○ Upgrading

⚑ Upgrading from a version prior to 7.0.0 requires backing up the project!

⚑ Make sure your project serialization is set to Force Text in Project Settings > Editor!

⚑ Create an empty scene and delete the TVE folder before importing the new version!

⚑ Recompile all the custom TVE shaders to get the latest improvements and changes!

○ Version 7.0.0

Changes

⚑ The minimum required Unity version is now 2020.3! URP 7+ and HDRP 7+ packages are now deprecated!

⚑ All TVE meshes will be renamed TVE Model and they will be re-imported. This might take some time depending on the project size!

New

✓ Shaders: Added a new Motion Flow for wind animation

✓ Shaders: Added Depth Prepass optimization in HDRP

✓ Shaders: Updated and cleaned up the SRPs shaders

✓ Amplify: Added option to keep the shadows with Global Alpha (SRPs only)

✓ Amplify: Added option to keep the shadows with Fade Effects (SRPs only)

Fixes

✓ Shaders: Fixed Motion Interaction jittering when the objects are far from the origin

✓ Shaders: Fixed global textures repeating outside the Global Volume

✓ Shaders: Fixed various issues with Motion Vectors in HDRP

✓ Shaders: Fixed thin line at grass bottom part with Color Mask

✓ Shaders: Fixed Global Alpha not working correctly when disabled on materials

✓ Shaders: Fixed Perspective settings not working correctly with size effects

✓ Core: Fixed meshes breaking when Keep Quads is enabled on the importer

○ Version 6.6.2

Fixes

✓ Core: Fixed some issues with mesh upgrading from versions prior to 6.5

✓ Core: Fixed the progress bar not working correctly on upgrading

○ Version 6.6.1

Improvements

✓ Core: Improved the materials and textures saving when Share Common Materials is used. The assets are now saved based on GUID instead of name to avoid issues with materials or textures having the same name! Please note, due to the new naming convention, the old materials will not be shared with the new ones!

○ Version 6.6.0

Changes

⚑ Due to a fix for the Motion Squash, the motion amplitude might slightly change and readjustments will be needed!

Improvements

✓ Shaders: Added back and optimized the Rolling Motion for leaves and bark shaders

✓ Elements: Added a Custom Material field for elements to be rendered with. Now the same particle can be rendered in the scene and as an element without duplicating the particle

✓ Elements: Multiple TVEElement components can now be added to the same element or particle element to be rendered to different render buffers

✓ Elements: Added a Custom Visibility option per element to bypass the global volume elements' visibility

✓ Elements: Added projection mode to the Custom Render Data to render elements from the camera perspective in screen space

Fixes

✓ Presets: Fixed Nature Manufacture bark blending in HDRP

✓ Shaders: Fixed Motion Squash not taking the object radius into account

✓ Shaders: Fixed the fog being applied twice with Deferred on URP

✓ Shaders: Fixed the objects disappearing with M1 chips on URP

✓ Shaders: Fixed ZWrite not working correctly with URP

✓ Shaders: Fixed Motion Vectors broken in Forward pass in HDRP

○ Version 6.5.0

Changes

⚑ The Mesh Packing now stores more data and uses fewer texture channels in shaders! The same materials can now be used for more prefabs regardless of the size and shape. The Motions Settings will slightly change, some adjustments might be needed!

Some meshes might not upgrade as expected and reconversion will be needed!

⚑ The Noise Settings are disabled for the built-in shaders to reduce the texture samplers. The option is still available in the Amplify Editor Base function. Color Noise elements can be used with greater flexibility to achieve similar results at 0 costs!

Presets

✓ Presets: Added Visual Design Cafe - Realistic Meadow

✓ Presets: Added Alexander Elert presets

✓ Presets: Fixed Valley Forest not getting the albedo

New

✓ Shaders: Optimized motion calculations by 25%

✓ Shaders: Optimized 2 keywords for faster compilation

✓ Shaders: Optimized texture usage when no elements are used or the layer is set to an unused layer

✓ Shaders: Redesigned the Second Motion for easier setup and better wind

✓ Shaders: Added option to use the vertex normals direction for better Flutter Motion

✓ Shaders: Added option to fade out the motion in the opposite wind direction

✓ Shaders: Enabled Pre Baked Pivots support for all shaders to be usable with combined meshes

✓ Shaders: Improved the I Made It shader with more settings and proper lighting in all render pipelines

✓ Amplify: Added Height Mask, Main Mask, and User Mask options usable as global Color Mask, Global Alpha Mask, Global Overlay Mask, Camera Fade Mask, and Subsurface Mask

✓ Core: Optimized elements per frame processing when rendering

✓ Core: The elements can now be rendered with any materials if they have a valid ElementType material tag: ElementType = ColorsElement. For instance, a particle system with the TVEElement script attached will be rendered in both the game and as an element if the tag is added!

