[RELEASED] Magic Light Probes - High Precision Light Probe Generator

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Hello! I developing a plugin that greatly simplifies the work of installing light probes on the scene.

Magic Light Probes is a tool that takes you from a long and painstaking work on the arrangement of light probes.

Light probes will be automatically installed where they really are needed - the borders of shadows, sharp changes in the color of textures, transitions from well-lit areas to dimly lit, corners and intersections of geometry, edges of geometry, ledges, breaks, sharp descents, two-sided geometry (to prevent leaks through walls, floors and ceilings). In addition, the modes of uniform filling of the entire volume and vertical duplication for particularly difficult cases are supported.

You can achieve AAA results much faster, you will no longer need to spend a huge amount of time looking through the entire scene in search of really important places for installing light probes, you will get this in automatic mode.

In addition, you are unlikely to get faster and better support anywhere. In addition to email and the forum, the Discord channel is available to you, where you can receive answers to any questions in real time.

This tool cannot guarantee that the probes will be installed correctly in all possible cases, but it can guarantee that:

• No probes will be located inside the geometry, no matter how complex it is, convex or concave. This is very important, because even in the simplest case of manually arranging probes by simple duplication, you will inevitably encounter probes within the geometry.
• With high accuracy, light probes will be installed at corners and intersections of the geometry. In corners, as a rule, the light intensity is lower, therefore, in order to properly illuminate a dynamic object when approaching such places, it is necessary to install probes there.
• Light probe placement density depends on contrast of the lighting, yielding more probes near the lights and at shadow borders. Depending on the settings, the system will try to place the probes in the most contrasting places (errors are not excluded)
• It is guaranteed to be pretty fast in most cases.

Large and complex scenes can be divided into separate volumes that can be calculated individually or all at once. You can adjust each volume individually, and also exclude some light sources from the calculation in volumes that they will not have any effect on.

Magic Light Probes supports multithreading where possible, which greatly increases the speed of calculation.

Volume calculation is split into several stages, each can be configured separately using the debug mode.

• Automatic arrangement of calculation volumes
• Dynamic Volume Density (Experimental)
• Automatically check for updates
• Workflow selection
  • Simple (quick and easy)
  • Advanced (slower and more accurate)
• HDRP/URP compatible
• GPU acceleration for some passes of calculation
• Quick editing of volume parameters after calculation
  • Equivalent Volume Filling (GPU)
  • Unlit Volume Filling (GPU)
  • Color Threshold
• Can work in background
• HDRP light source support (experimental)
• Installing probes in manual mode (option "Set Custom Probes" in "MLP Combined Volume" component)
• Culling geometry collisions
• Accurate search for corners and geometry intersections
• Arrangement of probes along geometry
• Multithreading
• Supports terrain
• The ability to divide the scene into separate volumes
• Debug volume calculation steps
• Works "out of the box" with a minimum basic settings
• Automatic search for all static objects and adding colliders to them at the time of calculation
• Ability to put the main folder in any project directory

Asset Store
Manual
Discord Server
Update Server (access is possible by login and invoice number after purchase)

Spoiler: Videos

Promo

Probes generation on indoor scene

Quick editing of calculated volume with GPU acceleration

"Separate Filling" algorithm demo

Scene setup demo

Spoiler: Images

 

Automatic placement light probes example: one directional light in mixed mode. Sample scene taken from Bakery plugin examples.

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Hello!
I am still working on the plugin.
I want to show you how objects are illuminated after calculating the scene with one baked directional light.

Placing of light probes in "Accurate Shadows" mode. Light probes are placed in shadow areas near the geometry and a bit further away from it. (this distance can be changed)

 

Hi everybody! The plugin is almost ready. In the meantime, here are a few more demos.

Calculation Types - Accurate Shadows vs Light Intensity

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This is an example of using the "Accurate Shadows" option. One of the light sources has a high intensity and a different color. This creates a shadow near another light source - in this place it is necessary to install light probes.

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This is an example of using the "Light Intensity" option. Both light sources have the same intensity and color. Most of the light probes have the same intensity and therefore have been removed. Those light probes whose intensity is too different are placed in contrasting areas of the scene.

