ex2D - the best 2D sprite solution for Unity [RELEASED]

[Wu Jie]

ex2D is now available on the Asset Store for $35 .

You can also buy it in our Web Store for $25.
Source Code included license will coming soon.

Current Version: v 1.2.5 (Updated 2012.05.10)

Links

• ex2D on the Asset Store
• Official Site
• ex2D Runtime Source Code
• Online Documentation
• Online Script Reference
• Buy Pro Version

Downloads

• Get Offline Documentation
• Get Offline Script Reference
• Get Evaluation Version

FAQ

Q: Why choose ex2D?
A: 7 Reasons To Choose ex2D For Unity

Q: Where can I submit an Issue?
A: In this forum thread or in github page

Q: How can I submit an Issue?
A: Step by step to submit an issue in github

Q: Can I have the source code?
A: We only open the ex2D Runtime source code, and you can get it in github in here. If you fix any bugs in the Runtime, we really appreciate you submitting the issue and post your solution.

Changes in v 1.2.5

• New Features
  

• Changes
  
  • Remove unnecessary virtual function, use new keyword instead. (120303)
  • Change exSpriteAnimation.AddAnimation() function. Now you can dynamically add different name of the animation in this sprite (120306)
  • Add SetSprite can change default animation sprite. This is good for dynamically change sprite for reusable objects (120307)

• Bug Fix
  
  • Fix soft clipping popping problem. (120227)
  • Fix exSpriteAnimation.GetCurFrameIndex() return minus value. (120302)
  • Fix no atlas Prefab will show error when click the inspector (120303)
  • Fix exSpriteAnimation.Play( name, index ) the index frame will from start instead of from end (120309)
  • Fix exSprite prefab can't set camera to null (120313)
  • Fix rebuild prefabs report meshFilter_ error (120402)
  • Fix Layer Manager sometimes not update child transform (120422)
  • Fix prefab set renderCamera will report error for pixel-perfect component (120423)
  • Fix IsPaused will throw error when animation is not playing (120423)
  • Fix pixel perfect camera calculate wrong in perspective mode (120510)

Introduction

ex2D is a highly integrated 2D-sprite-related development extension for Unity. It aims at providing high performance 2D sprite/UI solution inside Unity, with a specific focus on creating tons of cutting-edge sprite animations and other content in complicated Unity scenes, while still maintaining great performance on mobile devices.



ex2D includes several editor class that runs as view tabs inside Unity, to help developers making 2D assets easily. They are Atlas Editor, Font Editor, SpriteAnimation Editor, the upcoming Tile Map Editor and 2D Skinning Editor. All the editors are written by C# script and directly run in Unity.

ex2D follows the Unity working pipeline standard closely. Unlike other 2D plugins in Unity which directly saves 2D resource in Components, we use the ScriptableObject to handle most of the 2D resource (Atlas, Sprite Animation, Bitmap Font, ... ). In this way, ex2D generates assets that easily reusable and manageable for content-rich projects. We also design several Components to reference these data when editing the scene and runtime scripting. Following the advanced asset listening technique in ex2D, developers will not need to worry about data out of the date, they will sync automatically.

ex2D is highly optimized for mobile devices, the code is carefully written to prevent heap allocating and produce less draw calls.

ex2D works with both the free and Pro versions of Unity! Fully tested on PC, Mac, Web, iOS and Android deveices. and produce less draw calls.



Features

Atlas Editor

• Pack textures into texture atlas in an editor window inside Unity.
• Can manually move, add and remove textures in atlas.
• Automatically detect atlas changes and apply to the scene immediately.
• Generate atlas asset under the standard of ScriptableObject in Unity.

Sprite Component

• Add this component to any GameObject to turn it into a sprite.
• You can drag and drop texture file to the Sprite Component. The Sprite Component will detect if the texture is included in any atlas asset and choose the proper asset. If the texture is not in any atlas, it will just use the original texture file.
• Scale sprites in game without breaking dynamic batching.
• Choose different Anchor position for aligning the sprites in different type of Sprite Animation.
• Support different camera direction (XY, XZ, YZ)
• Pixel Perfect render support.
• Layer system to help Designer and Artist sort out the rendering order of all sprites in the scene.
• Automatically adjust the collider size when the sprite size changed.

Sprite Animation Clip Editor

• User friendly interface.
• Scale and scroll enabled time line editor.
• Move, add, remove and insert Frame Element by dragging and dropping them directly.
• Adjustable single frame length to make animation creating more versatile.
• Support adding animation events directly in the timeline editor.
• Preview animation result in the editor.

SpriteAnimation Component

• Reference sprite animation in script by clip names.
• Provide interface to control animation state ( play, pause, stop )
• Support pause/resume animation.

Atlas Font Editor

• Support fonts export from BMfont and Hiero.
• Multiple fonts can be put together in one big texture atlas to save draw calls.
• Fonts can also be put together with other texture sprite to save draw calls.
• Manage fonts easily in atlas editor.

SpriteFont Component

• Support rendering text from Atlas Font asset and Bitmap Font asset.
• Support in game gradient color rendering (you can specify two colors for gradient and change them in runtime).
• Support in game outline rendering (outline width and color are adjustable).
• Support in game shadow rendering (offset and color are adjustable).
• Support multi-line text.

