Unity Tree Billboard Bug!!! with Oculus UNITY WHAT IS GOING ON??

What is going on with the Tree Billboard Bug, any fixes???

I find it ridiculous that Unity has not fixed this issue. For those who are not aware of this issue, Tree Billboards rotations are wacky when you rotate your head to look around, others have pointed this problem out many times and after searching the forums there is still NO SOLUTION INSIGHT??

WHAT IS GOING ON UNITY??

 

It's an open issue for more then 1.5 years now. Don't expect to see changes very soon. Last Unite Europe ( 2015 ) they told me there was a new guy for terrain development, however he quit the job to go somewhere else. Since then, no progress on terrains. It's one of the features together with video texture that needs some heavy update as soon as possible.

 

The developer quit, he probably din't know how to fix the billboards( just kiddin).. It is a shame there is no fix, I would like to hear from Unity about this issue and the progress. The issue does not exist with SpeedTree trees however speedtree is awfully slow no matter how I configure the LOD levels.

Not sure why Unity are implementing orientation of billboards the way they are ,Unity Tree Billboards are aligned with the Camera Direction, when they should be looking or aligned to the (Camera Position - Tree Position) NOT Camera Forward.

So, please Unity can we get some feedback on this issue.. Cheers

 

this has been known for ages and it's amazing it's not fixed yet. It makes VR and terrains completely useless since you have to remove all trees from your scene or risk to get everyone laughing at your game or getting dizzy.

if at least we got some feedback on when a fix is expected...

 

Unity FEEDBACK PLEASE ? btw. This issue also effects billboard grass!

 

This issue effectively and completely eliminates the ability to use Unity based Trees ( + grass) in VR. speedtree as it stands has major performance issues. Unity, can you please at least acknowledge and perhaps provide some feedback regarding ETA on the fix, thank you.

Cheers,
Livenda Labs Pty Ltd

 

Bump..

 

https://unity3d.com/company/public-...announces-181-million-series-c-led-dfj-growth
Up for beers. When will this be fixed? Anyone?

 

I wonder if this billboarding thing happen on other engines. I'm going to give it a try.

 

@creat327 Any success?

 

Still no fix?

 

Still no fix +1 ?

 

Looking for solution. Will report back if I find one.

EDIT: easiest solution was to not use the free speed trees that are on the asset store. I bought the paid version and it doesn't force the Facing leaves which breaks it for VR.

 

I have the paid version and it has the same issues...

 

Does SpeedTree's alpha blending/alpha-to-coverage to remove leaf aliasing work for you all? I cannot get it working no matter what I try. Been trying to fix this for the past week.

Obviously aliasing on all my trees' leaves kills VR. Would be grateful for any help.

 

I can't believe the only option here is no option.. Why would a company not fix such a simple issue if they want to promote the use of VR? This bug alone pretty much destroys immersion for outdoor games and vastly limits the content that can be developed using their engine. Gives me the impression that the developers of Unity are down right lazy (or worse).

 

I too find this very very strange, until the last few days, the unity's front page advertised unity as the next gen VR development tool, yet we cant even use the terrain tree system in VR?

 

That's great news! Thanks for the update!

 

HI, thanks for the update, really glad to hear it is being worked on, but I am going to have to ask the dreaded question as VR is really key right now and is at a vital time to push games and VR applications and for me without this it is completely holding my project back (and it is a large project) and i'm sure many others. So, do you have an idea of when the solution for monoscopic rendering will be available?

As you already have said, even with the "Billboards face camera position." checked, you still get billboard rending issues.

Thanks again

 

"Billboards face camera position" does not help at all.

Please fix this. Not using billboards is not an option.

 

Tested this on 5.6.0b11 and it doesn't seem to actually do anything or affect the terrain tree billboards in any way. They still use the forward vector.

 

I thought I too had checked this previously to find no effect whatsoever, but after reading the above I doubted myself....

Had a bit of hope for a short while!

 

Cool. I thought I should probably have tested other billboards but was mainly interested in trees. If it works on other billboards then I suppose it is limited to the Tree billboarding. Maybe there is a newer beta version with it fixed and I could retest?