Baked And Mixed Lights

The placing of light probes is carried out differently for baked and mixed light sources. For mixed light sources, the light probes will only be placed at the borders of the shadow near the geometry to capture indirect light.
For baked light sources, the light probes will be placed both near the geometry and throughout the height of the volume in order to capture the exact place of transition from the illuminated area to the unlit.

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Hi everybody!
Another feature of the plugin is nested volumes. This allows for example, to create one large volume with low density to fill large spaces and several smaller volumes inside it. Nested volumes can have individual settings for more detailed processing of the environment and more accurate/dense arrangement of light probes.

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Asset is ready and is awaiting approval at the store.
Since the first release was sent, several bugs were found and some new features were added, so immediately after the publication of version 1.0, update 1.1 will be sent to the store.

Changes / bug fixes in version 1.1:

Added features:

• Duplication to a specified height with a given step
• The calculation mode "One by one" (for a large number of volumes on the scene)
• Progress bars in the manager window

Bug fixes:

• The manager window does not update the list of volumes when the volume is duplicated on the scene
• Rare cases of light probes placement far beyond the volume
• Double light probes near geometry
  
• Uncontrolled duplication of an object "- MLP Combined Volume -"
  
• Invalid shader for displaying light probe positions in debug mode
• Exception during scene unloading
• Error restoring scene state after calculation

 

Will you have a video showing a proper scene with and without your probes in place, I think that would be interesting to potential purchasers.

 

I have several videos, they are in the beginning in this thread, they show very simple scenes. Do you mean a demonstration of a more complex scene?

 

Yeah, simple scenes show the concept but it would be nice to see the difference it makes in a real world scene to the lighting and show the performance difference.

 

Ok, i will try ))

 

Lighting demonstration after automatic placement of light probes on Sponza. I did not notice FPS changes associated with light probes, it makes no sense to show the level without light samples.
Nevertheless, I know that this has a significant impact on the performance of mobile platforms, so they (as always) will require more careful tuning.

 

Why does it make no sense to show the level without probes, surely that is showing what benefit your asset brings.

 

Without light probes, the character looks evenly lit at any point in the scene. If it makes sense to show it, then I can, of course.

 

I mean, if you absolutely murder a scene with lightprobes of course it's going to look right everywhere.

I guess what most of us want to see, is intelligent placement of lightprobes that has almost the same results with much fewer probes, which seems that your asset might be able to do, but your examples here don't exactly showcase it.

 

Any chance you will add an optimize option to remove un needed probes like AutoProbe does?

 

A much smaller number of probes will reduce the quality of lighting. Miracles do not happen, unfortunately. )) Everything depends on the requirements and complexity of the scene. Somewhere it will be better to uniform fill the whole scene with probes with the specified step, somewhere it is better to use intelligent filling. On Sponza, for example, it is better to use uniform filling. Both methods are supported by the asset, both methods ideally exclude probes inside the geometry and take into account probes in the corners, also in both methods the probes are placed along the geometry and most importantly, the arrangement of the probes is very fast. You will not need to think about any of the probes being inside the geometry or below the floor or above the roof, otherwise, each scene requires an individual setting. I will record another video on Sponsa, in which I will reduce the number of probes to 500, which is significantly less than 3470.

The plugin's goal is to place probes where they are needed, so optimization may not be necessary at all. But as I said earlier, it all depends on the scene. It is possible to reduce the number of probes along the geometry, the number of probes equivalent in light intensity or unlit probes. It is guaranteed that not a single probe will be inside the geometry, and also, with appropriate settings, the probes will be placed in contrasting places.

 

Sure, but my point is that your examples are geared towards quality, while I would like to see examples that are geared towards a more equal performance/quality ratio.

Personally, I am currently hand authoring light probes, so they generally don't go above a couple of hundred probes. I would be interested in your asset if it does a better job in placing them than I do.

 

After a quick setup, I was able to reduce the number of probes on scene to an incredibly low. A total of 181 samples.
Of course, in some places you still have to correct the result manually. However, this result differs in accuracy from the previous video.

 

Hi guys!
Asset is published in the store. Here's a link: Magic Light Probes 1.0

I remind that a new version 1.1 is already available. Please contact me immediately after purchase so that I will send you a new package. After some time, the update will be available in the asset store.

 

Update 1.1 is published in the asset store.