SpriteBorder Component

• Support rendering Scale9Grid texture from atlas or texture.
• Drag to resize.
• Editor to setting Scale9Grid texture.

SoftClip Component

• Clip sprite, text and other sprite type in rectangle.
• Easy to setup clip list.

Layer Manager

• A tree view layer editor helps user easily arrange and group layers.
• Can edit layer in both Prefab and GameObjects.
• Support inserting new items in a layer dynamically when running the game.

Upcoming Features

• Tile Map Editor and Tile Map working pipeline
• 2D skeleton animation editor
• 2D Skinning editor
• 2D GUI editor

Researching

• Working pipeline for multiple resolution.
• Export the 2D scenes and assets in xml and json file formation.
• Load the exported xml/json file in Cocoa2D.
• Load the exported xml/json file in Web-Browser(Html5).

[nantas]

UPDATED with new video

Introduction of new features since 1.1.0





Please checkout the video tutorials to get an idea how easy it is to create professional looking sprite content with ex2D

[jeedee]

Good job guys!

[ChezDoodles]

This is brilliant!
Simple to use and setup - and very cheap!

Would be even better with a clipper (2d rectangle) object. This would enable me to use this for long scrolling text, scrolling lists, etc - necessary for more advanced GUI functions!

[Wu Jie]

This is brilliant!
Simple to use and setup - and very cheap!

Would be even better with a clipper (2d rectangle) object. This would enable me to use this for long scrolling text, scrolling lists, etc - necessary for more advanced GUI functions!

@ChezDoodles: Thank you for your comment. About the clipper, I already add it in the ex2D roadmap, two features are coming up in the future:

* Scale9Grid
* Soft clip rect

So with these two basic function, you can build your own GUI system through ex2D.

[p6r]

An evaluation version is always fantastic ! Thanks jwu !!!
And a so low price for all users ! Incredible !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It's so easy to combine ex2D and the Timeline of Unity3D to create a non-linear path for this horse :



6R

[ChezDoodles]

About the clipper, I already add it in the ex2D roadmap, two features are coming up in the future:
* Scale9Grid
* Soft clip rect
So with these two basic function, you can build your own GUI system through ex2D.

Fantastic!
I own EZ-GUI and iGUI (and everything GUI-related on the Unity3D AssetStore) - but I have never really used any of those for production. This is the first GUI extension simple and focused enough to make me feel 100% in control after just a few hours, yet advanced enough that it makes sense to replace my own homegrown GUI...

Looking forward to the clip rect : )

[ayrik]

This is great! Good job on everything. I am really glad to see that you are utilizing the Unity methods of doing things, it really feels like something built right into the engine. We are purchasing this right now, thanks for making such an awesome tool. Also, I am excited to see what your UI system will be like!

[nantas]

An evaluation version is always fantastic ! Thanks jwu !!!
And a so low price for all users ! Incredible !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It's so easy to combine ex2D and the Timeline of Unity3D to create a non-linear path for this horse :

6R

Good stuff Philippe!

Looking forward to more!

[2Dsprite.com]

I am trying the evaluation version before buying, and I absolutely love it... except one problem. It almost doubles the time it takes for me to make atlases, which is too long because of how many atlases I have to make.



I am trying to build 2048x2048 sprite sheets from 512x512 images (lots of them-- 20-40)

50% chance Unity will crash on trying to build an Atlas, but after a reload it's usually a success. So it always crashes first time, then doesn't second time I try.

This is extremely inconvenient, especially when these crashes messing up the atlases to where it still thinks the images are not atlased when I try to animate them (even after a successful atlas build, if it crashes later on a different atlas it can mess it up).

I am so frustrated, but I love this program.

I really wish there was a way to automatically create atlases based on images inside a folder.
If it was, it would be so easy! Even better, if I could get it to create atlases AND animations based on the ending name of _000 to _634, that would be even better. I'd be willing to pay for it if it wasn't too much (I'm sure it would be).
My naming convention of all my image files are already very organized (_000 to _040 is Idle, _041 is Walk, etc.) and I have to do this for every character, equipment, etc. PitA to have to manually create all the atlases and animations when they will be identical in organized folder and naming convention _###.

Would it be hard for an amateur programmer to make a script which does what I'm asking?

[Wu Jie]

I am trying the evaluation version before buying, and I absolutely love it... except one problem. It almost doubles the time it takes for me to make atlases, which is too long because of how many atlases I have to make.



I am trying to build 2048x2048 sprite sheets from 512x512 images (lots of them-- 20-40)

50% chance Unity will crash on trying to build an Atlas, but after a reload it's usually a success. So it always crashes first time, then doesn't second time I try.

This is extremely inconvenient, especially when these crashes messing up the atlases to where it still thinks the images are not atlased when I try to animate them (even after a successful atlas build, if it crashes later on a different atlas it can mess it up).

I am so frustrated, but I love this program.

