[RELEASED] Vegetation Studio

Voice and screen share is good also. Discord has a web version with no install needed.
My problem with slack is the 10 000 messages only log. Also good bot support for discord, could make a bot that automatic confirms invoice and adds you to dedicated support chat.

 

I do not have much experience, so my opinion may not be true, but I think about several things:
1. I, a man who, unfortunately, does not speak English well, I can say that the discord is not convenient for me. I use google translate to read the forum, and it's convenient, because the entire page is translated. but, discord does not support Google translate. maybe I'm not alone.
2. It will not be convenient for you to support in several places.
3. I like the practice of some authors who post on their sites a forum and wiki where they collect frequently asked questions and best practices. it's convenient for searching, on the forum and in the chat it's difficult to find, and reduces the number of support questions.

 

1. I agree on this. Forum is a good place for info, but sometimes you want to just ask other users about your own problems that helps no one else. Then a alternative with a chat channel is good. One does not exclude the other.

2. We are doing a beta chat now and it works good for some problems. This way anyone that wants to can join.

3. You are correct about this. Videos, FAQa etc. helps everyone.

 

I think a discord chat would be good.

 

and Skype is not suitable for your purposes? simply, the discord is a young system, and Skype has a rich infrastructure, including a translator: -?

 

Skype actually works good for me. I am just asking what people think. Only problem with Skype is the need for an installed application. Translator is a really good point

 

then take my humble voice for Skype. translator is very important to me.

 

I don't really use discord, so couldn't really say. I do use Slack for a few different projects, and am a fan.

 

Discord now has screen share and video available to all as well as the text and voice chat which has been around for ages. https://support.discordapp.com/hc/en-us/articles/115000982752. Video/sharing is limited to 8 people in a group so it isn't any good for broadcasting but great for support.
There are loads of bots available including google translate ones.
You can do voice, video and screen sharing from within a running game/unity project which should help you take a look at people's games and also show them a solution on your screen.
It is available as PC/Mac downloadable applications, mobile apps, or even a web browser, which is handy to keep up to date with discussions when away from your normal computer.
I belong to a number of diverse groups (music and dev) and we have all switched from slack to discord and dropped skype for videos.

 

can you share the experience of using google translate with discord? on the page of this bot very little information. Thank you.

 

developer Devdog also uses discord, maybe Lennart you can talk to him, about the pros and cons of Descord..

 

@lawsochi sorry I havent used the translate bot so can't comment on how well it works. There is a little bit more information on the source code page https://github.com/TannerReynolds/Translation-Bot. I notice it is not supposed to be used on public channels as it looks like it uses resources on the developers server (this is implied on his patron page), although I guess you could host your own copy of the bot on your own server.

 

Development update.

Still on documentation but getting closer. All screenshots is done with the new UI changes.
A couple of more days of writing left.

I finished the release candidate 2. After test installs on 5.6, 2017.1 and 2 I will upload it to the beta server.

All components now have a direct link to online documentation. The help icon in the upper right part of all components now links to the component online page.



Need to get back to writing, documentation is so fun

Lennart

 

Vegetation Color Masks.

I have posted some info about the VegetationColorMaskcreator before. I have just finished a small guide for how to generate a mask and set it up on a terrain using a built-in Vegetation Studio module for this in Microsplat.

https://www.awesometech.no/index.php/vegetation-color-mask-setup-with-microsplat/

Have a look and see what you think. The setup process is quite easy.

Lennart

 

Excellent- so glad I requested a solution for this, and you pulled it off 10x better than I was hoping for. Great work!

 

Documentation

The Persistent Vegetation storage documentation is now online.

Lennart

 

Just submitted to asset store !!

 

Congrats on making it through beta stage and to package submission, Lennart!! Here is to wishing you much success on this essential tool to any environment developer's toolbox!

 

congratulations !

I wish I could start already, hope unity is fast with approving

 

I would think this would get a fast approval being such a well put together and well documented system.

 

Hi @LennartJohansen

is the Collider System available as single asset? I think this will be useful for any project.

 

Congrats Lennart !!!

 

Yeah, congrats reaching 1.0!! Hope asset store reviews it quick (guess they'll be dying to test it too, lol).

 

Sent you a PM

Lennart

 

Congrats, I am looking forward to buy it. I am using SpeedTrees and this asset can improve the performance of my game right?

 

Yes.

 

How much do we need to set aside in our budgets to pick it up once AS approves, @LennartJohansen?

 

Normal price will be 95 dollar but, the first few days there will be a discounted price. 75 dollar.

 

Well, if it really boosts the performance it's worth it!

 

It does and yes it's worth it.

 

Definitely is worth it. I haven't been able to work on beta for almost a month (or maybe a little longer). Even at the last point I was able to work on testing, the performance boosts were well worth the asking price. And Lennart has done a lot of additions and improvements since then.

 

Great to hear that good luck on release day. is there eny prediction when Release will be? (to get it in special price )

 

My guess is 3 weeks. Seems to be that time Asset Store is using on new assets now.

If you register on the newsletter on www.awesometech.no you will get an email when it is released.

Lennart

 

I was / am intending to get this out the door as well

Two questions .. First is or will there be Vegetation Color Masks and or the whole system
work / be compatible with CTS ?