✓ Core: The same materials can now be used for more prefabs regardless of the size

✓ Core: The meshes now use more data packed in less space

✓ Core: The baked pivots now store the Y position as well, so more meshes can be combined together and act as individual objects

✓ Core: The meshes can now be used with any TVE shader (not possible before)

✓ Core: The Material Manager (Settings) tool now gets the selected materials as well

✓ Core: The Prefab Converter will create automatic lightmap UVs if they are missing

✓ Core: Added UV coords option when using textures as vertex masks in the Prefab Converter presets

✓ Core: Added UV coords option when packing textures in the Prefab Converter presets

✓ Core: Added a new function to create TVE meshes: TVEUtils.CreatePackedMesh(TVEMeshData meshData);

✓ Core: Added a new function to combine TVE meshes: TVEUtils.CombinePackedMeshes(List<GameObjects> gameObjects, bool mergeSubMeshes); Supported with meshes with single materials only!

✓ Core: Creating an element with a terrain selected will scale it to match the terrain size

✓ Core: Added more debug options for the Scene Debugger tool

✓ Core: Redesigned the entire UI to better match the Unity GUI style

Fixes

✓ Shaders: Fixed default shader values for Size Fade

✓ Core: Fixed prefab saving when Convert and Collect is used on prefab conversion

✓ Core: Fixed prefab conversion with null materials

✓ Core: Prevent prefab reverting or reconverting if the backup file is missing

✓ Core: Bypass a unity bug with define symbols not registered for the Terrain Details module

○ Version 6.4.3

Improvements

✓ Elements: Added a way to pause the elements rendering on-demand while keeping the rendered texture: TVEManager.Instance.globalVolume.colorsData.isRendering = false;

Fixes

✓ Editor: Added workaround for broken prefab thumbnails

✓ Shaders: Fixed some default motion values set too high

○ Version 6.4.2

Fixes

✓ Shaders: Fixed material editor throwing errors with the Polygonal shaders

○ Version 6.4.1

Improvements

✓ Elements: Show an error message on the element script when the element is outside the volume

Fixes

✓ Shaders: Fixed Diffusion profile not changing when selecting another profile in HDRP 12+

✓ Shaders: Fixed Shader Settings not detecting the render engine correctly in some cases

○ Version 6.4.0

Changes

⚑ Version 6.4 comes with many improvements but also with changes. A project backup is recommended before upgrading!

⚑ The Subsurface effect is changed to a Translucency model which offers greater control and it is more optimized. Unfortunately, there isn’t an upgrading path for it and the subsurface effect might need small adjustments!

⚑ The Wind Flow and Motion Highlight are changed based on a procedural flow. Small wind adjustments might be needed! Smooth direction changes are not possible anymore but direction elements can be used to change the wind direction!

New

✓ Shaders: Added Translucency Subsurface instead of Transmission + Subsurface Approximation in BIRP/URP

✓ Shaders: Added Alpha To Mask for alpha test smoothing with SMAA in BIRP/URP

✓ Shaders: Optimized Subsurface Approximation on Standard Lit/Simple Lit/HDRP shaders

✓ Shaders: Redesigned the wind flow based on the Primary Motion speed and scale instead of on a constant global noise

✓ Shaders: Direction elements can be used to distort the wind flow/motion highlight locally around objects

✓ Shaders: Optimized one texture usage for wind noise

✓ Elements: Added support for line renderers to be used as elements

✓ Presets: Improved Pure Nature presets

✓ Presets: Improved Tree Creator presets, now the normal map is baked automatically

✓ Presets: Added override to make the albedo white but keep the alpha for stylized assets

Fixes

✓ Shaders: Fixed Decal support in HDRP 14

✓ Elements: Fixed error with particle elements using GPU instanced materials

✓ Core: Fixed some presets not working with the Material Settings tool

The Vegetation Engine