[released] Overcloud - Volumetric Sky And Lighting

Woah, that looks really wrong! What headset are you using? I've had other users report some issues with the latest version of SteamVR which I've been unable to pinpoint so far but I'm still looking into it. Could you check your log file (C:/Users/<username>/AppData/LocalLow/Fewes/OverCloud/Player.log) for any errors?

 

look good ! very good !

 

Hi,

I need to adjust the cloudiness and other parameter like time of day with a slider at runtime. With OverCloud.current.cloudiness I get massive flickering of the clouds and also OverCloud.timeOfDay.time does not work for adjusting the time of day at runtime.

Otherwise, Overcloud looks great.

 

Hi, can you describe your use case a little more? Modifying Overcloud.current.cloudiness will only modify the current interpolated value, which will then be overwritten next frame. You can either: A: Modify the cloudiness value of the target preset or B, modify the cloudiness after the interpolation is done but before the shader parameters are uploaded. You can do this by executing your code with the beforeShaderParametersUpdate event.
Not being able to set the time from code is definitely a bug, I'll look into it!

 

Thank you, I overlooked also beforeShaderParametersUpdate event in the documentation. Now, I can change the cloudiness without flickering clouds.

 

Would like to see some examples of the cel-shaded clouds!

 

Does wetness require special shaders or materials for terrain and meshes? How easy it is for example to make character clothes wet when it is raining? Do you know how compatible this is with CTS 2019 or Vegetation Studio? Also is there any plans to make snowy weather?

 

Originally I planned to develop this into an actual feature, but I realized the rendering method (sprites) does not suit itself well to hard-edges. That said, you can tweak the lighting and noise params some to get a similar look (courtesy of Why485 on Twitter):

It depends on the rendering path you are using. If you are using deferred, the wetness system modifies the g-buffer automatically and so all (opaque) materials will be affected. If you are using forward, you have to add support to the shaders yourself.
It should be noted that even in deferred, a character model will look wet, but will become instantly "dry" when moving under geometry cover. This is because the system doesn't take into account "how long" something has been in/out of rain.
I haven't used CTS or Vegetation Studio, but if they use opaque shaders (meaning they write depth values, which I'm assuming they do) they should both be fully compatible.
No plans for snowy weather, but you can easily add this yourself with a weather preset and particle system. The content examples provides an example for rain which could be modified to look like snow instead.


Also, I wanted to give an update on the SteamVR issue some users have been reporting. I have been able to reproduce it on my machine now and I am looking into a solution. I have the next few weeks off and so unfortunately a fix might take a little while. If this is a deal breaker for anyone who recently purchased the asset, please get in contact with me and I'll submit a refund request for you. When I get back to work I'll try and make sure a fix is out ASAP. Cheers!

 

I'm not really good with shaders. So any chance to get also integration of Crest Ocean?

 

Hi,

do you have an idea to get some more cloud details in compact areas like



Most of these are possible with Overcloud

but it would be cool allow little more cinematiq styles.

The most common of these is to have smooth and detailed areas.

 

Im needing to render out 360 stereo videos and have some questions before a purchase.

1. Is there a super duper high settings for the entire system clouds and all being it will be baked into a 360 video?
2. Once I get the system in terms of time of day, quality settings and the look of the clouds I am after can I make the system be static and not move. Meaning clouds do not morph or scale or move etc. Anything within the system that can move/morph make it be still for 360 video recording. This helps when looping the video the less things move the better on the loop.
3. Does it play nice with other assets that are pretty big and widely used. Such as RTP, CTS, Vegetation Studio Pro and regular, RAM and unitys post processing v2 stack etc and pretty much just the big hitters on the store we all use to make environments.

 

Also can this work with LUX Water as well.

 

+1, i tried for several hours and gave up to early.

Would be cool to support it out of the box.
For me it s really the new ocean reference implementation for Unity.

 

I'm a little unsure of what you mean exactly. You can get more detailed clouds by increasing the particle density, with the tradeoff being performance.

1. There is no switch to force the system to max quality, but there is a section in the manual which explains how to achieve the highest visual settings.
2. You can set the wind timescale to 0, effectively freezing the clouds in place.
3. The general rule for compatibility is that if the asset writes opaque fragments with depth (such as most non-transparent geometry shaders) it is compatible out of the box. If the asset uses transparent effects, it will most likely have to be modified. This especially goes for ocean shaders.

It should be a minor modification to support both LUX, Crest and AQUAS. The reason it is not supported out of the box is it requires shader modifications on their end, and I cannot include their shaders with OverCloud.
The code for this is already in place, but I understand it is something a lot of users without proficency in shaders need, so I'm working on a compatibility page for the website which will include full steps for adding support to various other assets, and I will update it as more support is requested and implemented.
I have just returned from vacation for a few days and so I will spend some time working on this, as well as fixing the SteamVR issues. Stay tuned!

 

Is it possible to control the height of the atmosphere? Say I wanted to exaggerate the distance to space and make it only a few hundred meters or so?

 

I tried your demo and it looks great but I honestly think 100$ or even 50$ is way to much for a glorified 3d cloud system.

