SUIMONO 2.0 - Interactive Water System

Hi there,

Great project.

1. Any tips for improving performance of Suimono?
2. Can I adjust the detail distance somehow? I am building a strategy game and I want the foam visible from a great height.
3. Do I need pro for reflections?
4. Some details in the settings reset when I play the scene. Why is this?

Thanks

 

@KnifeMedia

1. Performance can be optimized a bit by paying attention to the reflection settings (on the surface object) and also the transparency settings (on the module object). The fewer layers you set these objects to render the less intensive suimono will be. That being said, there are also some additional optimizations coming version 2.1.1.

2) In the current version foam distance cannot be increased. However this has been updated in 2.1.1 and foam view distance will now be as far as your camera distance. 2.1.1 should be ready soon, I suggest you register your purchase on the TanukiDigital website to get access to it as soon as it's released... http://www.tanukidigital.com/suimono/index.php?register=1

3) As long as you're using Unity 5, you don't need pro for reflections. All suimono functions should now work the same regardless of unity or unity pro.

4) This is probably because you have a specific preset set (check the presets tab on your surface). When you play the scene it will automatically load whatever preset is selected. You can set this to "none" and then edit settings without them being overridden on play, however what I recommend is to play the scene, and change settings while it's playing. You can then create a new preset with your current settings before you press stop. Not all water settings update properly when the scene isn't being played.

 

Always good to hear.
We desperately need more performance options from Suimono and Tenkoko ... specially on the basic end - for lower end PC's.

 

Great, everything works fine now.

Thanks

 

I'm still having trouble with the particle effects.

1) I have "Emit at Surface" checked, the the particles are emitted at the base/origin of the character. Looks weird to have splashes/bubbles a meter underwater. How do I force them to be near the surface?

2) I have just one particle fx set up for the character, for Splashes, but at runtime, the Ripples effect is also instantiated. Oddly, it IS at the surface.

3) I have two rules on the fx object: "Object speed is greater than: 2" and "Object is underwater." However, that second effect, the ripples, plays even when the character is stationary.

4) The actually-set-up-fx (Splashes) sometimes plays even when the character is out of/above the water plane (on slightly sloping land above the water, so clearly/visibly out of the water). Is there a way to add an vertical offset to prevent this from happening?

5) Sometimes if the character goes in and out of water a number of times, the particles just stop appearing anymore.

EDIT: Okay, more: I need to have the camera in Forward rendering for lower quality levels, and that creates two problems:

6) I have "Dynamic Reflections" deselected, and yet there is still a reflection of the terrain around the water. But when the camera pivots, the whole reflection pivots around as well, in a very unnatural way. Hard to describe, except that it's pivoting on a single point.

7) I'm using FurFX shaders and had trouble with depth sorting until I switched to Deferred Rendering. But now that I need to have Forward for some settings, I'm back with this problem -- the character mesh is drawn in front of the water, rather then the water being drawn in front of the parts of the mesh that are underwater. Did you have any more suggestions on that? I"m using FurFX's v3 shaders.

(Again, I'm stuck on 2.0.06 for Unity 4.6.8)

thanks much!
Dave

 

Hi @chingwa !
I just bought your plugin and I have a lot of trouble using it.

I've followed your instructions:
- Drop Suimono_Module on my scene: Check
- Drop Suimono_Surface on my scene: Check

I've put the surface into a prefab, which I instantiate at run-time.
- Launch the game, everything is working
- Tweaking the prefab values, I've created a new preset and after tweaking it I applied changes (by clicking on + button on the preset?)
- Stop the game
- Retrieve my prefab and set the profile to my surface
- Launch again

And then I have a lot of errors in console (file attached)

And my water turns to a simple colored plane.

What am I doing wrong? Thanks !

 

@cayouMontreal Thank you for your purchase! Just to double check that the surface object is part of a prefab, and the module object is NOT in a prefab and is just part of your scene correct?

I haven't done much testing with stacking the surface prefab into another prefab. In theory it should work, though the suimono_surface prefab is set to unlink itself from it's prefab connection once it's in the scene. I don't know if this would give you issues in your project but it shouldn't be causing the errors you're seeing.

Instead of making it a part of a new prefab, can you instead just instantiate the original suimono_surface prefab? Do the errors continue to happen if you just add the module and surface directly to your scene? Also, are there other objects in your scene that aren't instantiated until play, such as the game camera? If so then you need to make sure the module object is updated with the camera reference before the surface is instantiated.

And yes, pressing the + button next to the prefab will update it with your current settings. This works regardless of whether scene is currently playing.

