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SilverLining for Unity: 3D volumetric clouds, sim-quality procedural skies [DEPRECATED]

Discussion in 'Assets and Asset Store' started by sundog, Oct 6, 2011.

  1. sundog

    sundog

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    SILVERLINING FOR UNITY HAS BEEN DEPRECATED.

    Professional simulation & training developers should check out BlueSkies, a native wrapper of the SilverLining C++ SDK for Unity instead.


    This thread will remain for support purposes for existing customers only.


    Hi,

    We've released SilverLining for Unity, a ground-up port of our popular SilverLining Sky, Cloud, and Weather SDK for C++ that's widely used in commercial games, and serious simulations by folks like NASA and the FAA. SilverLining brings you physically-accurate procedural skydomes for any specified time and location, with an attention to detail that goes down to modeling the amount of ozone in the atmosphere, the density of water droplets in the clouds, and incorporating observational data on twilight lighting conditions.



    Even the positions, color, and magnitudes of the stars at night are accurate. But, what sets SilverLining apart from other sky packages is its real 3D volumetric clouds, with realistic lighting that depends on the time of day and even the phase of the moon, that you can fly around and through. By using Unity's ParticleRenderer component for each cloud, rendering is very efficient, and a scene including dense coverage of cumulus clouds extending to the horizon involves only a couple of hundred extra draw calls.

    We have a Web Player Demo up if you'd like to see SilverLining for Unity in action, which lets you vary the time of day in real time. Also, here's a tutorial video showing just how fast you can have simulation-quality skies and 3D cumulus clouds in your scene with SilverLining. Thanks for checking it out!

    Frank Kane
    Founder, Sundog Software LLC

     
    Last edited: Nov 19, 2015
  2. houndie

    houndie

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    Ouch a tad steep for me at this point but nice work!!
     
  3. bigkahuna

    bigkahuna

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    Looks nice, al biet pretty pricey. How is this different from UniSky?
     
  4. houndie

    houndie

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    Volumetrics and Moon phases along with star positioning is what I saw as different but not sure that's worth an additional $175
     
  5. psyclone

    psyclone

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    Possibly if it was very light weight and had little to non performance impact...

    What is the performance impact on a respectable machine?
     
  6. gordonramp

    gordonramp

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    Wonderful.
     
  7. sundog

    sundog

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    Hi,

    psyclone: I happen to be on a mid-range Toshiba Satellite laptop with built in Intel HD graphics at the moment. The scene shown in the demo and tutorial demo renders at about 65 FPS with SilverLining, and 70 FPS without. It's pretty modest overhead for the number of volumetric clouds in that scene (over 250, stretching all the way to the horizon.) Pulling in the visibility, decreasing the cloud coverage, or using a more realistic FOV would cut down that overhead even more.

    Regarding pricing - bear in mind that the C++ version of SilverLining lists for $2,500! We've discounted SilverLining for Unity very steeply because we're excited to break into the Unity community.
     
  8. Yusuf-AKDAG

    Yusuf-AKDAG

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    A question you've to ask yourselves,
    Do you want to spend extra ~200-250 drawcall for rendering clouds?

    And there's no relation with C++ version of SilverLining. This one is c#, particles and custom unity shaders.
    I think its expensive as money and as resources.

    Thanks for product sundog.
     
  9. duke

    duke

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    Also keep in mind that while they're volumetric - if all you want is the high visual quality, you could RTT them behind the scenes.
     
  10. runner

    runner

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    Would like to sample that and the night sky

    A UI selection slider would be nice
     
  11. bigkahuna

    bigkahuna

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    Seems to run reasonably well on my old Macbook Pro and flies on my Toshiba i5. The demo terrain and scene are a much larger hit to performance than the volumetric clouds. I "flew" the camera well above the terrain and pointed it away from the terrain behind me and the frame rates of just the clouds seemed very good. Performance certainly seems good enough to be used in anything I do, but my target machine is a desktop PC so I'm not nearly as picky about a couple extra draw calls as I am visual quality and accuracy.

    Also, how accurate are the star positions and moon phases? Can you enter a day / time / latitude / longitude and get an accurate representation of the start field?

    Any plans to port your "Triton" ocean to Unity? I remember a while back several of us were drooling over it before the "community ocean shader" was born. And although we also have two UT made ocean assets, neither is fully developed and we still lack boat wakes and spray which I see you have in your SDK.
     
  12. sundog

    sundog

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    bigkahuna - Thanks, we're quite happy with the performance as well. While there is a draw call for each cloud in the view frustum, they are all drawn using the same material so there should be no state changes between the draw calls.

