SLATE (Complete Gameplay Cutscenes & Cinematics Sequencer)

Hey,

The Overlay Text clip can already be placed on any screen position since it has a Position and a Anchor parameter. . Or are you referring to something different?
Indeed though there is no Font selection and that would be nice to add.

Thanks!

 

Ok I got it working. Here is my workflow if anyone wants to know:
1. Add the 360VR Camera to the scene. Make personal adjustments to component.
2. Position it and make it a child to a pre-animated Camera from Maya. The camera comes in as a place holder and not a camera.
3. Go to Tools>ParadoxNotion>SLATE>Open SLATE Editor
4. In the SLATE Editor hit Create New Cutscene
5. In the Director of that Cutscene click the +>Add Track>Alembic Track
6. In the Inspector with the Alembic Track selected from the SLATE Editor, click Import Alembic File
7. The Alembic File is located in a sub folder of Assets called StreamingAssets (must be here)
I use the Scene window and see that when I hit Play in the SLATE Editor that the Alembic is playing. It will play like it was animated in Maya with offsets in place.
8. Tools>ParadoxNotion>SLATE>Extra>Create Cutscene Starter.
9. With the SLATE Editor open I can either hit play for starting the game or Render Panorama from the camera and the animation will be captured and the movie made automatically after the frames designated in the VR component is reached.

Thanks for your help in getting this working, the Alembic was 45G in size and played without any drag in Unity. And the movie was created in less than an hour using your SLATE and VR 360 Panorama Pro. It just took me a couple of tags with you to understand what I needed to do.

Thanks for your tools.

 

That's great! I am very glad it worked out for you without issues and thanks for sharing your workflow as well as your feedback

Cheers!

 

Sorry guys that was incomplete. After I finished the render I found that the Alembic was not playing. Then I found it was that I did not use the Render Camera from Slate. So I had to go learn how animate the camera in SLATE to do that, and now I am back. This is more complete and works.


1. Add Slate to the scene. And import your animated Maya Scene with FBX.

2. Go to Tools>ParadoxNotion>SLATE>Open SLATE Editor

3. In the SLATE Editor hit Create New Cutscene

4. In the Director of that Cutscene click the +>Add Track>Alembic Track

5. In the Inspector with the Alembic Track selected from the SLATE Editor, click Import Alembic File

6. The Alembic File is located in a sub folder of Assets called StreamingAssets (must be here)

I use the Scene window and see that when I hit Play in the SLATE Editor that the Alembic is playing. It will play like it was animated in Maya with offsets in place.

7. When you created your cut scene in the SLATE editor a Render Camera was placed under the Director Camera Root. This is the camera to animate and apply your Components to. You can't just child it to the Maya camera transform like I first thought. It has to be animated in the SLATE editor.

8. In the Director Camera Track right click and create a Camera Shot. This is where you will create keys for the Render Camera.

9. With the Camera Shot selected look at the Inspector this is where you place your inputs at the bottom.

10. Set your in and out for the length of the capture mine was 0 in and 3600 out.

11. If you animated a camera in Maya then the XYZ will translate. I noticed that the X in Maya was negative and in Unity it was positive. The rotations the X was good the Y was not so I could put the X value in but the Y I had to just rotate the camera until it was looking in the same direction. The rotations in Maya and Unity are off a little for the Cameras.

12. After setting all of the key frames on the Camera Track in the Director. You can attach all of your Components to the camera and adjust them as normal. My last Component was my VR Component.

13. Tools>ParadoxNotion>SLATE>Extra>Create Cutscene Starter. This will enable the Cutscene to play when you hit play.

14. In the Inspector with the Cutscene Starter selected drag and drop the Cutscene to the Cutscene place.

15. From the SLATE Editor you can either hit play for starting the game or Render Panorama from the Render Camera and the animation will be captured. When the frames are captured the movie will be made automatically.


Thanks for your help in getting this working, the Alembic was 45G in size and played without any drag in Unity. And the movie was created in less than an hour using your SLATE and VR 360 Panorama Pro. It just took me a couple of tags with you to understand what I needed to do.