 

Thats heavily depending on the use.
Added some trees with wind and butterflys, some flare and bloom post processing and scrubbed the mouse wheel for sun and moon movement behind the vegetation for hours.)

Out of my perception through all the links to the papers in the source code and the fexibel use possible it is one of the best assets i purchased.
Done with lots of love and lots of effort for pysical plausibel dynamic day night.
Hope it finds the way to HDRP one day.

However. Together with Crest Ocean renderer which is free you get some nice Crysis Sandbox feelings.)

 

Support for this is arriving in the next update (along with support for changing the planet scale)!

 

Are the star positions realistic? Are they using lat long/date?

 

Currently the star positions are fixed (although the cubemap used for it is accurate to Earth's starscape). This would be a great addition though, I'll see about getting it in.

Also, a new version has been submitted which fixes a rendering bug (which was present and has been fixed in the VR demo) and adds the aforementioned parameters for the planet/atmosphere size. Besides this, I've also created the compatibility page I talked about. If you use it, let me know how it goes!

 

That would be great! I'm currently using Time of Day (supports star positions) along with my own weather system for a maritime simulation (realistic star positions are a requirement). From what i see of overcloud, i could move some assets out in favor of it. I'll keep an eye out for the star positions if you ever decide to put them in. Looks great though!

 

So without compatibility page.
4 hours of ????

with compatibility page. 4min.)

Merci.

Probably an good idea to send it to Crest, too. They could integrate or link it in crest github repro.
Gives you also additional visibility.

 

Can you also add RAM to the compatibility page its a very popular water I use also.

 

Looks fantastic. Is it possible to use this on spherical planets ?

 

I'll check it out and if all goes well it should be on the compatibility page by tomorrow.

Maybe with some serious shader hacking, but I would not recommend trying it!

 

Fewes, thanks for this great asset - lots of good stuff in there. I am using the system for general day-night plus clouds for dynamically generated terrain. ( Unity 2019.1.10f1, microSplat, MapMagic, Aquas with your shader changes applied ) I think I followed the install instructions correctly, but I'm seeing a number of behaviors that I'd like to change:

- When the sun is low, sometimes I'll see a solar aura through the terrain

- While using the storm preset, distant terrains appear to be glistening with rain - I would expect the effect to attenuate at any moderate distance

- While using the storm preset and moving around the environment ( first person standard asset with OverCloud components attached to camera ) I sometimes see flashes of color in an otherwise shadowy bluish environment - this appears to be related to the sun light's command buffer for CloudShadows.

Thanks again!

 

( static of shiny oddness )

 

Hi Fewes. How can I achieve something like this in this pic? https://www.tripadvisor.ca/Location...501-Fira_Santorini_Cyclades_South_Aegean.html Is there a way in OCloud once I lock in the static look to create a gradient of colors for the sky backdrop to have that gradient of colors from top to bottom. I'm messing wtih the ambient lighting for the sky, Equator and ground which seems like a perfect place to throw those colors in but its only affecting the clouds for the most part.

 

1. Could you provide a screenshot of this effect? I suspect this might be related to the Mie scattering.
2. Sounds like a good addition, I'll add a parameter which will control the rate at which the wetness effect fades, based on distance from the camera.
3. This one I'm not so sure what might be the cause. I'll investigate and attempt to replicate but any extra info you can give me would be very helpful. Could you try using the Frame Debugger and comparing two frames, one where the artifact occurs and one where it does not? Thanks!

The sky rendering is physically based, meaning it derives its color values from equations which attempt to mimic physical light scattering. Because of this, it favors realism over control and so there is no way to explicitly define the "sky color". The image you linked seems to be post-processed to give it a more saturated/contrasted look. If you would like to emulate this look with OverCloud, I would suggest looking into color grading (using something like Amplify Color).
Another alternative is providing your own skybox material (which OverCloud supports), but you will have to find a suitable skybox cubemap for that.

 

There are several issues with the demo:

-It states that you can steer with the mouse, however, the mouse controls the camera instead.
-The plane aimlessly tumbles around. I cannot control it either with the rmb-mouse or the keyboard.
-The frame rate is locked to 60 fps. The quality settings do not change the frame rate (1080ti).

Additional note:
The lightning has a cool looking but not realistic dissolve effect.

 

The mouse does indeed control the camera, but the plane flies where the camera is pointing. WASD can be used to control the pitch/roll manually.
I'll add a toggle for the framerate lock, thanks!

 

Some questions:

1. Does it work with Crest? Didn't manage to figure that out from the messages.
2. Does it work with Ceto?
3. What ocean system is it sure to work with? How hard would it be to setup the ones I mentioned to work with it? Are there instructions for that?
(If not out of the box, should it be easy to make it work)
4. How much can we customize, can you customize fog color? Ambient light? For example, night is too dark in the demo for my usage, its basically pitch black. While cool, I cant really use that in the game Im working on, need to be able to adjust ambience.
5. Is there an option with the fog to make it start appearing at some distance from the camera, like here:
http://prntscr.com/oixohz
6. Is it possible to modify the options to achieve this kind of a fog:
http://prntscr.com/oixp55

Id like to know to what extent can I customize it all, Id love to see customization options, since its aimed for realism Im kind of nervous to buy it if I cant adjust to my needs.