    Yes, the phase of the moon, star positions, and position of the sun and moon are all accurate for the location and time you specify.

    SilverLining is our first foray into Unity - if it does well, porting Triton over would be something we consider next. It would be a bit more challenging since it relies on GPGPU capabilities and would require us to develop native plugins for Unity in order to compute the FFT's fast enough. I'll have to check out those other ocean packages you mentioned to see if there's a simpler way to do it in Unity.
     
    Last edited: Oct 7, 2011
  13. bryanleister

    bryanleister

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    Hi,

    I was wondering, is it possible to instantiate individual clouds? In other words, if I wanted to place individual clouds manually into the scene and control their appearance and movement, is that possible or is it all procedurally generated?

    Other software I've used allows you to place an object or mesh where you want a volumetric cloud to appear, so am looking for something similar in real-time.

    Bryan
     
  14. sundog

    sundog

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    The individual clouds are placed procedurally, using a physical model of cumulus cloud size distributions derived from observational data. Basically you define an area that you want filled with clouds at a given sky coverage, and SilverLining fills it in for you. Manual placement of individual clouds is not exposed in this initial release.

    If you have any C# scripting experience, it wouldn't be hard to modify the underlying scripts to allow you to place multiple cloud layers to achieve manual placement of many distinct areas of clouds. Under the hood is a SilverLiningCumulusCloudLayer object; you would just need to modify SilverLining.cs to have many of these objects instead of a single instance.
     
  15. runner

    runner

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    In either the webplayer or in the Tut do you represent the 24 hr transition.

    I previously mentioned a slider would have been keenly appreciated in the webplayer so that we could see the 24 hr time lapse.

    So how about this night sky or should we just take for granted that its there?

    Sorry if i sound cynical but i''ve seen assets purchased taking another 6 months of beta testing before they reached a ready state.
     
  16. sundog

    sundog

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    runner - our bad; our original demo build did have a time of day slider, but somehow it got overwritten. I've re-posted a new WebPlayer for SilverLining that includes a time of day slider so you can see it in action.

    There are also several screenshots in the Asset Store listing that show various times of day.
     
  17. reaper7

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    Really hope that Triton Oceans is ported over, this would be a major addition to Unity. Looking at getting Silverlining - due to its use of realtime star positions, a brilliant feature.
    Both together would make for a killer combination.
     
  18. sundog

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    Your request is well timed - I started tinkering with Triton under Unity on Friday and did get an ocean scene up and running. Still quite a bit of work to turn it into a real product, but it looks like it will happen. It needs to be implemented as a native plug-in due to its use of CUDA and OpenCL, which means it will be a Pro-only product for PC desktop initially.

    SilverLining and Triton do play well together - if you download the Triton Ocean SDK Demo it actually integrates both products. You can change the time of day dynamically and stars and moon will come out, and the water reflections will change accordingly.

    Thanks for your interest! Might want to sign up for our mailing list to make sure you get any launch announcements.

    Best regards,
    Frank Kane
    Founder, Sundog Software LLC
     
  19. reaper7

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    Thanks Frank, that all sounds brilliant. Can't wait to try it out.
    Had looked at the demos and SDK kits previously and there the reason I'm holding out for your packages - require both, so great the unity versions will play nice together. Will sign up to the mailing list too.

    Do you reckon that the full power will be implemented - would love to get something running similar to what IFAD have using the standalone package as in the following:



     
    Last edited: Aug 30, 2012
  20. sundog

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    Yes, the complete Triton API is wrapped automatically by SWIG. I'm also including some collision functions in the TritonUnity.cs script you can use to get the surface point and normal at any ray. (Note, Triton doesn't include a buoyancy model for your ships - that's an exercise left for the reader.)

    Triton for Unity is coming along nicely; here's a video to whet your appetite:



    I also have ship wakes working within Unity as well, with both 3D wave displacement and propeller backwash.
     
  21. reaper7

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    Cool, that's coming along very nicely. No worries about the buoyancy, as should be easy enough to sort out.
    The Ship wakes and backwash are major pluses for this Ocean compared to others.
    Will you be doing underwater effect to similar to that used by the Community Ocean: http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/16540-Wanted-Ocean-shader/page30

    Again looking Great so Far, thanks for update.
     
  22. sundog

    sundog

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  23. reaper7

    reaper7

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    Thanks Frank, will download check it out. I'm sure it shall be exactly what I'm looking for.
     
  24. Yusuf-AKDAG

    Yusuf-AKDAG

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    Hello Sundog,

    I tried Tirotin demo even with your demo scene, water did not created or rendered. Just lighthouse and unlimited emptiness. Is there any other special requirements to work with it? I'm on v3.5.3 pro and Win7. And when I stop and hit play again, unity crashes.