Thanks for your tools.

 

So I really want to purchase this asset...
I hesitate due to the lack of demo scenes, though you've been promising (since the start of this thread).
I doubt that will keep me from waiting.
In fact, I'll probably go purchase once I've posted this.
Because is looks super awesome (congrats)!
I'm sure the lack of an example scene will aggravate me later.
I know you're busy fixing bugs.
But it's really time to get 'er done!

 

I don't think you'll regret it. Slate is great, and easy to use. The documentation is pretty good for getting started http://slate.paradoxnotion.com/documentation/

 

Well I must be stupid, because I've wasted the last 2 hours trying to do something with this asset. How f'in hard can it be to make a stupid camera follow a path looking at a stupid cube. c'mon. I have read the docs, and re-read. I finally managed to make a cube move, but that is it.

 

Hello,
To make any object Follow a Path and Look At something, you need the Follow Path and Look At clips.

- Add FollowPath clip. Hit "Create new Path" or assign an existing one in it's inspector.
- Add LookAt clip. Drag and drop the target Cube in it's inspector.

These need to be arranged in different tracks so that both happen together of course:


This naturally also works for created Camera Shots if you don't want to animate them with keyframes.



Let me know if that works for you.

Thank you

 

Any news on the new version with the new API and no runtime allocation?

 

Thanks @nuverian that worked, though it took me a while to figure out how to add the path. I also watched the korean video tutorial part 1, which is what really helped me get started. Your animated gifs help, and seem to be something you're pretty good at. Maybe a couple more of those to help the newbie's, where you show the various steps of click here, then click here, then right-click here...

I'll bet you could do a quick video in under 5 minutes. Forget the example/demo scene, just show us where to click a few times. After that we can figure it out.

 

1. For some reason I can't resize (retime) the clips using the edges (as shown in the animated gifs). I also can't just click&drag to move (slide) an entire clip. Only thing I can do to adjust keys as a group, is to drag-select a group of keys and then I can click-drag. This is a properties track on a wheel game object. Can anyone tell me what I'm doing wrong?

Edit: Looks like this only occurs when I try properties track clips.


2. There's something strange going on with the camera, which I hope I can explain. I have a shot cam that follows a path and "looks-at" a cube. When I scrub, the camera follows the path from start to finish. During runtime (playing the game), the cut scene plays and the render camera (I assume) looks like it is lerping towards the path, transitioning at about the 40% mark; as opposed to the beginning of the path.

Edit: I changed the Blend-in value on the Camera Track, and I think that fixes #2

3. How would start the cut scene with a longer fade-in? I've tried making a longer fade-in, but the camera is already halfway through the start of the follow path sequence. I'd like a fade-in and then the follow path to start. Any idea how I can accomplish the above?

Edit: I think I should add a shot cam for a half-second sequence that is simply a half-second blend-in. Hoping this will create a half-second black-out.

4. Is it possible to key/animate the Rigidbody IsKenematic property? I have a rigid body component on my game object. ?? Would love this one!


Thanks!!

BTW, starting to love this asset.

 

What's the runtime allocation you mention here? I typically setup my projects using mostly runtime instantiation and I'd be curious to know about this. Thanks.

 

Runtime allocation means allocation memory when the game is running. To avoid this you either preallocate some pool of objects or use types that are allocated on the stack like structs.
When you allocate temporary objects they are later all deallocated in block by the garbage collector, which may cause a frame spike since there is a sudden raise in cpu usage which is even more evident than if the same high cpu usage would be constant.
It's of concern only for mobile only usually, where the the garbage collection can take many milliseconds, on pc it shouldn't be an issue.

 

Okay thanks. I am targeting the mobile platform, so I'll keep a watch out for this.

 

@nuverian
Hi...
I would like to know if your "Alembic" importer can import an alembic exported from maya and if your "alembic" importer can import the the UV's and original materials of the animation mesh.