Second Question, will there be support for Gaia 2 when it come out ?

Third comment .. Congratulations getting this submitted to asset store!!!
I wish you a great deal of success and i am sure that it will happen.
All the hard work you have put into this very much needed asset package,
will pay off, I am sure of that.

Great work. will buy asap it is up on the store. ( as i am sure many more will as well )

 

Hi.

1. The vegetation color mask itself is produced as a RGBA texture with an alpha channel. It will require the terrain Shader to be able to blend in this at from a set distance. I will have a talk with Bart to see if this is something he wants to implement. I know CTS has a global mask that might be used.

2. Gaia 2 will produce Unity Terrains that will work with Vegetation Studio direct.

Adam is also adding direct spawn to Vegetation Studio using the API on the Persistent Storage. GeNa is done and Gaia will be added soon. I think it will be an update to Gaia 1 while we wait for Gaia 2

Lennart

 

Hi back, Thank you for your fast reply, Thank you for talking to Bart, I would imagine if its possible he will
be more then willing. Great news on Gaia, as well.

I am not technical, and kinda noobish, so I could not in good faith ask to be in the beta group XD ,
but I have read the whole forum, and been keeping up with it for the last month or two .. So i am very excited about this in general. For me having fun and making levels for VR is great and from everything that i have read Vegetation Studio is going to be huge! With Speed tree going full PBR, this is all great timing. Hopefully this will make for a
Very Happy Christmas and great New Year for you!

Congratulations again, You have worked very hard on this and I wish you tons of $$$ with this package.

 

A nice large clap goes out to Lennart on this. When I was introduced to this system I was kind of dragged kicking and screaming into it.....I had my own well developed system and it kicked royal a**! When I first started with this I put it into some really difficult performance and rendering tests. I have pics earlier in this forum showing exactly those tests. My system was beating Lennart big time in the beginning of testing.....I gave him a list of required features that a Real Game actually has to have and the performance he needed to beat.

Lennart deserves a round of applause....he has the features and the performance is outstanding. More so....at the asking price this is one of those 'No Brainer' purchases that you just have to have.

In the end of this wild ride in Beta with him....I will still use GeNa for my go to painting brush for all things landscaping except my large scale rocks (basically a pseudo terrain). The rest I have already started pulling out all the connecting links of my own system to implement this AVS. This says a lot! Hopefully I will be the first purchase and the first review. Very happy customer.

Cheers
O

 

Thanks for this. I've been waiting to see if I could swing it. With a discounted launch, I'm a definite buy. I wish you a successful launch!

 

Yes, I'm testing VS right from the start and I can guarantee it's worth it.
It is excellently optimized, generates a high fps and an incredible visual.
@LennartJohansen did an incredible job with this feature. It is fundamental to any work with vegetation;
You will not regret it.

I'll post some screenshot later.

 

Awesome !!!!!!
Can't wait to try it!!

 

Looks like this will be one to go on my wish list for the point in which I get back into serious game making

 

Hey, I was stalking through docs and TouchBend car trails pdf file seems to be broken.

 

Thanks.

I seem to have made the link and forgot to write the guide. I will get around to it soon and post a link here.

Lennart

 

Will this system be mobile friendly?

 

I had it running on a Samsung s8 and a Ipad Pro.
Vegetation Studio is based on the availability of Instanced and Instanced Indirect rendering and requires ShaderModel 5.0 for full functionality. It will not run on old mobile devices.

Here is an example running with instanced indirect disabled on the Samsung s8 at 720x1480 resolution. The trees are desktop version but the grass density is reduced quite a bit.



Lennart

 

NatureManufacture just released the Advanced Foliage pack

It has shaders set up for Vegetation Studio. The grass renders instanced indirect and included a pre made VegetationPackage set up for manual painting. You paint with the different textures on the splatmap and forest shows up.

Here is a video showing a speed level design using VS and some other tools.

A bit fun that content packs show up before I manage to release VS on asset store

 

Yeap I hope we will be released in pretty the same time but anyway thanks for introduction! Pack also contain alot of foliage, models and ground textures

 

Hi Lennart, Can't wait for the full release.

Is the documentation for converting shader to instanced indirect available yet?

Edit:- I found the prefab spawner docs and usage but it appears to only work for trees and objects. Is it intended to work for plants too?

Usage case is I have banana plants set as plants instead of trees and want fruit to spawn around them.

 

Congrats @LennartJohansen on making it through beta stage! I Can't wait for the full release.

Two questions:

- will it be compatible with meshes/terrafirma ?
- I have a hexagon tiles system with different biomes possibly on each tile, generated at runtime (mesh at this time). How you will approach this with VS? I have seen the mask feature or the texture based vegetation but I am not sure it can cut it. Also note that I have splatmaps coming from world creator and I can swift to terrain if necessary.

thanks in a advance.

 

- Yes, not sure if right away but it will be. The person behind Terrafirma and Lennart have joined forces
- Is each biome/hexagon its own mesh? If yes, then you can have multiple vegetation systems in the scene. Each hexagon would have its own system. You would just have to wait for mesh support. If not, you probably will have to use the masks. Or a combination of multiple vegetation systems with masks