Uni2D beta

I emailed you my receipt when can i get the beta download?

 

You guys have to make some proper Documentation for the 2.0 Release (also some tutorials for the Sprite Animation and the Smooth Binding/Bone Animation-System)

 

Is it true that we can now make prefabs out of Uni2D Sprites and use them in the editor??

I was worried that these new features would make Uni2D feel bloated. But you guys somehow managed to keep everything super simple and easy to use Great update!

 

@zephren We try to answer to beta request within 48 hours. You certainly will receive your confirmation soonly.

@Mayhem
Yes sure! We will do our best to provide a great documentation and some good tutorials.
And... I think we have some good stuff in stock!

Hope you will have fun with the beta!

 

@bryantdrewjones Sorry if we introduce some ambiguity in our log but the prefab system is for now always the same.

Again, the only possible way to actually create a "true" prefab is to disconnect the sprite from the Uni2D's workflow.

"_ Fixed sprite prefab creation" would mean the current system was previously broken (due to the new animation system).
Don't forget Uni2D already allows you to create prefab but only for runtime instanciation.

That said, even if this information have really to be taken with caution, if we where right, we would find an possible way to finaly introduce a "full" prefab solution. Unfortunately I can't give you more details nor any delay before this feature would be eventually tested and maybe introduced.

My goal with this post is not to awake any false hopes here because we feel really concerned by this problem.

We sincerly want to be fully prefab compliant but it's really challenging for us now.
Be sure we all really want to see this feature coming as soon as possible in Uni2D ...and working in this way!

 

And a little post @all the uni2D beta community

Feel free to send us quickly all your bug reports for the last Uni2Dv2 beta beacuse we want to deliver the best product as possible!

 

Here is a video showing animations made on 2D pictures with Uni2D. Very easy to use !!! Thanks Bento-Studio !

6R

 

Looks great p6r!

We need really some tutorials, i couldn't manage to animate with Bones :/


@topic

So far i didn't get any errors or problems (Mac OSX , Unity 3.5.6f4)

 

@p6r great!

@Mayhem Yes sure we are working on tutorials for the release! ... and happy to see you found no problem yet!

 

Thanks a lot...

@Mayhem : Wait and see the tutorials from Bento-Studio !?! (Then I could make a tutorial.)
I'm curious to see how THEY do !?!

Not only animations ! Look at this picture :
-> Without bones = 1 tree !
-> With bones = An "infinity" of trees !!!

So, you don't have to use several drawings to create your forest background. Add bones to your straight tree then duplicate it and play with the bones...



6R

 

Don't hesitate to "cartoonify" your picture. A boring window can look more cartoon thanks to the bones.
If you make this with facades, doors, fences and so on, you can create various cartoon houses for your background with a few pictures. (If the pictures are white/grey you can have an infinity of backgrounds by simply changing the color in the shader !)



6R

 

Hi!

Bento, great work, bones feature is awesome. p6r, good examples!

I've a question about sprite animation. I follow this steps:

- Import 3 frames to assets folder. (frame0.png, frame1.png, frame2.png)
- Uni2D->Create->TextureAtlas and rename as myTextureAtlas.
Uni2D creates "myTextureAtlas_GeneratedData" with a texture and a material.
- myTextureAtlas->Inspector->Size set to 3, drag the 3 frames and apply.
- Uni2D->Create->AnimationClip, rename as myAnimationClip.
- myAnimationClip->Inspector->UseAtlas->myTextureAtlas.
- myAnimationClip->Inspector->AddFrame->Select->Frame0.png (and the same for frame1.png and frame2.png) and apply.
On each frame, in the field "Use Atlas" I can see myTextureAtlas.
- GameObject->Create Empty, rename as mySprite
- Component->Uni2D->Uni2DSprite
- mySprite->SpriteTexture->Select->frame0.png
- mySprite->UseAtlas->myTextureAtlas
- mySprite->AddAnimationClip->myAnimationClip

Click on play and the sprite animation seems to be OK.

These steps are correct? if so, I suppose that myAnimationClip takes the images from myTextureAtlas_GeneratedData not from original pngs.
But if I delete original pngs myAnimationClip lose the reference to the images, so, what is the meaning of myTextureAtlas? I get the same result if I drag directly the frames to myAnimationClip without myTextureAtlas.

Thanks!

 

Thanks jmcubo.

Here another examples to "toonify" your pictures or animate them thanks to the Uni2D bones for your games :

6R

 

You can do it in fewer steps:

• Select your 3 textures, drag'n'drop them to the scene view while pressing SHIFT. Uni2D creates a new sprite AND a new animation clip automagically.
• To add the textures to an atlas, select the newly created animation clip. In the "Use Atlas" popup menu, click "Create a new atlas...". The atlas will be used as a global atlas for the whole animation clip and every frame texture will be added to the atlas.

Now, what is the purpose of atlasing and why should you consider it? When something needs to be rendered on the screen, there's a "draw call" behind it. For various reasons, a draw call is a slow operation and one should keep the draw call count as low as possible to have a good frame rate. On mobile devices, 30~40 draw calls begin to be critical.

