Audio Will it be possible to create audio mixer groups one day?

According to https://forum.unity3d.com/threads/c...s-add-plugins-at-runtime.433380/#post-2801809, it appears that one cannot create audio mixer groups at run time. I've confirmed this based on the APIs that are available.

Will it be possible to create audio mixer groups under a specific mixer in the future? Maybe I'm not looking at the right place, and it can be done?

 

It seems (from my short exploration of the doc) that this is still not possible today (i.e. more than 4 years later...) I was trying to instiate a mixer at runtime, and either I didn't find how to do it properly, or it can't be done...

Any earthshaking / groundbreaking idea anyone?

 

It would be nice. I have dynamic audio sources that I wish to normalize, and the only way to normalize an individual audio source is to do so via an individual audio mixer group. So not only is it not possible to create an audio mixer group dynamically, but I cannot try the alternative -- apply a normalization filter to an audio source without relying on an audio mixer group.

The other alternative is to do various effects like normalization via C#. Or if I want to rely on audio mixer groups for that stuff, I would have to maintain a pool of used and free audio mixer groups but that sounds a tad complicated.

 

Hi, I would also like to create channels and groups during runtime, as well as adding effects and automatically exposing variables of the effects. Another useful feature would be if you could clone / copy existing audio channels (runtime or editor), as for now you have to set up every channel by hand.

Also the settings of all audio effects aren't copy-able from one effect to the other. Why not?
And please Unity, give direct access to all parameters in the mixer. Currently not all parameters are exposable. I would like to have a direct link with the output level of a channel (after and before processing effects).

 

+1 +1 +1 on this. Dynamically adding and removing mixer groups would be outstanding.

 

Looks like we need to wait another 4 years for next audio engine iteration

 

Make that another 4 years

 

And another 2 years

 

Any day now..

 

While it would be great to create audio mixer groups dynamically I still needed a working solution for my project. I only need a couple of such mixer groups and only temporary, so I implemented a pooling where a pool of audio mixer group is shared via an ObjectPool. Thats the code for creating the pool:

Spoiler: ObjectPool of AudioMixerGroup

Code (CSharp):

1. using System.Collections.Generic;
2. using System.Linq;
3.  
4. using My.Game.Scripts.Audio;
5.  
6. using UnityEngine;
7. using UnityEngine.Audio;
8. using UnityEngine.Serialization;
9.  
10. using Zenject;
11.  
12. using Object = UnityEngine.Object;
13.  
14. namespace My.Game.Scripts.Project
15. {
16.   public class GameObjectPools : MonoBehaviour
17.   {
18.     private List<AudioMixerGroup> _pitchedSoundEffectsMixerGroups;
19.  
20.     [Inject]
21.     private AudioController _audioController = null!;
22.  
23.     private ObjectPool<AudioMixerGroup> _pitchedSoundEffectsMixerPool = null!;
24.  
25.     private int _pitchedSoundEffectsMixerProvidedCount;
26.  
27.     public ObjectPool<AudioMixerGroup> PitchedSoundEffectsMixerPool => this._pitchedSoundEffectsMixerPool;
28.  
29.     private void Awake()
30.     {
31.       this._pitchedSoundEffectsMixerPool = this.CreateSoundEffectsMixerPool();
32.     }
33.  
34.     private ObjectPool<AudioMixerGroup> CreateSoundEffectsMixerPool()
35.     {
36.       this._pitchedSoundEffectsMixerGroups.Clear();
37.       // The MasterMixer is the AudioMixer which is assigned from a serialized field of a different GameObject
38.       var matchingGroups = this._audioController.MasterMixer.FindMatchingGroups("Master/SoundEffectsSend/PitchedSoundEffectsSend/");
39.  
40.       // Filter out parent
41.       this._pitchedSoundEffectsMixerGroups.AddRange(matchingGroups.Where(group => group.name != "PitchedSoundEffectsSend"));
42.  
43.       return new ObjectPool<AudioMixerGroup>(
44.         () =>
45.         {
46.           if (this._pitchedSoundEffectsMixerProvidedCount >= this._pitchedSoundEffectsMixerGroups.Count)
47.           {
48.             throw new GameException($"Too many audio mixer groups requested from pool. Maximum is {this._pitchedSoundEffectsMixerGroups.Count}.");
49.           }
50.  
51.           return this._pitchedSoundEffectsMixerGroups[this._pitchedSoundEffectsMixerProvidedCount++];
52.         },
53.         (audioMixerGroup) => { },
54.         (audioMixerGroup) => { },
55.         audioMixerGroup => { },
56.         defaultCapacity: this._pitchedSoundEffectsMixerGroups.Count, maxSize: this._pitchedSoundEffectsMixerGroups.Count
57.       );
58.     }
59.   }
60. }

This is the audio mixer configuration:

Each exposed parameter has to have its own unique name so they can later be called to change the necessary mixer group settings. The code getting a mixer and chaning the exposed parameter looks like this:

Spoiler: Get shared audio mixer group and adjust exposed parameter

Code (CSharp):

1. var pitchedAudioMixerGroup = this._gameObjectPools.PitchedSoundEffectsMixerPool.Get();
2. someAudioSource.outputAudioMixerGroup = pitchedAudioMixerGroup;
3. var pitchParameterName = $"{pitchedAudioMixerGroup.name}.Pitch";
4.  
5. if (!this._audioController.MasterMixer.SetFloat(pitchParameterName, 1.1f))
6. {
7.   throw new Exception($"Pitch parameter '{pitchParameterName}' not found");
8. }
9.  

When no more needed the mixer should be returned to the pool.