Looks awesome. I want to use it for on-ground perspective so fog is mostly that I will need to adjust.

 

1. Yes. There is information on how to make the two compatible on the compatibility webpage.
2. Probably yes, but I have not tested it. I will check it out and update the compatibility page if successful.
3. See the above webpage.
4. Fog color yes, ambient light yes. The ambient lighting is controlled by three gradients (sky, equator, ground) and so you can explicitly define it for all times of day.
5. Fog density is based on distance, however if you mean offsetting the distance at which the fog starts, then no, currently there is no such option. This would be trivial to add however, I'll add it in the next patch.
6. It's a little hard to tell exactly what kind of fog you mean. The fog used is analytical (meaning it is not ray-marched, just like the Unity default fog) with height attenuation. Going by the screenshot, I'd say yes, that look is possible to create.

 

Yeah, look is more important than the fog type. Ok cool. Can you tell me, how time is controlled? Is it possible to make the day (or night), last for certain amount of time?

If it cant be done exact, will I be able to do it approx at least?

 

Time is controlled by setting the latitude+longitude and the date/time. There are controls for automatically advancing the time and you can change the speed at which this happens. The date will automatically advance at the end of a day and works for the day, month and year. If you would like to control the length of night-time separately, it would be trivial to hook up a script which sets the speed of time based on if the sun is above the horizon or not.

 

Got it, I think if you ever will want to, might be helpful to do something similar to what uSkyPro did, they have 2 options.

Realistic - http://prntscr.com/oj21me
Default - http://prntscr.com/oj22dt

Might be useful for someone that just wants to set the sun to position, rather than set lat and long etc. Dunno.

Anyhow I just purchased the asset, looking forward to trying it out! Thanks for all the answers.

 

1. Is it possible to set Fog start height? I can't find that option. Can it be added in the patch as well? would be useful to prevent fog from appearing underwater (for example).

2. Not sure why, but my fog albedo doesn't affect the fog: http://prntscr.com/oj4479

 

1. Currently no. Attenuating fog from under water can be pretty complicated, but I can at least add a simple toggle for discarding fragments under a certain world height like you suggested.
2. Make sure you are changing the fog albedo of the currently active weather preset. I could be mistaken but it looks like you are changing the albedo of the "Clear" preset while the "Foggy" one is active.

 

Nope, Im changing clear, I changed the density, just double checked: http://prntscr.com/ojavum

I know its the right one for sure because density changes when I change it.

 

Ok I found out whats wrong, you don't really use _OC_FogColor for anything. There is a commented bit of code at atmosphere.cginc, lines 374, 375, but if you uncomment, it still doesn't work because the output gets overwritten with GetSkyRadiance in the next line.

I just put * _OC_FogColor.rgb at the end of line 379 of the Atmosphere.cginc, which enables me to tint the fog, however let me know if it should be done some other way.

 

Ah that is not intended. Probably a leftover from some other code fix. I'll re-enable it in the next patch, great find!

 

Any idea why overcloud demo scene would crash when doing a Server Build, using unity 2019.1.11f1 ?

Ok managed to build an empty scene with overcloud prefab, but this error popped up: http://prntscr.com/okcrvu

 

What platform are you building for? It seems it does not support floating point textures.

 

Asset looks amazing; just wondering :how hard would it be to make it look like this ?



https://www.reddit.com/r/Unity3D/comments/chozdk/just_wondering_how_is_this_made_physics_how_to/

 

Windows, but with checked "server build" checkbox. So it's a headless build, basically.

 

I would say straight up impossible. While both the video in your link and OverCloud renders volumetric clouds, OverCloud is optimized to render a large, soft, flat-ish cloud volume. I suspect the system in the video either uses some form of 3D data storage (which OverCloud does not, except for the detail noise) or simply uses meshes with some clever rendering to make it look like clouds.

Ah alright, I think I understand what is happening. OverCloud is trying to initialize its scattering tables (which requires shaders and RTs and whatnot) even though it is a headless build, which is completely pointless and probably impossible. Could you try adding the following code at the top of InitializeAtmosphere in OverCloud.cs and see if that fixes the problem?

Code (CSharp):

1. if (SystemInfo.graphicsDeviceType == GraphicsDeviceType.Null)
2. {
3.     // Skip if headless server
4.     return;
5. }

 

Works good, thank you! Will you be including that in the patch as well? Just so I know if I need to overwrite it again once I patch next time.

 

Great, I will be including it in the next patch (no reason not to). Thanks for testing it!

 

Awesome! Hey on a completely side note I noticed that your website certificate expired, you might not have noticed so just to let you know. (overcloud.me)

I will keep using and testing and let you know if I find anything else on the way. Thanks for the great support so far.

 

Could you check how to make this ocean compatible with overcloud when you get a moment?

https://github.com/Scrawk/Ceto