I have a cloth simulation in Maya, exported with the "Alembic Exporter". In Unity, using this script I can playback the animation but I can not get the original materials.

Thanks in advance.


Update: My mistake. I don't know yet how Alembic works with materials. If you can give some lights....

 

Sorry for late replies everyone

Hey,
There have been some improvements in that front in the new version, yes.

Hey,

Thanks. Glad you like Slate and getting used to it.

1. ReTiming clips is done by holding down Shift key while resizing the clip. If Shift is not held down, then the clip will simply resize without ReTiming it's animation keyframes. Is that what you meant?
The Properties Track is a very special track in that it does not accept any actual clips. If you want to animate properties, but use clips instead, please try the "Animate Properties" clip which can be added in an Action Track.

2. This is probably happening because you either have set "Blend In" or "Post Smoothing" parameter in the Camera Track inspector (probably Post Smoothing if you can only see this happening in play mode). Is either of those not zero?
(Post Smoothing will smooth the Render Camera towards where the Render Camera *should* be in Play Mode)

3. If you want to manually control screen fading, you can use the "Rendering/Screen Fader" clip which can be added in any Director Action Track. This clip basically allows you to manually fade in/out the screen whenever you require as well as animate both the fade and the color if desired.


4. Definitely. You can animate any property or field of type float, int, boolean, Vector2, Vector3, or Color, on any component of the actor gameobject or within it's transform hierarchy.

- Drag and Drop the gameobject in the Slate editor.
- Add "Animate Properties" clip in an Action Track.
- Click "Add Property" in it's inspector and select "Self/Rigidbody/IsKinematic".




- Animate it as required.



Let me know if the above works for you or if you have any other questions.
Thanks.

Hey,
Slate uses and integrates this exact same library from Unity Tech Japan. (It's also noted in the documentation).
Alembic does not support materials since it's made only for mesh data. After imported in Unity, Unity materials can of course be created and assigned to the imported alembic mesh. UVs are of course imported as well, so textures will be applied correctly.

Thanks

 

Thanks nuverian!

 

Awesome! Thanks for the direction on my questions. Everything seems to be working, however I do see the following error in the console:

Setting the Material property is not supported for Colliders of type WheelCollider.
System.Reflection.MethodBase:Invoke(Object, Object[])
Slate.ObjectSnapshot:Store(Object, Boolean) (at Assets/ParadoxNotion/SLATE Cinematic Sequencer/Utility/ObjectSnapshot.cs:150)
Slate.ObjectSnapshot:.ctor(Object, Boolean) (at Assets/ParadoxNotion/SLATE Cinematic Sequencer/Utility/ObjectSnapshot.cs:61)
Slate.CutsceneGroup:Store() (at Assets/ParadoxNotion/SLATE Cinematic Sequencer/Framework/CutsceneGroup.cs:277)
Slate.CutsceneGroup:Slate.IDirectable.Enter() (at Assets/ParadoxNotion/SLATE Cinematic Sequencer/Framework/CutsceneGroup.cs:169)
Slate.TimeInPointer:TriggerForward(Single, Single) (at Assets/ParadoxNotion/SLATE Cinematic Sequencer/Framework/TimePointers.cs:32)
Slate.Cutscene:Sample(Single) (at Assets/ParadoxNotion/SLATE Cinematic Sequencer/Framework/Cutscene.cs:430)
Slate.Cutscene:Sample() (at Assets/ParadoxNotion/SLATE Cinematic Sequencer/Framework/Cutscene.cs:402)
Slate.<Internal_UpdateCutscene>c__Iterator0:MoveNext() (at Assets/ParadoxNotion/SLATE Cinematic Sequencer/Framework/Cutscene.cs:604)
UnityEngine.MonoBehaviour:StartCoroutine(IEnumerator)
Slate.Cutscenelay(Single, Single, WrapMode, Action, PlayingDirection) (at Assets/ParadoxNotion/SLATE Cinematic Sequencer/Framework/Cutscene.cs:294)
Slate.Cutscenelay(Single, Action) (at Assets/ParadoxNotion/SLATE Cinematic Sequencer/Framework/Cutscene.cs:241)
Slate.Cutscenelay(Action) (at Assets/ParadoxNotion/SLATE Cinematic Sequencer/Framework/Cutscene.cs:239)
Slate.Cutscenelay(String, Action) (at Assets/ParadoxNotion/SLATE Cinematic Sequencer/Framework/Cutscene.cs:687)
Slate.Cutscenelay(String) (at Assets/ParadoxNotion/SLATE Cinematic Sequencer/Framework/Cutscene.cs:667)
EnemyTriggerViewlayCutscene() (at Assets/Scripts/Views/EnemyTriggerView.cs:76)
EnemyTriggerView:OnTriggerEnter(Collider) (at Assets/Scripts/Views/EnemyTriggerView.cs:69)