 

@gecko
1) the particles should be emitting at the surface when that option is checked. However if your player object is on the "water" layer then the surface detection position might be getting confused? Your water surface is on the "water" layer correct? Do you get any errors in your console? I can't think of another reason why the surface position would fail. (edit see 4-5 below)

2 - 3) Going back and testing my version 2.0.06 under Unity 4 it seems like there is a bug with the ripples, as I don't see them at all. This was fixed somewhere w/2.1. Hmmm. There's no chance there's another object w/ripples somewhere in your scene correct?

4-5) There is no "offset" setting, but you can just change the position of the object to be lower. This is a bad hack for this situation though. This reminds me of another possible issue where the calculations may be getting blown off by the water scale. Can you confirm your water surface Y-scale is set to 1.0? If it isn't then it should be. The x and z can be whatever size you want, but they Y should be 1.0. Later versions set this automatically, so I didn't think about this possibility until now.

6) This sounds like an artifact... perhaps turning off dynamic reflections on the surface AND on the module (under performance settings) will help?

7) I haven't done much further testing with fur effects, unfortunately. I couldn't figure out what to change in the 3.0 shaders to get them to combine properly like some of the older shaders.

 

Thanks for the reply. I finally figured out most of this:

1) Particles not emitting at surface. Okay, I solved this one -- I had moved the FX object in the character hierarchy previously, and so the water-surface offset was adding to my own offset. Whew!

4) I thought that the fx objects were either particles or audio. But apparently each one is always both? So I had created one of each, but apparently the other half of each of those was also doing its thing, and hence some mysterious results. Now that I've properly set up each half of each object, the particles start/stop just perfectly.

6) Dynamic reflections are unselected on Suimono Module and all Suimono Surface objects. And when I toggle it on, what I see is nothing like I'm talking about -- which is more a reflection in a convex mirror, enlarging the reflected terrain and skybox. Aha! WHen I toggle "Use UV Reversal" then it's fixed! But have to have different setting on that toggle for Deferred vs. Forward rendering. How do we access that toggle via script, to tie it into our quality levels?

7) I can't get any FurFX shader to do proper depth-sorting with Suimono -- I've tried Mobile as well as the main versions 1,2,3. You've seen it work with some of those shaders?

thanks!

 

Thanks for your quick answer !
I'll try to simply use the surface on the scene directly.
There is A LOT of objects that are instantiating after launching the scene as the game is procedurally generated but the Main Camera is already on scene at start.
I'll give it a try, your plugin is what we need for one of our environment, I'll do my best to make it working !

(If you want to check the game where I'm working on, it's called Subaeria )

 

Alright, it seems working if I use directly the surface on the scene.
My guess is if you're touching parameters like depth calculation, reflection, tessellation, while running the game it will break the system. I'm not sure as I don't have a lot of time for testing it, but that's my guess.

Oh, and I don't need to use your system all the time (depending on the current environment), right now I'm deactivating the surface game object when I don't need it. Can I deactivate the module too (it seems taking resources for nothing if I don't need it) ? On the same playthrough the player will navigate between different environments while remaining on the same scene, so I will toggle those gameobject at runtime.
Do you think this is the best strategy?

Thanks !

 

@cayouMontreal Yes You should be able to deactivate the module when you don't need it. However make sure that the module is re-enabled BEFORE you enable or instantiate your surface objects. The various parameters should be changeable during play... if you do run into any trouble with these let me know.

@gecko Should be able to acces by setting up a reference to the module object like so...

Code (CSharp):

1. var moduleObject : SuimonoModule;
2.  
3. function Start(){
4. moduleObject = GameObjectt.Find("Suimono_Module").GetComponent(SuimonoModule);
5. }
6.  
7. function Update(){
8. moduleObject.useUVReversal = false;
9. }

I've seen certain furfx shaders work... I'll have to go back and check them in 2.0.06.

 

Alright, thanks !
Just to warn you, on the script fx_causticobject.js you are setting the seed to a value (position of the object).
This created for us an issue where all of random generated labyrinths were exactly the same on every playthrough.
I just commented out the line to prevent the side effect.

This might happen to other projects, it seems quite dangerous to change the seed on a plugin...

Cheers !

