on 2 different prefabs with the same mesh and the same baked MA files?

I also get MA standard shader failed to compile.

EDIT: Duplicating mesh and changing the new mesh for every object that I want different material on solved the issue.

Windows, Unity 2019.4.4

 

I've finally been able to reproduce the problem. Trying to find the fix.

 

I've been able to figure out the issue and have submitted a fixed version to the asset store.

Version 2.0.4

• Fixed rendering issues on devices where Graphics.CopyTexture isn't supported (certain Android devices).
• Fixed different materials using the same base mesh not being properly setup in shader mode.
• Added the ability to use original mesh normals in Shader mode instead of baking them.

If you need it before it's approved (usually within a day) PM me and I'll get you the updated version.

 

I tried updating to 2.0.4 but I got the same problem. I have got permission from the company to send you the model which is under NDA.
I will be really grateful if you take a look at it.

 

Version 2.0.5 has been submitted to the asset store with more fixes & goodies! Shout-out to @abdalla-ramadan for helping find the fixes to some of these bugs!

• Fixed flickering animation in shader mode on some mobile devices.
• Fixed "Add Selected Clips" button not adding individually selected clip assets.
• Fixed "Baked" normal mode not working correctly in snapshot mode. This now produces the best looking results, but larger asset sizes. Using baked mode for shader mode does not affect asset size.
• Added support for animations that toggle on and off mesh renderers/skinned meshes during playback. Those meshes will now be hidden (all rendered at a single point) for the frames the renderer is disabled.
• Better support for combining and baking assets with multiple meshes. Scaled transforms should now bake at the proper size.