 

Hello,

I am totally new to Slate and i'd like some help.

I'm trying to write my own ActorActionClips to be compatible with Spine, in order to play animation, stop them, to do a full Cutscene.

So, i have my GameObject CutScene with a CutScene script on it. Then, i have a box collider which, when triggered, launches the cutscene with Cutscene.Play();

In the CutScene itself, there is only one actor which has one Track with one clip (the one i'm trying to write).

Code (CSharp):

1.     protected override void OnEnter () {
2.  
3.             MathewsController mc = actor.GetComponent<MathewsController> ();
4.             mc.DisableMoves ();
5.             mc.ForceStop ();
6.  
7.             skeleton = actor.GetComponent<SkeletonAnimation> ();
8.             skeleton.state.ClearTracks ();
9.             skeleton.Skeleton.SetToSetupPose ();
10.             skeleton.state.SetAnimation (trackIndex, animationName, loop);
11.             Debug.Log ("Playing animation: " + animationName);
12.         }
13.  

Everything is going fine until 'skeleton.state.SetAnimation (trackIndex, animationName, loop);'
The skeleton stops moving but the message never appears on the console.

Do you have any idea why ?

Thanks.

[EDIT]
Ooh, and i have a new problem. How can i "activate" the scrubbing when creating my cutscene ?
As in : i want my animation to be played when i'm not in play mode and moving in the timeline with the mouse. I'm not sure if it's understandable.

[EDIT2]
Okay, so, the scrubbing is working BUT only if i have enter the playmode once after compiling.
Is it possible to make it work the first time ?

Thanks again.

 

What are the odds of getting Cinemachine integration? Would really like to try this out, but that's the one thing holding me back.

 

This error causes an exception on my player game object. The vehicle control stops behaving correctly at this point. Any idea what I can do as a work-around? Thanks!

 

Hello and welcome

There is a bug for ActionClips placed at exactly time 0 at the moment which is already fixed for the immediate next version that I will send to the asset store very shortly.

Does your ActionClip works as it should if set to some starting time any other than 0?

Furthermore, one important thing to keep in mind when creating custom ActionClips, is that their callbacks are always called the same both in editor as well as in runtime. So basically scrubbing is always enabled and it's just up to the ActionClip on how to handle it in the OnUpdate override. Some things may not be suited to run in editor mode and Spine API might be one of those things, in which cases it should need to be handled differently. (Of course if you want some certain things to take place in runtime only, you can use UnityEngine.Application.isPlaying).

Let me know.
Thanks!

Hello,
Thanks for your interest in Slate.
I've already contacted the Cinemachine author about an integration, but I'm also working on an official dynamic cameras feature set, so that it is tightly integrated with the rest of the tool. So either or both will come in the future
Thanks!

Hey,
This issue is already fixed. I can send you the fix to your email if you want, so that you don't have to wait for the asset store approval. Just send me a PM with an email to send the fixed package to.
Thanks.

 

Thanks for your answer.