 

Just found an error in the behavior of the component "MLP Combined Volume". (for versions 2019.2 and higher it is duplicated at each volume rebuild) Please contact me and I will provide you with a short correction.

 

Version 1.1.0.1 published in the asset store.

Bug fixes:
- Uncontrolled duplication of an object "- MLP Combined Volume -" in 2019.2 or newer

 

Update 1.2 in progress.

Changes / bug fixes in version 1.2:

Added features:

• Integration with Bakery GPU Lightmapper. All Bakery lights are now supported.
• More visual display of Gizmo for some types of light sources.
• New component "MLP Portal" to account for the distribution of light from window openings and other
• New algorithm for probes placement near light sources

Bug fixes:

• Invalid shader for example scenes

 

Hi guys!
I recorded a video that demonstrates the setting of the scene.

 

Version 1.2 is available in the asset store.

Added features:

• Bakery GPU Lightmapper integration (support all light types)
• Probes optimization after volume combination
  
• More visual display of Gizmo for some light sources
  
• Highlighting console MLP messages
  
• Detailed progress bar in the manager
  
• New "Global Settings" tab in the manager (editing general settings for all volumes)

Bug fixes:

• Fixed bugs in probes placement algorithms
  
• Fixed a bug due to which the baking involved probes that should have been disabled

Changes:

• Manager window moved to Windows -> MLP Manager

 

I totally agree. I also would like to see this.

 

Isn't this video enough? Here are 181 probes on the Sponza [RELEASED] Magic Light Probes - Quickly build high-precision volumes of light probes

 

Perhaps the tool has a too provocative name, or I did not exactly describe its purpose. In any case, I want to pay attention to the following.

Magic Light Probes is a tool for quick placement of standard Unity light probes. The arrangement takes place using several complex algorithms. This tool cannot guarantee that the probes will be installed correctly in all possible cases, but it can guarantee that:

• No probes will be located inside the geometry, no matter how complex it is, convex or concave. This is very important, because even in the simplest case of manually arranging probes by simple duplication, you will inevitably encounter probes within the geometry.
• With high accuracy, light probes will be installed at corners and intersections of the geometry.
  In corners, as a rule, the light intensity is lower, therefore, in order to properly illuminate a dynamic object when approaching such places, it is necessary to install probes there.
• Depending on the settings, the system will try to place the probes in the most contrasting places (errors are not excluded)
• It is guaranteed to be pretty fast in most cases.

This tool does not have artificial intelligence and cannot guarantee that it will cope with the arrangement of probes better than you do it yourself, but it will arrange them quite quickly and accurately in contrasting places, so all you need in the end is to slightly adjust the results of it work (in fact, in most cases, this may not be necessary).

As for performance, this is a slippery issue, as always. This completely falls on the shoulders of the user of this tool. This tool can generate both thousands of probes and much less (this is shown in the video, which can be found above), for this the tool has the appropriate settings, and the manual describes in detail what they are responsible for.

In any case, the purpose of the tool is to significantly speed up and simplify the process of arranging light probes.
In most cases, this will do its job perfectly, in some cases you will have to adjust the result manually, but in any case it will be more accurate and faster than doing everything described manually from scratch.

 

Version 1.2.0.1
Small but significant bug fix - an error in the "MLP Light" component with "Bakery Light"

Also for everyone who uses an asset with Bakery. There is currently a problem with adding Scripting Define Symbols.

The plugin checks for the presence of two packages in the project (Terrain and Bakery) and changes the Scripting Define Symbols. This option is currently malfunctioning, I recommend manually checking the symbols and adding "TERRAINPACKAGE_EXIST" and "BAKERYPACKAGE_EXIST" there if the packages are installed in the project.

 

Hi guys!
I recorded a short video that demonstrates how one of the available fill algorithms works.

"Separate Filling" algorithm demo

 

Version 1.3 published in Asset Store.

Added features:

• Automatic division of large volumes into smaller ones

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If your volume is too large, it will automatically be divided into parts for faster calculation and memory saving. If the number of probes in the volume exceeds this value, then it will be divided.

