Scripts & Tools – De Environment

Scripts & Tools Overview

Documentation about DE tools & integration with 3rd party systems.

Table of Content

Global Controller

Open – DE Environment Global Controller

Vertex colors control a single type of wind movement per vertex channels RGB

windZone.windMain != WindStrength
(R) Red: = main wind
0 value = no bending
1 value = full bending

windZone.windPulseFrequency != WindPulse
(G) Green: = randomness / variation

windZone.windTurbulence != windTurbulence
(B) Blue: = turbulence

Global Controller can either be attached by script, add component on a game object, or by opening the Unity dropdown menu: Window/ DE Environment / Tools / Add Global Controller

Important: when using cut-out and surface shader together on the same model the wind influence values should be matched up to same values in order to have correct wind applied thru the entire model

DE Environment Global Controller

Wind Controller __
Snow Controller __
Rain Controller __
Water Controller __

Synch with Wind Zone: 
enables or disables in scene wind gizmo

Wind Settings:
Wind Zone: unity wind zone component
Strength: main global wind strength
Turbulence: shivering of the leaves
Pulse Frequency: wave speed
Randomness: randomness in wind settings

Billboard Wind Settings:
Enable Billboard Wind: impact on billboards
Strength: main global wind strength on billboard

Global Properties – Wind

NAME	PROPERTY NAME	VALUE	NOTE
Main Wind Intensity	_Global_Wind_Main_Intensity	Float	Range NA (default = 0.01)
Main Wind Direction	_Global_Wind_Main_Direction	Float	Range NA (default = 0)
Main Wind Random Offset	_Global_Wind_Main_RandomOffset	Float	Range NA (default = 0)
Main Wind Pulse Magnitude	_Global_Wind_Main_Pulse	Float	Range NA (default = 10)
Main Wind Turbulence	_Global_Wind_Main_Turbulence	Float	Range NA (default = 0.01)

Enabled Billboard Wind	_Global_Wind_Billboard_Enabled	Int	0=Off 1=Active (default = 0)
Billboard Wind	_Global_Wind_Billboard_Intensity	Float	Range 0~1 (default = 0)

Enabled Cloth Wind	_Global_Wind_Cloth_Enabled	Int	0=Off 1=Active (default = 0)
Cloth Wind Intensity	_Global_Wind_Cloth_Intensity	Float	Range 0~2 (default = 1)

Enabled Water Wind	_Global_Wind_Water_Enabled	Int	0=Off 1=Active (default = 0)

Enabled Fade Wind Distance	_Global_Wind_Main_DistanceFade_Enabled	Int	0=Off 1= ActiveFadeOut 2= ActiveFadeIn (Default =0)
Fade Wind Distance	_Global_Wind_Main_DistanceFade_Bias	Float	Default = 0

Global Properties – Snow

NAME	PROPERTY NAME	VALUE	NOTE
Enabled Global Snow	_Global_Snow_Enabled	Int	0=Off 1=Active (default = 0)
Snow Intensity Top Down	_Global_Snow_Intensity_TopDown	Float	Range 0~10 (default = 1)
Snow Intensity Bottom Up	_Global_Snow_Intensity_BottomUp	Float	Range 0~10 (default = 1)

Global Properties – Rain

NAME	PROPERTY NAME	VALUE	NOTE
Enabled Global Rain	_Global_Rain_Enabled	Int	0=Off 1=Active (default = 0)
Rain Intensity	_Global_Rain_Intensity	Float	Range 0~10 (default = 1)
Rain Wetness	_Global_Rain_Wetness	Float	Range 0~1 (default = 0)

Mesh Tools Overview

Open – DE Environment Mesh Tools

MESH OPTIMIZATION

Repair poor or damaged vertex tangents
Repair poor or damaged vertex normals

WIND VERTEX COLOR

Bake vertex wind animation into models thru vertex color

AMBIENT OCCLUSION

Bake ambient occlusion AO into mesh thru vertex color

Opening the Unity dropdown menu:
Window/ DE Environment / Tools / Open Mesh Tool

Mesh Optimization

Mesh optimization tool is useful for repairing poor or damaged vertex tangents and or vertex normal that are required for proper lighting and rendering in Unity