My ActionClip is indeed working when not set to Time 0 but not always and not in a stable way.
I explain : I have the same Action clip (with the same parameters) for two different Actors. And when i play the cutscene in editor mode, or when i scrub, one of them is sometimes not working, when the other is always working.
I have to manually scrub until the first one works. But if i play the cutscene again (still in editor mode), when the timer is back to the beginning of the cutscene, it's not working anymore.
I'm not really sure if i'm clear enough ...?

Also.
Is there a way to pause the cutscene from inside an ActionClip ?
I'd like to pause the cutscene on some occasions and resume it when the player clicks.
For now, i still have my own Cutscene controller on my cutscene but maybe there's a way to do it without sending messages or without having a reference to the cutscene in my ActionClip ?

Thanks again.

 

I have a cutscene in my project, and everything works good. The cutscene plays perfect during gameplay etc. The only problem I'm seeing is the the camera preview in the unity inspector never displays anything from my scene. I don't see the terrain or my vehicles. I've tried to figure out if it's a layer or culling problem, but haven't been able to figure it it. I'm hoping you know what the problem might be. Currently I have to do everything in the scene view and game view.

Edit: Basically when I click on a Shot Camera the preview shows what looks like the sky (I think).

Update: I got the preview to work by changing the Shot Camera Clear Flags to Depth Only. I'm not sure if that's the correct answer, but it works!
Awesome asset so far!

 

I'm having some struggles with Slate today. I can't really describe it except to say, I'm getting "strange" behavior from my shot cam. It has the setup you described for me above, where the shot cam follows a path and "looks-at" a target. It has recently started jumping off the path sometime during the middle of the path clip. I'm still trying to narrow down the problem as this was all working perfectly. I get the feeling it has something to do with the fact I have setup the cut scene as a child of a prefab game object; organized very cleanly, but still a prefab. I build my entire cutscene, along with necessary game_objects, get it all working and saved as a prefab. Then I instantiate at runtime into my scene, when the game starts. I'm sure it could be any number of things, including mistakes I might be making. I just thought maybe something about my prefab setup isn't kosher. I deleted the path track and created a new one. Added the existing path to the new follow path clip and everything started working again. Clicked apply to save/update the prefab and then tested it was messed-up again.

Any thoughts?

Update: After adding this post I went back to the path track and disabled it. I then added a properties track and set three keys (start, middle and end) for position of the camera just like the path. I have to say awesome work on the trajectory path as I saw from setting the properties a little gizmo-handles popped up in scene view, which allowed me to adjust the trajectory curves perfectly to match the disabled path. Anyway, after applying the update to the prefab, I ran a quick test and everything seems to be running perfect. Fingers-crossed it holds.

 

i got the exact same "issue" but when i click on the timeline play button it display things correctly, but scrubing does not display all the gameobject sometime

 

I get that too sometimes. I also have keyed parameters (position & rotation) on a game object that will animate correctly during scrubbing, but during gameplay the object doesn't move. Sometimes this gets fixed with the creation of a new prefab, or deleting the Directors camera. I can't be sure what exactly gets things working again, but I do manage.

 

Hey!
Sorry for late reply.

Can you please send me a small reproduction project (support_AT_paradoxnotion.com) so that I can see exactly what you are doing and potentially the problem that exists here? That would be great.
It might be a problem with your custom clips, Spine itself, or of course a bug.

Regarding pausing the cutscene from within a clip, yes that is quite easy. Here is an example clip:

Code (CSharp):

1. namespace Slate.ActionClips{
2.  
3.     [Category("Utility")]
4.     [Description("Pauses the Cutscene. It's up to other scripts to resume it.")]
5.     public class PauseCutscene : DirectorActionClip {
6.         protected override void OnEnter(){
7.             if (UnityEngine.Application.isPlaying){
8.                 (root as Cutscene).Pause();
9.             }
10.         }
11.     }
12. }

Let me know if that works for you.
Thanks!

Thanks. I am glad you like Slate so far.

Are you by any chance in Android build target? I've recently also discovered that when Unity is set to Android build target platform, the Shot preview in the inspector does not work correctly (and indeed setting Shot Clear Flags to anything else other than Skybox works).