 

@cayouMontreal Ah yes, good catch! Sorry about that! This has been changed for the next update, in fact there's a whole new caustics system coming which features better rendering features and improved performance. (and no more pesky seed changes)

I recommend heading over to my website and registering your asset store purchase as this will give you notification and access to the updates as soon as they become available, rather than waiting for them to be approved for the asset store. (which can take weeks) If you're interested you can register here: http://www.tanukidigital.com/suimono/index.php?register=1

 

Thanks, that works! However, in the process, the Suimono Module got messed up and lost a bunch of references. I think I should just reinstall it...but can I do that without losing my presets?

EDIT: Never mind: RTFM, eh?

 

@gecko Go into the Suimono/Resources folder and make a backup of the 3 preset .txt files to another location. After you reinstall, simply copy those back into the resources folder and it should reload your custom presets. (you might need to restart Unity after?)

 

thanks for the quick reply -- that's even faster than looking up the answer in the manual!

 

I will take a look, but as I don't want to break the game, I update plugin when I REALLY need it (blocking issue).
For example, the version of NGUI in our game is approx 1.5 years old

 

I deleted and reinstalled Suimono, and all is good -- except now, even using my old presets, I can't get any transparency in the water with Deferred Rendering. The Transparency slider does nothing, nor does adjusting the alpha on the Survade Blend/Overlay colors. I'm on 2.0.06 so there's no setting for transparency on the Module. How do I adjust it? (I used to have transparency...)

 

@gecko Make sure the 'Unity Version Target' setting is set to one of the "pro" modes. In 2.0.06 (Unity4) the non-pro modes don't allow transparency.

 

Yeah, it's already set to Unity Pro.

 

Hmmm. Can you click on the SUIMONO-Surface-->Suimono-Object game object and make sure that it's using one of the pro shaders? It should either be "water_pro" or "water_pro_dx11".

 

Yeah, it's set to Water_Pro.

Could I pay you for some Skype screen-sharing assistance?

 

I just came searching for the same issue that @DesertRaven posted about back in April. Is the sound controller something you are considering possibly updating? Would be awesome if it could have some type of "Distance from shore" parameter so we could have the sound fade as we get further from shore to eventually fade out totally when we reach that distance inland.

 

@gecko I'll send you a PM.

@Shawn67 I agree that the sound controller could use some updating, specifically for the reasons you describe. However this particular subject (determining how far away from the water "edge" that you are) is very scene dependent and not something I can adequately determine in a third-party project.

I would suggest that instead of using the global sound controller in Suimono to play above-water/shoreline sounds, you could instead use a number of normal Unity sound objects, placing them near the shoreline in your scene so they overlap slightly. You could then edit the falloff as best suits your scene.

I think this would work better than anything that I could build into suimono... sure it involves a bit of setup for each of your scenes, but you'll get much better results this way I'm sure.

 

Hello All,

I'm posting to let you all know that a preview version of the upcoming Suimono version 2.1.1 is now ready for download...

Download Here: http://www.tanukidigital.com/download

While the final version of 2.1.1 is nearing completion, I thought it best to go ahead and put out this preview for those who are interested in seeing what's coming up, as well as get some feedback and bug/compatability reports before moving on to the final release version. Version 2.1.1 is a large release and incorporates many changes and new features. I know many of you have been waiting a long time and I apologize for all the delays. This has been a complicated process, but I think the updates will be beneficial to all and ultimately worth the extra time.

A NOTE ABOUT INSTALLATION:
Since this is a major upgrade it's recommended to delete your current Suimono scene objects, and then completely delete the Suimono folder in the Project list before installing this update. Also as you'll see below in the notes the Preset system has changed format. This means that your current presets will not work and will have to be recreated in the new system (sorry!) The new preset system is more flexible though, and is much more forgiving for these types of changes going forward. You also now have the ability to easily backup and share individual presets, simply by trading the .txt preset files located in the Resource folder.

CHANGES TO SETUP PROCESS:
The setup process is the same as before, but with the addition of step 4 and 5 below.

1. Drag the SUIMONO_Module prefab into your scene.
2. Drag the SUIMONO_Surface prefab into your scene.
3. Add your main scene camera to the 'scene camera object' slot on the module.
4. (NEW!) Add your main scene directional light to the 'scene light object' slot on the module.
5. (NEW!) Go to your scene camera object and add the Suimono Underwater Effect component by going to Component-->Image Effects-->Suimono-->UnderwaterFX

Also note that on first install, Suimono 2.1.1 adds a few new layers to your project. These are used for specific effects and Suimono Surfaces now uses these instead of the built-in 'water' layer.


WHAT'S NEW IN 2.1.1:
There are countless updates and changes that have been made to improve the system, but below I will go through the major changes and additions.

