SmearKees VFX Adventure

[SmearKees]

Because I know minimal about vertex offset and how it works I googled on internet, and watched tutorials and was reading what every node means on ShaderForge there website. This is the outcome when I use the offset on a sphere. The vertices are not connected to each other, does this has to do something with normal maps?

This is the shader itself, right now I’m figuring out how to create the “beam pulses” with the vertex offset.

If somebody has a shader that can show the major steps I need would be amazing if I could take a look into this

[Travis]

Brows through this thread real quick and see if the solution they came up with works for you

Need help for vertex offset

The first example of the generic long/lat sphere has issues at the poles due to the points there inherently having mismatched UVs. Here’s the default UVs created by 3ds Max on a sphere. [image] As you can see across the top and bottom, the UVs are in a saw tooth pattern. Each of those points are thus sampling a different point in the texture, thus will be offset by a different amount. One option is to weld the UVs across the top, like this: [image] The result is now all of the vertices at t…

[SmearKees]

Awesome travis, thanks for the link! I’ll check out how the uv’s are in blender

[SmearKees]

Instead of running stuck on one effect I tend to always learn alot from doing different aspects. So I’m also watching the videos from Sirhaian’Arts his Unity VFX tutorials, and here’s my take on the sparks tutorial. The sparks with some adjustments could also be a nice add-on for the beam effect to give the impact more power

[Asuran]

His tutorials very helpful) But some of them are too old. Like with black hole he used wind zone but you can use velocity over time) And some videos using Shader Forge and it is always doesn’t work properly (for me)), always some errors and at the end i was making crystal reflections and it was ruined by shader forge errors((( I downloaded it from github but i hope some day i will buy amplify shader) Nice sparks!

[Dom]

If you are using a cube which has flat shading (split normals), the normal offset is steering each face into a different direction. You need unified normals (smooth shading) to keep the surface in one piece.
Wow, just gives me the idea to make a tearing cloth effect based on normals blending from smooth to flat (wondering how to do that)

Here some Smoothing Groups ref:
http://wiki.polycount.com/wiki/Smoothing_Groups

[SmearKees]

started with a projectile

[SmearKees]

Awesome, thanks alot :D. I need to educate myself alot more on these kind of subjects !

[Dom]

No worries. Yeah, you can also just keep going and tapping in those traps will teach a lot. =)

[SmearKees]

Still alot of nice stuff to learn from :D, I never checked out amplify shader. Is amplify shader a better and more updated version of shader forge?

[boorch]

I mostly prefer ASE since I guess it’s a bit faster to work with (not in terms of performance, but in terms of UX/UI) I just press space and type the node name to add that node to the graph. And “shader functions” is super useful so I can create custom nodes for the stuff I use most of the time. For example, I’ve created shader functions for various kinds of gradients and shapes and that’s super handy. I like my schematics super clean and I don’t want to place 4-5 nodes whenever I need an angular gradient etc.

And the most important feature of ASE for me is, the graph window is SUPER fast. You can zoom in-out and pan like surfing through clouds. A fast graph window is I guess the most important feature of ANY node based tool.

IMHO the only thing Shader Forge is better at is the vast amount of online content such as tutorials and sources created by its community. I’ve started shader development by examining Shader Forge schematics and reconstructing them in ASE.

[SmearKees]

Updated the projectile :), added a buildup and clash sequence. Still need to figure out how to combine the beginning summon together with the ground sprite, but I’m happy how the process of this effect is going

[colbaltblue]

Maybe you could animate the opacity and value towards you as you anticipate and then sling it back across when you fire the projectile

[SmearKees]

Oeeh, I really like that point. Im definetely gonna try that !

[colbaltblue]

Easiest way, always think where do you want the eye to lead to. Then find subtle ways to lead and give direction.

[SmearKees]

New update on the projectile, I got alot of feedback to change up the colors. So I made the projectiles have more contrast with the beginning, still lots to learn about colors :). I recently found the VFX styleguide from Riot Games, already going through that step for step to get a feeling how the people at Riot games do it.

I also did a quick test how vertex colors work in maya, tons of fun and so much ideas opened up for me now :D. Definetely will dive more into the combination of shaders + meshes !

This effects for me brings over a healing theme, so that could be a cool concept to develop further in the future.

I still have to fix the seem for the outer mesh but a fellow friend of mine will help me with this

[boorch]

Sweet! For the outer mesh, if you’re sure the geometry is right, it may be a UV issue. I’m not familiar with Maya (I use C4D) but maybe you can dive into the UV editor and figure it out! Are you by any chance using a “Rotator” for the UV? Because I feel like the geometry and UV seem right, so it seems like the texture is not tiling (which may also be caused by a rotating UV).

[SmearKees]

I already solved the problerm :), It was a problem with my UV layout. I unitized and optimized the UV’s and that fixed the problem

[SmearKees]

Little update on the healing fx :D, I played with some trail meshes from Maya and made some beziers that send out healing “pulses”. I’m quite happy how the overall effect turned out.

I got my eyes on the new vfx sketch so I might participate for my first sketch

[SmearKees]

I’m back :D, the VFX sketch is going quite well but I made some Concepts in my freetime for some other effects also. Already started to create the star effect, I’ll show the other concepts in the future if I start with creating those
Star concept : I love the fx style of League of Legends and with this effect I try to mimic it, I still want to put in some 2D traditional fx as this is one of my better skills

During the time I was creating this effect I learned some new tricks and this brought me on some ideas for the VFX sketch

Feel free to drop your thoughts