Hopefully, in some conditions, draw calls can be batched, Unity does that automatically. Atlasing is one way to help draw call batching: by using one big texture, various sprites can be batched because they're using the same texture: the atlas' one.

So the result looks exactly the same, but internally, there's some precious performance gains.

Uni2D needs to keep references to the original textures in order to work with the Unity Editor, but only the atlas textures are used and stored into memory.

 

@jmcubo
@Kusmi given a very complete and great answer, this is a normal behvior. In our workflow, the atlas is generated from source textures. So if you update your source texture, your atlas will be automaticaly updated with the good texture. But don't worry, the source texture will never be include in the build so they don't take space on disk or on memory on your final project.

 

@Kusmi Thanks for the answer, now I understand everything perfectly. And thanks for simplify the animated sprite creation is the best way, no doubt.

@Bento-Studio Thanks for clarifying that the original textures will not be in the final build.

 

Another video : Simply attach objects or lights to your bones for nice effects in your game !

6R

 

People ask me for tutorials... OK !
Here is a tutorial with a simple 2D branch found on OpenClipart.org -> Page 5 : "ramo" !

Tips :

1- Don't start at 0:00 on the timeline, but don't forget it (after) if needed ! (Don't ask me why !?!) ;-)
2- As you can see : You easily can change the values after your first animation. So don't worry if you're not satisfied with your animation.
3- I'am adding a bone out of the branch to be able to easily use the one before it. Don't hesitate to learn with this simple branch. Delete all and do it again : Change the position of the first bone to see how it reacts...
4- Sometimes, the first bone can be out of the picture !

6R

 

This is great, thank you!

 

From boring pictures to Cartoon ones with a few bones (rotate and scale !) :



6R

 

So how long do you guys think the official release of 2.0 will take from now ?

 

@ Mayhem In short, we're in the home stretch now. Until next week, we hunt the remaining bugs and we need a little more time to finish the documentation, tutorials and website and once this is all done: Release!

 

Ah, i'm so excited

I've got another questions:

1. Concerning future Updates for the Physics in Uni2D. I know you use the native PhysX-Engine, but do you think about supporting something like Box2D or Farseer?
As far as i know there are plugins for both Libraries for Unity.

Native Box2D: http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/156635-NativeBox2D-The-best-2D-physics-solution-for-Unity3D
Farseer Port: http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/13...r-Physics-Engine-(Box2D)-port-for-Unity-(WIP)

I think it would be a great addition!

2. I would like to see a Sprite-Atlas Window like in ex2D: http://www.ex-dev.com/ex2d/wiki/doku.php?id=manual:atlas_editor
It's a little bit a pain in the ass (sorry for the language ) selecting all the sprites particularly and dragging them into the array in the Inspector, especially when you make big atlasses with small sprites...would be a great time-saver and way more neatly arranged!

 

@Mayhem

Thanks! We are very excited too!!

About the first point, we have already try to implement the native port and the farseer port for this version. But we have encountered some big problem (pro version only for the native DLL, and a lot of work/support too hard for us) For Farseer the performances are pretty bad due to the C# execution that kill a bit the gain of use true 2D physic. But we are always in reflection around this point because it could be really interesting even if the performances are not incredible. So... maybe for the future!

For the 2nd point did you try our "one click" atlas solution.
I know it's not documented yet so it's very hard to discover all the features but let me introduce this one :
1- Make a multi-selection of all the objects you want to be atlased.
2-On the sprite inspector, in the "Use Atlas" section, click on the list and choice "Create a new atlas... "
3-Set a name for your atlas and click on ok
4-A confirmation box appear click on "Yes, build Atlas"
5-Your done!
Your atlas is now generated and set on all the sprites.

Same thing for animation sprite sheet.
1- Make an animation clip from the menu and drag and drop all the sprites you want to see animated.
2-Once your animation clip is ready click on "Use Atlas" section, click on the list and choice "Create a new atlas... "
3-Set a name for your atlas and click on ok
4-A confirmation box appear click on "Yes, build Atlas"
5-Don't forget to click on "apply"
6-Your done!

Hope this helps!

 

Hi @Bento-Studio:
I'm having a problem with the TextureAtlas workflow. I don't know if this is a known bug but each time I close/open the project I was working on, all the Textures associated to the TextureAtlas are removed from the Textures array on the Inspector (Uni2DTextureAtlas). This can be very annoying cause if I want to add an extra Texture to an existing Atlas I have to re-add all of the previous textures I had again. Please see screenshot attached.

Before:


After:


Also, I have another question. When I add bones to a Sprite the Draw Calls count increases by 2, is this expected? Please see the Draw Call count in the screenshots.

Without bones:


With bones:


Thanks.

(btw I'm using Unity 4.0.1f2 and Uni2D beta #5b)

 

Hi Bento Studio

I just import the beta 5 version into an empty project file. I tried to unfold the folder structure but got a lot of editor errors like these:

I am using unity pro 3.5.6
I am pretty interesting in the smooth deformation feature, Could I know how to access the api of bones in runtime?
Thanks. It's a really promising feature!

 

@Fluxa
Thanks for feedback
So first point we can reproduce the bug we added it to the list and will publish a RC soon.
It's very important for us to deliver the best product as possible so again, please everybody test the last beta and give us feedback!