BEFORE

UNITY NATURE SHADER

VERTEX NORMALS

VERTEX TANGENTS

AFTER

UNITY NATURE SHADER

VERTEX NORMALS

VERTEX TANGENTS

Visually Correct Environment Lighting

BEFORE

AFTER WITH DE SHADERS

Processing Object Selection:
Active Game Object:
Active Selection:

Preview Game Objects:
Preview Type: select preview in scene for selected game objects seeing changes in Realtime for Vertex Color, Vertex Normal, Vertex Tangent and or Ambient Occlusion. selection of default will return game object to its original shaders

Load Default Shaders: returns preview type to its original shader

Operations:
Normal Smoothing Angle: 60° tolerance is good for most applications

Recalculation:
Tangents: repairs vertex tangents
Normal: repairs vertex normal
Normal & Tangents: recalculates tangents and normal steps together

Baking Vertex Color

Wind Vertex Color

Wind vertex color tool is useful for repairing or adding wind in 3rd party vegetation

BEFORE

AFTER

Processing Object Selection:
Active Game Object:

Load Default Shaders: returns preview type to its original shader

Sub Mesh Options:

Settings:
Main Bending Strength = Vertex Color Red (R)
Random Strength = Vertex Color Green (G)
Tumbling Strength = Vertex Color Blue (B)

On each sub mesh users may additionally re bake or reset selected sub mesh individually if needed with B (Bake) or R (Reset) selections

Operations:
Recalculate Vertex Color: bakes vertex color into model
Reset Vertex Color: resets vertex RGB color to white

Baking AO

Ambient Occlusion

Mesh ambient occlusion tool is useful for baking AO into mesh and FBX models

BEFORE

AFTER

Processing Object Selection:
Active Game Object:
Active Selection:

Load Default Shaders: returns preview type to its original shader

Settings:
Samples:
Minimum Range:
Maximum Range:
Intensity:

Operations:
Recalculate Ambient Occlusion: bakes ambient occlusion into vertex color Alpha channels
Reset Ambient Occlusion: resets vertex Alpha color to white

Texture Combiner

Open – DE Environment Texture Combiner

Opening the Unity dropdown menu: 
Window/ DE Environment / Tools / Open Texture Combiner

Texture Combiner
Texture combiner tool is a simple channel packer to support mask texture creation

DE Environment Texture Combiner

Preview Texture: simple preview of the final texture
Texture Output Size: 128/256/512/1024/2048/4096
Type: help guide to identify what type textures to add in RGBA slots
Save: save final texture to file location

Input Channel: mapping channel from source texture if needed
Output Channel: mapping channel to final texture if needed

Note: DE Environment shaders use sampler states target set as repeat trilinear filtering for performance reasons.

When importing (non-color textures) packed mask textures should be set in Unity to Linear/RGB instead of sRGB color space as sRGB on non-color textures could result in visually wrong looking materials.

DE Environment texture suffix key:
_D = Albedo
_N = Normal
_S = Smoothness
_AO = Ambient Occlusion
_M = Metallic
_R = Roughness
_G = Gloss
_H = Height
_E = Emissive
_T = Translucency
_Mask DE = (R) Ambient Occlusion (B) Roughness /Smoothness (G) Metallic /Gloss

Sinespace

Connecting DE Global Controller with SineSpace

Important: This module is only available when Sinespace is installed in project

(1) Press – Add new scripting Runtime script
(2) Press – Add Attached Scripting Runtime script

When scripting runtime is attached no additional Sinespace setup is required

TVE Converter

Open – TVE Prefab Converter

Compatibility
Requires installation 3rd party asset The Vegetation Engine version 3.0.1 or higher

TVE CONVERTER
Applies DE Environment shaders directly on prefabs working seamlessly with TVE The Vegetation Engine

DE Vegetation presets:

DE Cutout Wind Translucency
DE Surface Wind Simple
DE Billboard Wind

DE Static Prop presets:

DE Surface Simple

Step 01: Add TVE Manager in scene

Step 02: Select prefab and open TVE prefab converter

Step 03: Set conversion preset applicable to your asset and convert
(Example: for Mtree set as tools/Mtree/Vegetation)

Step 04: Set conversion override to DE Vegetation or DE Static Object

Billboard Generator

Note: This tool is under development and will be available soon!