• Removing probes with equivalent color neighbors

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• Customizable distance between the probes located in the corners without loss of accuracy
  
• New component "MLP Force Save Probes" for objects that need to be forced to evenly fill probes
  
• Automatic installation of probes at the edges of the geometry
• Lock settings during calculation

Bug fixes:

• Incorrect light source type assignment in "MLP Light" component
  
• Scripting Define Symbols are not assigned at the right time (Added ability to force dependency checking)
  
• Some disabled objects are not activated after calculation
  
• Progress in "Debug Mode" now displays correctly
  
• Erroneous message that the light source is outside the calculation volume

Changes:

• Manager window moved to Tools -> Magic Light Probes -> MLP Manager
  
• Added menu item for forced dependency checking Tools -> Magic Light Probes -> Check Dependencies
  
• Added menu item Tools -> Magic Light Probes -> About MLP...

 

Version 1.3 published in Asset Store.
List of changes in the previous post.

 

Hello,
after pressing the Calculate Prbes Volume button, I noticed that some objetcs (witch seem like child objects marked as contibute GI and have a mesh renderer) get a huge stack of mesh collider components added.

It's a weird behavior, is this a known issue?



I use 2019.3.1 with HDRP

 

Hello! No, for the first time I see, obviously this is a bug. I need a little more information. Are you saying these are just some of the childs? How are they different from other child objects, maybe they have some kind of components or static flags selected in some other way? Also interested in how these objects are located in the scene hierarchy.

 

Sweet mother of... this looks amazing!

Is there any comparison with AutoProbe that I missed?

 

Well, I have not used AutoProbe, and I do not know how it works exactly. However, I developed Magic Light Probes precisely because, having studied all the possible tools, I did not find anything suitable.

I can not compare them objectively, but I can highlight the key features of Magic Light Probes
I'll just list them all in this spoiler:

Spoiler: Magic Light Probes Key Futures

• No probes will be located inside the geometry, no matter how complex it is, convex or concave. This is very important, because even in the simplest case of manually arranging probes by simple duplication, you will inevitably encounter probes within the geometry.
• With high accuracy, light probes will be installed at corners and intersections of the geometry. In corners, as a rule, the light intensity is lower, therefore, in order to properly illuminate a dynamic object when approaching such places, it is necessary to install probes there.
• Light probe placement density depends on contrast of the lighting, yielding more probes near the lights and at shadow borders. Depending on the settings, the system will try to place the probes in the most contrasting places (errors are not excluded)
• It is guaranteed to be pretty fast in most cases.
• Large and complex scenes can be divided into separate volumes that can be calculated individually or all at once. You can adjust each volume individually, and also exclude some light sources from the calculation in volumes that they will not have any effect on.
  
• Magic Light Probes supports multithreading where possible, which greatly increases the speed of calculation.
• Volume calculation is split into several stages, each can be configured separately using the debug mode.
• Culling geometry collisions
• Accurate search for corners and geometry intersections
  
• Arrangement of probes along geometry
  
• Multithreading
  
• Supports terrain
  
• The ability to divide the scene into separate volumes
  
• Debug volume calculation steps
  
• Works "out of the box" with a minimum basic settings
  
• Automatic search for all static objects and adding colliders to them at the time of calculation
  
• Ability to put the main folder in any project directory

I myself would like to see some kind of comparison, from people who really used both plugins.

 

Version 1.3.0.1 has been sent to the store and will be approved only after the sale is completed.
It contains one important bug fix due to which some probes were inside the geometry. Please send me the confirmation of the purchase so that I can send you a new version before the sale is completed.

 

Hi guys!
I make a list of bugs and improvements for version 1.3.1. I would be grateful for any help. Also now you can use the Discord channel to solve operational issues.

List of known issues

• Geometry intersection detection does not work correctly in some modes
• On some objects marked as static, colliders are duplicated during the calculation

 

Hi,
I have version 1.3.0.1, once the scene is compiled, Player.log gives me these errors:

The referenced script (MagicLightProbes.MLPVolume) on this Behaviour is missing!
(Filename: C:\buildslave\unity\build\Runtime/Scripting/ManagedReference/SerializableManagedRef.cpp Line: 199)
The referenced script on this Behaviour (Game Object 'Accurate Shadows I') is missing!
(Filename: C:\buildslave\unity\build\Runtime/Mono/ManagedMonoBehaviourRef.cpp Line: 334)
A scripted object (probably MagicLightProbes.MagicLightProbes?) has a different serialization layout when loading. (Read 32 bytes but expected 19708 bytes)
Did you #ifdef UNITY_EDITOR a section of your serialized properties in any of your scripts?
(Filename: C:\buildslave\unity\build\Runtime/Serialize/SerializedFile.cpp Line: 2269)
The referenced script on this Behaviour (Game Object 'Area Light (1)') is missing!
(Filename: C:\buildslave\unity\build\Runtime/Mono/ManagedMonoBehaviourRef.cpp Line: 334)
A scripted object (probably MagicLightProbes.MLPLight?) has a different serialization layout when loading. (Read 32 bytes but expected 1020 bytes)
Did you #ifdef UNITY_EDITOR a section of your serialized properties in any of your scripts?
(Filename: C:\buildslave\unity\build\Runtime/Serialize/SerializedFile.cpp Line: 2269)

I also attach an image



Thanks for the support

 

Hi, I understood the problem will be fixed in the next update. For a quick fix, you can remove the #if UNITY_EDITOR directives in the specified scripts yourself. You can also write to the Discord Channel, after presenting the invoice number, I will upload the update to you personally.

 

Hi,
can you give me a private email to send you the invoice number? or tell me where I have to write it?

 

I wrote you a message on Discord. You can also send me a message by email evb45@bk.ru

 

Hey, interesting plugin. However, I experience the same issue with mass-stacked MeshColliders in the scene.

 

Hi, this problem has been fixed, but its version has not been updated in the store. I can send you a new package after presenting your invoice number

 

Version 1.4 sent to Asset Store.

Bug fixes:

• Geometry intersection detection does not work correctly in some modes
• On some objects marked as static, colliders are duplicated during the calculation
• Restoring scene state after calculation in "Debug Mode" works with errors
• Violation of the queue for calculating volumes (when there are several on the scene)
• Culling by equivalent color works with errors
• Wrong progress counter in Removing Unused Points pass
• The endlessly repeating warning "This component will be automatically disabled when baking." When the main component is disabled in hierarchy
• Invalid value of probes number counter after calculation
• Warning in console "Releasing render texture that is set to be RenderTexture.active!"
• Errors in the console after building the project

Changes:

• Minor changes in the interface of the main component

A very annoying error was found in the update. It was hidden to me due to compilation directives. I just fixed it. I will send an update on demand. Write me an e-mail, telegram or discord.

 

Hi I have just purchased this asset and it totally destroys my large scene by spamming mesh colliders everywhere! and more than duplicates, on some objects 10+. This is least desirable and will take me hours to remove all that junk. Some assets do not require a collider at all, and lods have there own on another GameObject, things like trees are absolutely spammed with mesh colliders. This makes no sense. Here's what I would do to fix that. I would cache every collider you add, and remove them after the process is complete cleaning up any collider that was not in the scene in the first place.
Rather than save time, I have paid for an asset that just totally slows down the process. now I see its potential, but if this is not fixed I will want a refund, as this should not have made it to asset store in its current state. NO EXCESS SHOULD BE LEFT IN SCENE. Also it appears to have added sphere Colliders to many point lights.

 

Hello! I’ve been struggling with a problem for some time because of which colliders are not deleted after calculation. In fact, there is a mechanic that caches and removes colliders from all objects where they weren’t before after calculation. For most cases, this works successfully, but in some cases the problem persists. I will definitely fix this soon.
Please, if possible, join the Discord channel, there I will be able to more quickly provide support.

 

Hi everybody!

Version 1.4 was accidentally rejected in the asset store (as I was informed), so I took the opportunity and made some corrections and additions.

Bug fixes:

• Terrain irregularities are perceived as geometry edges
  
• Colliders are still duplicated in debug mode

Improvements:

• Saving a scene before calculation
• ETA for calculating automatically divided volumes
• Volume optimization for mixed lighting

It will be available soon in the asset store.

 

Hi everybody!
A small update 1.4.1 is published in the asset store.

Bug Fixes:

• Non-optimal code in the "Find Geometry Edges" pass (with a large number of objects on the scene, the editor freezes for a long time)

Changes:

• ETA calculation algorithm is now more accurate

 

Hi everybody!
I updated the video demonstrating the plugin. Now it corresponds to reality!