    Also, I wish you provide trial/evaluation version of Silverlining Clouds too . I'm curious about drawcalls that awesome looking clods add to my overall scene..
     
    Last edited: Sep 1, 2012
  25. reaper7

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    Getting the following error: GUI Window tries to begin rendering while something else has not finished rendering! Either you have a recursive OnGUI rendering, or previous OnGUI did not clean up properly, then CTD's. Ran First time ok, then now can't get it to run again.

    EDIT: Got it working - Deleted the First project that it worked in and Created a new scene and re-imported, then it worked ok. (Still get the above error, but still runs - no CTDs any longer)

    EDIT2: Is Water disabled in windows build, just tried a quick scene to view and no water was displayed.
     
    Last edited: Sep 1, 2012
  26. John-G

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    See on your website that your standalone version includes the new following features:

    "SilverLining 2.7′s most eye-catching improvement is crepuscular rays, AKA God rays"
    "This update also provides new “shadow maps” that developers may use to cast shadows from the clouds on the ground, and “environment maps” that may be used for reflecting SilverLining’s simulated sky on water and other objects."

    Are these included in the unity version, if not any plans to include them?
     
  27. sundog

    sundog

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    Unity Pro already includes most of those new features in our C++ SDK as part of the engine, so we're not planning to duplicate them. Unity's sun shafts, shadows, and the Camera.RenderToCubeMap method provides all of that already. Our crepuscular rays effect is an image-space effect just like Unity's sun shafts.

    They're useful for our customers integrating SilverLining into their own engines that don't have these features already - but Unity's already ahead of them :)

    Thanks!

    -Frank
     
  28. arkon

    arkon

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    I can't seem to get the trial to work on Unity 3.5.7 pro on a Mac dev machine. Does this only work in a PC environment? if so does this rule out mobile as a target? specifically IOS and Android.
     
  29. sundog

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    SilverLining should run fine on any platform - are you talking about our Triton Ocean package by chance? Triton only supports Windows at this time. There is no SilverLining trial version so I suspect you might be in the wrong thread here :)
     
  30. John-G

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    Can these be done in Unity Indie version? Sorry but I'm a complete noob ;)
    Love the pics on your site, and would love to acheive the same for my own project.
     
  31. sundog

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    Sun shafts, shadows, and rendering to cube maps are all Unity Pro features I believe - there is no way to achieve these effects that I'm aware of within the free indie version. But if you had Pro, the sorts of scenes you see on our website would be possible. Thanks for checking it out.
     
  32. John-G

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    Ok, thank you. Hopefully Pro will be an option for me down the road.
    Still as is i love the package and hope to acquire it soon, funds permitting.
     
  33. twisted89

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    How well would this package work in a planet environment? Could it be applied spherically? Can you leave the atmosphere and view the clouds from above?
     
  34. sundog

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    SilverLining for Unity assumes that the positive Y axis is "up" in many places, so it wouldn't interact well with a spherical system.

    Our Pro SilverLining SDK for C++ and C# developers does support geocentric coordinate systems however, and is widely used in simulation and training applications that simulate the entire Earth. Depending on your budget, target platforms, and in-house expertise, wrapping that with a native plugin for Unity could be an option for you.
     
  35. LokiDavison

    LokiDavison

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    Any idea when the Hosek-Wilkie model will be coming to the Unity version?
     
  36. sundog

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    Pretty busy with contract work here at the moment. But, there is a new demo of our technology in the works being built with Unity - so that will likely force me to do it within the next couple of months in order to show off SilverLining at its best. Stay tuned, I'll announce it here when it's done.

    For those who aren't familiar with the new Hosek-Wilkie sky model, here's a video we made comparing Hosek-Wilkie to the Preetham model we used before.
     
  37. gecko

    gecko

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    Can you post an image or two of the night-time sky, showing the stars? I'm looking for a day/night sky simulator with accurate stars, but I really need a photo-realistic sky with a dense Milky Way band. How close does Silverlining capture that look?
     
  38. sundog

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    SilverLining includes a full ephemeris model that simulates the positions, brightness, and colors of the 1,527 stars visible to the naked eye, as well as the visible planets and the moon. Here's a 90-degree image of SilverLining for Unity simulating 11:30 PM on January 24, 2011 offshore of Los Angeles:



    Note that I slightly increased the brightness and particle size of the stars (these may be adjusted at the top of the included SilverLiningStars.cs script) to make them more visible for this screenshot.
     