Either way, thanks for keeping us in the loop.

 

Ah, okay. So the root of the issue is the terrain tree reference mesh orientation being rendered for the billboard. Too bad this feature won't fix what we're seeing but at least we know what the issue is now.

Think a fix is on the board in the near future? Sounds like we'll need to migrate to Speed Tree where the trees don't have rave-parties in the distance, otherwise.

 

Of course, no problem.

Thanks for the information it has been very helpful!

 

Good to see that someone finally picked up this issue. It has been open since 2014 and I thought I would never see someone working on it. However I still think the whole terrain system should be overhauled as it's the worst in it's kind of all game engines I've seen. No seamless terrain height and texture painting, weird billboards in VR, limited grass painting as when you continue painting, all the first grasses disappear. I made some nice terrains but painting by hand is just awefull at the moment. I've send feedback on quality of life improvements (told me to do when I was at Unite 2015 A'dam), but never seen an answer nor improvement else then bug fixes.

Don't ge me wrong, Unity is a nice tool, but the terrainsystem is just way behind and used to be the worst together with MovieTexture, of which the last is finally being improved. Can't wait for the new terrain system... if it ever comes.

 

This does sound great, also good to have an update. Could you elaborate a little more on how I (or we) could possible make a fix for this untill the release of the beta containing the atlas billboarding method you are implimenting?

I really want to try and get trees going in my VR (without having to buy speedtree), as they are a significant part of my project.

I do agree with this, however with perseverance, using certain terrain tools and procedural generation of trees and grass I have found the terrain system to work well for me in creating photo realistic terrains, apart from this VR issue. But admittedly I haven't done any terrain, texturing or veg placement by hand, so cant comment on this.
I have however done my own modifications to both the grass shader and tree shader to improve them for my needs.

Thanks

 

For those interested in a temporary fix, use LOD Groups on your tree prefabs and make the lowest one cross quad with the tree texture or a quad with a custom billboard script. Push your Terrain Tree billboard distance all the way up and you'll never see Terrain Billboards.

Basically, use LOD groups and turn off terrain billboarding.

 

I've noticed grass is also oriented to forward direction of camera, not towards camera position. A little vomit-inducing in VR!

I'm pretty sure I can cook up my own grass asset/material/shader. Is there any way for me to get those into the Unity terrain system, and if not, are there any third party products that are out there that will 1) let me paint them on easily in areas like the unity detail paint brush and 2) do the lod fading out thing for me?

And I don't have the expertise to cook up my own trees - is there a third party tree asset system (either set to work within Unity terrain or in its own system) that solves the current problem where most of the leaf textures also rotate to match camera orientation instead of position? I don't mind purchasing a terrain package asset but I would like to have verification that it would work without fiddling.

 

Do you have any recommended tutorials on how to use LOD groups on tree prefabs? I've got so much to learn.

 

https://docs.unity3d.com/Manual/class-LODGroup.html

 

@KellyJelly Any updates on this?

 

Well, it's been over a year, and the trees are still wacky/broken in VR. Good job everyone.

 

2017.1 out... any information on improvements?

 

Bit of a Unity newbie here... Can someone confirm if I can fix the problem with this?

http://www.speedtree.com/unity/

 

Nope

 

I have also encountered this issue. It looks "trippy". It feels strange to be able to rotate trees around you with your head. Totally breaks immersion in VR. What are possible workarounds for this?

"Billboards face camera position" does nothing (5.5.2f1).

 

I've had this thread bookmarked for 1 year, any news?

 

None.

 

Calm down people, it's not like Unity has much money. Furthermore, this is a VR issue. It's not like Unity is coming out in public and promoting VR development. I think we need to be reasonable.

 

Also, I mean, trees... have you ever even played a game with trees? One or two trees; maybe. But placing many trees together in a large area in the background?! Now you've lost me. How can we expect such a fringe feature to receive much attention is beyond me.

 

Unity guys come on. We need a working foliage solution in Unity!

 

Just adding my name to this list, having just seen the issue in VR with the branch billboards in the free Speedtree Broadleaf...

 

And working grass/foliage that does not completely kill perfomance