• Completely rewritten water shader and wave effects.
• Water surface waves can now be modulated based on Beaufort wave scale (0-12), from still to calm to stormy.
• New Underwater Effect, now contained in an Image Effect component that get's added to camera.
• Improved Edge Blending effects. Water surfaces now blend correctly at the edges, including foam, depth, caustics, and refraction giving a much more natural look to the water.
• New Caustic system with better performance and more realistic rendering. Can optionally be modulated by color and light direction based on the scene light object. Also can now be activated/color tinted on a per-water surface basis.
• ReWritten Preset system. Each preset is now contained within it's own file, which can be backed up (and shared!) as needed. This is a more more stable and flexible compared to the previous system. However, If you use custom presets, they will need to be reformulated.
• New Shoreline system. Setting up where you want shoreline waves and foam to be generated is now customizable with the new 'ShorelineObject' prefab. See notes below for setup instructions.
• New Integrated normals displacement/refraction effects, most notably on the ripple effect.
• New Trail system allows for water displacement and foam trail/wake effects. See demo character for example. (still work-in-progress)
• Improved foam rendering. Edge foam now blends properly with shoreline and other objects and renders into the distance.
• Improved Buoyancy and GetHeight() performance, allowing more concurrent function calls without dragging down system performance.
• Improved performance and stability. My tests here have seen a 10fps performance increase (depending on scene/settings) and is also much more stable with far less random and allocated GC spiking.
• Graphics auto-switching. Dx9 and Dx11 versions are now determined automatically and should switch based on the computer and Unity settings automatically. This should remove most instances of "pink" water due to the wrong shaders being loaded.
• Rendering Parity between Forward/Deferred/Legacy Deferred.

STILL TO-DO:

• Preset-to-preset transitions have been temporarily disabled. This feature will be ready in the final 2.1.1 version.
• Move water transition screen effects (splash/droplets) to the On-Camera UnderwaterFX component for better compositing.
• Finalize the trail/wake system. (still needs some rendering error fixes and custom UI/Options).
• Improved height-wave foam rendering.

SETTING UP NEW SHORELINE SYSTEM:
The new ShorelineObject prefab determines where you want shoreline to render in your scene. You can place as many shoreline objects into your scene as you wish, and they can be scaled and rotated to fit your terrain and objects. There is a sample shorelineObject setup in the demo scene for guidance. I should have better instructions available in the documentation pdf and a demonstration setup video soon.

1. drag a ShorelineObject prefab into your scene.
2. drag the Suimono Surface you want it to affect onto the 'Attach to surface' slot.
3. press the 'Debug Mode' button to show the shoreline rendering limits.
4. use normal unity controls to scale and rotate the object until it fits the terrain/objects in your scene.
5. adjust the sliders to control depth rendering (red is the wave area, and green is the shoreline)
6. when you're done editing, uncheck the 'Debug Mode' button again.

WHEW! That's a lot to write (and read!). For those who are brave enough to jump in and test out this preview I'm very interested in hearing what you think overall, and how this update performs for you. As you guys are testing I'll be putting the final touches onto 2.1.1 and updating the documentation with all these new changes. I also plan to create a setup video of how to incorporate suimono and the new shoreline system into your projects.

As always, let me know if you have problems/questions/feedback etc, either by email or on the forums!

All the best,
Justin Kellis
Tanuki Digital

 

Hi. I'm testing 2.1.1 it looks beautiful but I just wanted to let you know that the new layers interfere with UFPS.

 

@reocwolf really? what's happening on your end?

 

UFPS uses a 2 camera set up. It renders the weapon with the 2nd camera and uses 2 layers that are replaced by the new suimono ones. Which means that some suimono layers will be rendered by the 2nd camera.

BTW IDK why this is happening. I turned off reflections, the 2nd camera etc. and it keeps happening. Is it something to do with the rendering order?

 

On another note, UFPS now works better with suimono out of the box when entering the water. But this happens when camera is mid water, which I guess is part of the same issue above. I'm going to do another projec and import both assets differently to see what happens.

 

2.1.1 is going crazy!
It's an improvement at all fronts, looks better, runs faster, incredible amount of changes, features and optimizations!
Thanks Justin!!!

 

@reocwolf Hmm. It's possible that we're both trying to access the same layers. I purposely selected the end of the layers array thinking "surely noone will ever need these layers here". Looks like I might have been wrong. I'll look into building an auto-check so that it will first make sure those layers aren't already occupied. In the meantime you can open the SuimonoModule.js file and edit the below layer number starting on line 11...