I will of course have to fix this, but please let me know if your target build platform is also Android.
Thanks.

Can either of you please send me a small reproduction project (support_AT_paradoxnotion.com) to check what might be the cause of these issue you are facing. I've tried to reproduce those problems, but didn't manage to do so yet.
Thanks!

 

Close... I'm on IOS.

 

Around when will the new version be available?

 

When I "playback" my cutscene, it always loops. The Default Wrap mode is set to Once. This happens on all of my cutscenes, even when I create new ones. I know this worked when I first imported the asset however.

 

The Camera Previews are now fixed to work on all platforms correctly.

I will submit the new version to the asset store tomorrow.

In Editor mode, cutscenes are always played in Loop mode. The 'Default Wrap Mode' setting is only relevant to Play Mode. Are you referring to Editor Mode, or are you facing this behaviour in PlayMode as well?

Let me know.

 

Thanks, that sounds correct, I was speaking about Editor mode.

In case no one else has reported this problem, but when I try to change the near clipping planes on a (prefab) shot cam and click apply, it immediately reverts back to 0.01. I have the same problem with trying to change rendering path to Use Player settings, immediately changes back to deferred.

Thanks,

 

Hey,

I am glad that this was indeed the case.

Regarding Shot Cameras, the clipping planes as well as Rendering Mode, or HDR and the rest of the Camera Component settings do not have any effect at all in what is rendered when the cutscene is playing, since we never render through those cameras. The only camera that Slate uses and renders from within is the "Render Camera" (child of the 'Director Camera Root' gameobject).

If you want to alter the actual clipping planes seen in cutscene, please change the clipping planes of the Render Camera component instead, and also make sure that the setting named "Match Main When Active" on the Director Camera Root inspector is turned off. Otherwise if it is turned on, the Render Camera will mimic the settings of your 'Main Camera' in the scene if any.

Let me know if that helps.
Thanks.

 

Thanks, I kind of figured that.

 

Hi,

I'm using ProCamera2D in my current project in order to manage a parallax. The parallax plugin is based on creating as much cameras as parallax layers needed. Each camera will render some Unity layers and are using the "depth only" clear flags.

With this set-up, when a Slate sequence starts and something starts moving on the screen, the moving object seems to be duplicated - actually it's not the case - it's more about the rendering that is not correctly updated.

I tried to set the main camera to render all Unity layers and everything worked as expected - so it's seems to really be an issue with the camera set-up. Would it be possible to make Slate and ProCamera2D parallax plugins compatible ?

Thanks

 

Hello, I am trying to do a character animation with mecanim track and head look track, though head doesn't move unless I disable mecanim track. Seems to override head look thing. Am I doing something wrong?

 

Hello,
Since both tools are using camera in a totally different way, it's not very easy to create a seamless integration between Slate and ProCamera2D. What you can do though to make use of ProCamera2D's parallax, is to recreate your ProCamera2D parallax settings on the "Render Camera" gameobject found under Director Camera Root gameobject. Here is a step-by-step.

• Locate Render Camera gameobject and add ProCamera2D component to it.
• In the new ProCamera2D component attached, add your MainCamera as a "Camera Target" and only enable Parallax.
• In the new parallax component created, assign your Render Camera for the ProCamera2D variable.
• Re-create the Parallax settings you have in your MainCamera if you want to be the same.

You will end up with a similar setup to your MainCamera, but under your Render Camera :


Then it will work as expected:


I hope this works for you
Cheers!

Hello,
This was a bug now fixed. Please send me a PM with your email and I will send you the fix.
Thanks.