I really wish there was a way to automatically create atlases based on images inside a folder.
If it was, it would be so easy! Even better, if I could get it to create atlases AND animations based on the ending name of _000 to _634, that would be even better. I'd be willing to pay for it if it wasn't too much (I'm sure it would be).
My naming convention of all my image files are already very organized (_000 to _040 is Idle, _041 is Walk, etc.) and I have to do this for every character, equipment, etc. PitA to have to manually create all the atlases and animations when they will be identical in organized folder and naming convention _###.

Would it be hard for an amateur programmer to make a script which does what I'm asking?

Hello 2Dsprite, I will go check memory problem! Some of my customer report this, too. I think I got a way to solve it.
For dragging a folder to Atlas Editor, I'm working on it.

About the naming to animation, I think it is not quite generic so ex2D will not add a solution for it. I can see it is a specific working pipeline in your studio. So my answer is for writing a special script in Editor, it can be done. Aslo I don't think it has any difficulty.

[2Dsprite.com]

Hello 2Dsprite, I will go check memory problem! Some of my user report this, too. I think I got a way to solve it.
For dragging a folder to Atlas Editor, I'm working on it.

About the naming to animation, I think it is not quite generic so ex2D will not add a solution for it. I can see it is a specific working pipeline in your studio. So my answer is for writing a special script in Editor, it can be done. Aslo I don't think it has any difficulty.

Thanks! I notice it does the memory problem when I just browser using the Atlas & Animation Clip editors. I don't have to even click anything, if I view the files with either of those two windows open, it kills the memory. So I think it might have to do with all the images being viewed in the editor's window. Hope that helps.

Thanks for the help.

[SoulWind]

Thanks! I notice it does the memory problem when I just browser using the Atlas & Animation Clip editors. I don't have to even click anything, if I view the files with either of those two windows open, it kills the memory. So I think it might have to do with all the images being viewed in the editor's window. Hope that helps.

Thanks for the help.

In fact at the first time you browser a gameobject which attach a sprite component, it seems that ex2D will read all the picture file you add in atlas editor, and store all image in memory.
So the more atlas you build the more memory you need to store images

[nantas]

In fact at the first time you browser a gameobject which attach a sprite component, it seems that ex2D will read all the picture file you add in atlas editor, and store all image in memory.
So the more atlas you build the more memory you need to store images

We are aware of this issue. With the next update (should be pretty soon!) unnecessary textures will be unloaded soon enough to prevent problem.

Thanks for the feedback!

[badawe]

Guy i need backup!

I don't know what is going on, but all my Sprites now are pixelated!? Check this out:

Before:


And now:



Someone know what is going on?!

[nantas]

Hi badawe，

I'm not sure exactly what cause the problem but you can run the following check:

1. Open your atlas texture file in Photoshop or other picture viewer tool, see if it looks alright.
2. Select atlas texture file in Unity project folder, look at the preview of Inspector window. See if the dimension of texture is the same as what you set up in Atlas Editor.
3. If the atlas texture is fine. Check your camera setting and viewport setting, make sure you have selected the correct camera and viewport size.
4. Select your sprite in the scene. See if you have enabled UsePixelPerfect and has the scale of the sprite modified? Try to set up the scale to 1,1 and see if it helps.

If you have gone through all above checks and still got the same result. Please send us a mail: studio@abitgames.com with more details about your scene set up.

Thanks!

[badawe]

1 - Yeah, looks fine on Photoshop!
2 - Yeah, looks right to: 2048 x 2048!
3 - My camera its ok to: Is orthographic and size is 384 for the 1024x760 resolution. Works fine untill this.
4 - Its not UsePixelPerfect and try to change the scale, but don't work too.


I try the project on iPad and everything looks fine! Only in the Editor and Play looks pixelated. Anyone have this problem too?

[Wu Jie]

Thanks! I notice it does the memory problem when I just browser using the Atlas & Animation Clip editors. I don't have to even click anything, if I view the files with either of those two windows open, it kills the memory. So I think it might have to do with all the images being viewed in the editor's window. Hope that helps.

Thanks for the help.

@2Dsprite.com, @SoulWind.

Hello all, I have solve the big memory problem. Instead of loading all Atlas in AtlasDB for cache, I use GUID instead. In this way, it only increase memory in editing Atlas and those texture used in the scene.

I have submitted my fixes to Unity Asset Store, and will available in v1.0.1 b2. I also update the Evaluate version so people who didn't buy the production can also test it.

You can download the new Evaluation version here

For more detail about the upgraded version, check the my Change Log

Enjoy!

[Wu Jie]

1 - Yeah, looks fine on Photoshop!
2 - Yeah, looks right to: 2048 x 2048!
3 - My camera its ok to: Is orthographic and size is 384 for the 1024x760 resolution. Works fine untill this.
4 - Its not UsePixelPerfect and try to change the scale, but don't work too.


I try the project on iPad and everything looks fine! Only in the Editor and Play looks pixelated. Anyone have this problem too?

Hello badawe,

Can you give me more details, like what is your Texture settings, Render settings in your project. Or if possible, please send me an example project with this problem. That help me a lot.

Thanks in advance.

[badawe]

jwu!

The only thing seens to work is export the hole project as package and import in a new one =/