Code (CSharp):

1. //layers
2. var layerWater : String;
3. var layerWaterNum : int = 29;
4. var layerDepth : String;
5. var layerDepthNum : int = 30;
6. var layerScreenFX : String ;
7. var layerScreenFXNum : int = 31;

Instead of 29,30, and 31, try setting these lower... 21,22,23 for example. You may need to try deleting your current suimono layers first, then edit the above code. It looks like you're screenshots are probably related to this issue, but let me know if you continue to see weirdness.

@MS80 Ah that's great to hear!!!

 

it keeps replacing layers 29-31. I guess there is another line of code that gets the tagmanager to change those specific layers.

 

line 470?

 

Try removing the Suimono_Module and Suimono_Surface from your scene... delete the suimono layers from your layers list... edit the code numbers above... and then re-add the module and then the surface to your scene?

The layers are set to only initialize once, so it probably just isn't updating the new code until the module get's re-added.

 

The only thing that worked was deleting the script from the module prefab and re-applying it before putting it in the scene. And then the water looks like this. All the other issues are gone though.


UPDATE: Ok so I made a Ground layer and put the terrain on it. Then went to the SuimonoModule and under Water Transparency I set the rendering layer to Ground.

 

How Suimono works with multiple water sources? If I want to make lots of lakes in one scene, will it work fine? What about performance?

 

Hi montyfi,
Suimono is intended for use with multiple water sources. This is one of the reasons there are two components in the system... the 'module' object does much of the heavy lifting (especially in the latest 2.1.1 preview version) and then the 'surface' object(s) inherit much of the calculations done on the module. You should be able to add as many surface objects as you like.

 

I grabbed the latest one, I still see reflections disappearing sometimes as i move around, any new tips for this?

 

Hi, I was trying the last preview but dont' work in deferred in my 5.2.1p4 only in forward e legacy deferred...

 

Hi @chingwa - I've created a flat plane surface type, set the scale, however when I travel beyond this scale I get the Caustic FX beyond this scale on the terrain. Any ideas?

 

@julianr this sounds like theres a setup issue somewhere, as you should only be seeing caustics when viewed through the water surface. It might be a layer issue, as suimono adds some additional layers to your project which it relies on for effects like this. Are you perchance using UFPS, or another asset in your project that automatically adds layers?
EDIT: Sorry, just to confirm, what version of Suimono are you using? I recommend upgrading to 2.1.1 preview (available to registered users from my website) if you haven't already, as it has some major improvements to caustics.

@ThunderTruck Not working in deferred? Can you describe what happens, or post a screenshot? Is the water just invisible?

@radiantboy I thought this bug was fixed. I'll take a look at tit again. Does it matter if you're using deferred/forward etc? Does it only occur while at the edge of a water surface, or is it seemingly random?

 

In Unity 5.2.1p4 the normals simply not appear like in picture...
If I disable HDR from "cam_SuimonoNormals" works as espected.
This, in a clean project with Unity 5.2.1p4 win64 dx11...
Instead in Unity 5.3b3 all works fine...

 

Ahh, so it's the camera settings on the SuimonoNormals? I'll do some tests here... it's possible I'll just disable this through code to avoid future issues. Thanks!

 

Regarding that problem I had with a weird reflection on the water surface in Forward rendering: It works on some computers to toggle "Use UV Reversal" ...but turns out, on other computers, that doesn't fix it. (Presumably it would look correct without that toggled on. So that's very frustrating. There's no way to automate that--somehow determine whether it should be toggled on or off automatically? The only other thing I can think of is to put a toggle in the Game Settings, but boy, that's clunky.

 

@gecko If you haven't already, I recommend trying the current 2.1.1 preview version if you have time. The whole 'use uv reversal' issue is now deprecated and as much as I have been able to test and get reports, rendering should now be the same between forward/deferred/legacy etc.

 

i'm stuck on 2.0.06 (and unity 4.6.x)

 

@gecko Ah yes, sorry I forgot that. The uv reversal was created specifically because forward render have some inconsistencies when used with other unity settings... either camera effects, or anti-aliasing settings, which distort the uv deconstruction coordinates. It isn't always as simple as reversing it anytime someone is just using forward, so I left the option there to use when necessary. However it's only ever an issue in forward. deferred never had this problem.

 

We don't have any other camera effects, and anti-aliasing (along with deferred rendering) is disabled at these lower quality levels. Is there anything I could look at that might be causing this unpredictability?

 

So I guess no? So I have to put a "Fix Water" toggle in my game settings as the only way to make it work for players?