 

Hi,

It almost work but not quite ;-) When I press the Unity Editor Play button both ProCamera2D and ProCamera2DParallax script are disabled, is it Slate fault/behaviour ? Beside that, before entering my Slate sequence trigger I can see that the Salte Render Camera and sub-camera positions are correction, meaning they are the same as my game Main Camera and sub-camera positions. But when the Slate sequence starts the Director Camera Root position which was previously set to (0,0,0) is then set to the same position as the Render Camera whereas the Render Camera and sub-cameras positions are not update by the same offset in order to keep the same global position. So my sequence will not render the right portion of my game. I guess I can force the Director Camera Root position to (0,0,0) whenever a sequence stars, but I rather ask before if it's the normal behaviour ?

Thanks

 

Hey!

Can you please try again with the new version gone live and let me know? (which is also the version I did for my tests posted above). Regarding the root position of the Parallax, the ProCamera2DParallax component has a Root Position variable which you can set by the end of it's inspector. In my tests/examples above, I had it set to be the same as the MainCamera's Parallax component Root Position. Have you tried setting them to be the same?

Let me know.
Thanks!

 

So, the new Version 1.6.0 has gone live with a huge list of changes, improvements and fixes!

On Animation

There is now an option to Enable/Disable AutoKey with a big relevant button on the top and works very similar to how it is done in most animation software. When AutoKey is disabled, any changed parameters will not automatically be recorded. Instead the 'key' icon of the parameter will turn green to indicate it's changed and only by clicking on it the key will be recorded. Moving the current cutscene time will simply revert the parameter value.
On top of that, there is also a nice button at the top of the editor to key all changed parameters without having to go through all clips one by one in case there are many changed.


All ActionClip parameters' DopeSheet Editor and Curve Editor can now also be viewed and edited directly within the Slate editor timeline right bellow the clip (instead of only within the Inspector as it was up to now). This does not only account for gameobject animated properties, but for all ActionClips and their Animated Parameters!
For this, there is a new 'curve' button next to each track, which by clicking it, will open the selected clip for editing:


Copy/Paste for multiple keyframes selection has now been implemented, but along with some extra unique options (to my knowledge). Selected keyframes can be cut or deleted along with removing the time selected, thus making all keyframes after selected move to the left by that amount. On the same spectrum, keyframes can be pasted by inserting them into time, thus making all keyframes after, move to the right.
Last but not least, copy/pasting is also possible between different clips/tracks as long as the animation curve count are the same.


Tracks height (as well as width) when editing animation curves is now re-sizable

• Improved DopeSheet Editor performance to handle any number of keyframes without lagging as before.
• When viewing Animation Curves in timeline editor, the curves can be panned and zoomed regardless of cutscene pan/zoom, by holding down Alt+Shift + Left or Right Click.
• When editing keyframes in Animation Curve Editor, their time (x) is locked and will only move in y (value). This is an option that can be turned on or off in the preferences, but by default is on.
• Keyframes of Color type animated parameters will now display the color next to the keyframe rather than their numerical value.

On Runtime

• Cutscenes now have a Playback Speed variable.
• Added 'Renderer/Animate Material Properties' action clips (Texture, Color, Float) along with relevant inspector popup menu for property selection.
• The 'Composition/Additive Scene' action clip, can now load the target scene at a specific position of the current scene either at World or Cutscene Space!
• Added Depth Of Field Focal Range parameter in Camera Shot clips.
• Added DontDestroyOnLoad option for Director Camera. If enabled, the behavior will be the same as it was up to now. If disabled though, the Director Camera instance on the new scene loaded will be used instead.
• Components in RenderCamera gameobject are no longer forced enabled/disabled. Instead the gameobject as a whole does.

On Editor and Workflow

• Clips can now be added/removed from multi selection by holding down Control.
• When exiting Shot Look Through mode, the previous Scene View camera coordinates will be restored to what it was before entering Look Through mode.
• Required objects and string not set, are now marked red.
• Added option in Sections, to 'Colorize The Background' with their color.
• Cutscene Settings in the inspector are now collapsible to save space when editing clips.
• Action Tracks can now have a custom icon loaded from within their inspector.
• When scaling clips, a vertical guide line is shown similar to when dragging clips.
• Clips once again have rounded corners. Yei