    Attached Files:

  39. gecko

    gecko

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    An ephemeris model--that's fantastic! But for my game, which is set at 5,000m elevation, I really need a bright Milky Way. Does SilverLining offer a way to add a skysphere with a photo-image of the celestial sphere, like this? http://home.arcor-online.de/axel.mellinger/images/mwpan_polar2_s.jpg , which would rotate in synch with the planets and moon and sun, etc.?
     
  40. sundog

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    No, there is no texture-based Milky Way effect at night. If you had your own texture mapped onto a transparent sphere inside our own sky sphere, you might keep it in sync by using our method for getting the moon's position and rotating it relative to that point. It would require some scripting to pull it off.
     
  41. gecko

    gecko

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    Would synching my skysphere to the moon be accurate throughout the year? Wouldn't it be better to synch it to your skysphere? Either way, would you be available to do this custom scripting? And is there any pre-purchase documentation available about the product? Thanks!
     
  42. sundog

    sundog

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    It would be more accurate and performant to integrate your Milky Way texture directly into our sphere, but it would require more work and an understanding of our Ephemeris class - just suggested syncing to the moon as a way to get the rate of rotation correct without a ton of effort.

    We do customer-specific customizations on a contract / hourly basis; PM me for rates if you'd like to explore that route.

    We don't have much in the way of documentation, as using SilverLining is mostly self-explanatory. But, there is a "quick start guide" with release notes that I uploaded here. Definitely have a look at our tutorial video if you haven't already - it walks you through the process of adding it into a scene, and configuring it for a specific time, place, and weather conditions. I wish the asset store had some way to let you try before you buy, as it does sound like you have some very specific requirements.
     
  43. gecko

    gecko

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    I realized that this is perfect right out of the box for another project, so I've purchased it and am evaluating it for this more complicated project. I'll probably PM you with specific customization specs, but two quick questions:
    1) Is there anything in SL currently that automates time progression, day/night after day/night?
    2) The moon is cool but not oriented correctly to the sun -- a crescent moon should be tilted so the lit side faces the sun, rather than always being horizontal to the horizon. Is there something I need to do for that to work?
     
  44. sundog

    sundog

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    Thanks for the purchase!

    There's no automatic time progression, but it should be trivial to adjust the _SilverLiningSky's Hour and Minute properties from an Update() method somewhere.

    You are right that the orientation of the moon isn't modeled, only its phase and location - and you're the first person to notice that in the 7 years that SilverLining's been around! Adjustments to the moon's rotation could be applied inside the SilverLiningSky.UpdateMoon() method - both the moon and sun positions are available in horizon coordinates, so you could in principle compute the proper rotation of the moon particle and apply it to particles[0].rotation toward the end of that method. It's not a feature that currently exists, however.
     
  45. crazyhorse666

    crazyhorse666

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    Cant seem to get the cumulus particles or cloud textures to cast moving shadows on the ground
    .
    help pls ! :)
    Thks
     
  46. sundog

    sundog

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    From what I've read online (such as http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/8227-Shadows-and-Transparency ), Unity won't cast shadows from transparent objects (such as our cloud textures and particles.) Unless someone knows a trick I don't, there's no simple way to enable shadows from the clouds today.

    Under Unity Pro, I could envision a feature such that we render the clouds to a texture that is then used as a shadow map, but this doesn't exist yet, nor would it be integrated with Unity Pro's built-in shadows.
     
  47. sundog

    sundog

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    A new version of SilverLining just got accepted into the Asset Store! This version includes the new Hosek-Wilkie sky model from last year's SIGGRAPH proceedings. If you thought SilverLining's skies were a little too pink near the horizon - well, you were right. It's better now.

    Check out the difference in the side by side video on our blog.

    Thanks!
    Frank Kane
    Founder, Sundog Software LLC
     
  48. crazyhorse666

    crazyhorse666

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    Whats the best tweak to allow linear space coloring with silverlining i am thinking of using and IBL Marmoset type lit environment this need linear colorspace
    thks

    oh and could we have cumulus nimbus clouds add to the package ?

    cannot the status texture shader allow shadows to be cast from them ?
     
  49. sundog

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    I'm not very familiar with linear space coloring, but from what I could gather quickly it sounds like there is no gamma correction baked into it. So, it should be possible to simply remove the gamma correction in the SilverLining sky shader to achieve this. You'd need to edit the shader - it's not something we have an option for.

    The stratus texture is also transparent, since it can have variable coverage, and so it too cannot cast shadows. The issue as I understand it has to do with how Unity sorts transparent objects more so than what the shader does.

    Your feature request for cumulonimbus is noted!
     
    guyal likes this.
  50. Monil

    Monil

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    Hi, in this latest version has been removed compatibility with unity 3.5.7?