For the second point, it's an "excepted" behavior.
Skinned mesh can't be batched.
In fact, due to the skin mesh, all the matrix need to be different and that's the reason why sprites can't be batched.

We have preferred doing skinning on GPU for better average performances. Because using skin mesh on mobile devices is in any event very consuming, on computer draw call are less sensitive... and skinning must be performed on GPU to be efficient. So that's why we do this choice.

 

@paraself
Ok reproduced. This version have been built using Unity4 that's why you see this.
We will publish a RC version 3.5-4.0 compliant that remove this behavior.

About your second question we use the internal Unity bones system so you can handle them directly in your scripts.
Many thanks for all your feedback and support!

 

@Bento-Studio, thanks for your response. Uni2D is looking pretty awesome! Do you have an ETA for the next release? Thanks for the hard work!

 

@fluxa

Thank you very much! We currently work on tutorial and documentation and we do all our best to make the tool available as soon as possible.

 

Hey Bento,

I'm running on a very short time-frame here, and I have to get my project finished by this Friday, but I have a problem with Uni2d. The thing freezes my entire Unity editor. I try to open the sprite editor, Unity freezes and starts consuming all my RAM. I try to apply changes to an atlas, Unity freezes and starts consuming all my RAM. I literally cannot do anything with it at all, which is a shame because it looks so good, and I spent $50 on it. I'm sure there must be some explanation, can you help me out please? I'm using version 1.0, if that helps.

**EDIT**
So I did some more testing, and it appears to work fine with a new project, which is very strange. There must be something in there that is incompatible with it, but I'll be damned if I know what it is. Ideas>

 

@Code_Of_Honour,

Hello, unfortunately it's a knowed bug.

You can reduce the impact of this trouble by updating these files :
http://www.bento-studio.com/Forum/Uni2DEditorUtils.cs
http://www.bento-studio.com/Forum/Un...ilderWindow.cs

Don't forget to clone your project before applying this patch.

You can always contact us to get a Uni2DV2 beta access that solve the problem but that broke retro compatibility.
Hope this helps.

 

Just wanted to add to this thread to say that I've just begun making the move from Cocos2d to Unity and Uni2D is making the cross over very easy!

 

@WickedLilGames
Thank you very much for your support! Glad to see how you like our tool!!
Are you already a registered beta user?

Best regards

 

I've purchased Uni2d but not sure of how to put myself forward as a registered beta user. Could you provide a link?

Thanks!

 

You have just to send an Email to BentoStudio with your Invoice Number of Uni2D

 

@Mayhem Thanks! And for information, we're always working on tutorials

 

So, do you have a certain date for the 2.0 Release? Will it be March yet?

 

Hey, was wondering if you got any tutorials up, almost ready to start animating my characters, been busy working with playmaker.

thanks

 

Hello,

We are seriously exploring the idea to work closely with Playmaker. But for now, we always working (hard) on tutorials...and we do all our best to release as soon as possible.

 

If you're going to do some Actions i think the most useful Actions for PlayMaker would be Actions refering to the new SpriteAnimation.
Like:

- PlayAnimation
- StopAnimation
- ResumeAnimation
- IsPlaying
- PlayAnimationWithEvents

I'll stay tuned. I literally can't wait for the 2.0 Release! I am looking forward to it, also looking forward to the Parallax-Script!

 

This wait better be worth it JK

Of all the reason I finally dumped Corona for Unity. Uni2D is the one straw that finally broke the camel's back. I gotta say the only reason I can wait patiently for the 2.0 release is that I am working on a 3D project right now for a client. If it wasn't for that I would be on here asking for the release date, too. I just hope it is released by the time I finish that project.

 

hi !
any news about a release date ? (sorry I can't wait for it, I need to know xD)
thx !

EDIT : will this new version fix the laggs issues ?

 

Hello to everyone.

For quality reasons the release of the tool could not be yet announced.
We currently prefer polishing some aspects of the product. This is an absolute necessity.

I know it's very frustrating (really) but we prefer deliver a good product in some weeks rather than ruin all our efforts by releasing now.

I hope you will understand our decision and again, be sure we really work hard to make this tool a great tool.

 

Some weeks?
Uff, i understand that you want to deliver a solid and good tool, but personally my team and i waited too long for this. We'll use Uni2D for our next game for sure, now we have to move on and use something different instead.

 

This is pretty frustrating. We hoped we could use Uni2D 2.0 for our game but we can not keep waiting with the uncertainty of when it will get released. I understand the situation but I think the lack of a solid delivery schedule is something to improve here. We will too have to move on and use something else.

 

Hello,

For all the persons that are in the same position of @Fluxa and @Mahyem please contact us by mail to find a solution.

Best regards

 

Hi!

We sent you a couple of message in the past few days and didn't get any answer. To wich mail should we send our questions?

Thanks a lot!!!

 

Hello,

Yes we have already sent you a mail to get more details about your problems. Now we have the informations we need. Please give us some time to answer to all your request. Best regards.

 

Ive emailed about acquiring the beta, looks good.

Charlie