Fixes and Minor Mods

• Fix: Clips not triggered when their start time is 0 in play mode and after a cutscene restart.
• Fix: Camera Previews in inspector that were not showing in some platforms.
• Fix: CrossDissolve glitching issues.
• Fix: DepthOfField to work with new Unity changes.
• Fix: Performance when using DepthOfField that was bad due to reflection used.
• Fix: Error for when sampling time exactly at two clips start and end time (when clips were totally adjacent).
• Fix: SpriteFlipbook clip from playing first sprite on exit.
• Fix: AnimatorTrack to be able to be used along with 'Character Look At' correctly in runtime.
• Fix: Clip DopeSheet when dragging keys/selection outside of clip.
• Fix: Warning ("consider to use SetParent..."), that was shown by Unity when reverting a RectTransform.
• Fix: Clip multiselection that was sometimes resulting in wrong clip positions.
• Fix: 'Simple Grounder' clip.
• Fix: Some issues with Mecanim Track.
• Fix: Some issues with GIF and MP4 rendering.
• Fix: PNG Image Sequence Rendering, will now correctly render GUI effects too (fades, screen texts etc).
• Mod: Improved initialization performance considerably.
• Mod: Improved allocations for animated properties.
• Mod: Improved white skin theme.
• Mod: PairedKeying option is now removed.

Last but not least, Spine is now supported will full realtime editor feedback! Along with blending between animations and sorting layer re-ordering. Also thanks to @DarkMagicCK for his initial code posted in the Slate forums.



That's all for now! Enjoy!

​

 

Hi @nuverian,

Finally i have SLATE. Congratulations once again for a huge asset. I work in audiovisual and it is really easy to work with it. Very powerful and professional. Well Done! Keep doing great stuff like this.

The realtime preview is key to work with ease. The camera shots are very handy and easy to create and manipulate. I've tweaked a bit the LIPSYNC plugin to work with the free version without emotions and Eye controller, at least until i can get a pro version after a couple of months.

All is working perfect and i'll add it to my projects for sure.

Thanks a lot!

 

Hey Danirey!

Thanks a lot for getting Slate and for your very positive feedback!
I am really glad you like it and to hear that it will be part of your projects!
When you have something made with Slate and want to share it, by all means please do

Thanks again!

 

Hi, one of the main things I want to control creating videos is a particle system, will be PopcornFX effects controllable from SLATE?

 

Hi people,

Any way to animate pan and volume of an audio track? I'm sure it is easy, but i can't find how.

Cheers!

 

Hi,

This is what you can do with a bit of imagination and SLATE.

Cheers!

 

Hi @Danirey. Add a "Properties Track" to an Actor Group that has an AudioSource component. Then if you click "Add Property" you'll see all animatable properties of the AudioSource listed. You can keyframe them directly in the timeline.

 

Thanks. And if you want to animate an audiotrack from the director's main group?

 

Hi @nuverian, we are looking for cutscene editor assets and this one looks very good. The one we are using right now falls short in some aspects, and we're looking into upgrading the system.

A key point for us is that the asset should work when building the game for consoles such as Xbox One and Playstation 4, in addition to PC and Mac. I've been reading about the asset but haven't found much information about this. Is it currently compatible with these consoles?

And another thing, is it possible to get a trial version of the asset of some kind? It would be very useful for us if we could get to test the asset with our own project and systems and see if it suits us.

Thanks!

 

Hey,
I haven't tested with PopcornFX yet. There is probably going to be the need for a custom clip (which I can provide) to be able to realtime preview and playback PopcornFX particles though. I will try it later today and let you know.

Hey!
Nice! Thanks for sharing the cinematic with us I would love to see more when you have them!

Regarding volume and pan of audio played from within Audio Clips, they are right now not animatable parameters, even though I can easily add this. I can do this now and send you an update in PM if you want

Cheers!

Hello,

Thanks for your interest in Slate.
Yes, Slate supports all platforms, including AOT compiler platforms such as xBox One is.
Regarding a trial version, please send me a PM.
Thanks again