Building Quality Shaders for Unity®

Building Quality Shaders for Unity®
Author: Daniel Ilett
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2022
Genre:
ISBN: 9781484286531

Understand what shaders are and what they're used for: Shaders are often seen as mystical and difficult to develop, even by skilled programmers, artists, and developers from other game design disciplines. This book dispels that idea by building up your shader knowledge in stages, starting with fundamental shader mathematics and how shader development mindset differs from other types of art and programming, and slowly delves into topics such as vertex and fragment shaders, lighting, depth-based effects, texture mapping, and Shader Graph. This book presents each of these topics with a comprehensive breakdown, the required theory, and some practical applications for the techniques learned during each chapter. The HLSL (High Level Shading Language) code and Shader Graphs will be provided for each relevant section, as well as plenty of screenshots. By the end of this book, you will have a good understanding of the shader development pipeline and you will be fully equipped to start making your own aesthetic and performant shader effects for your own games! You Will Learn To • Use shaders across Unity's rendering pipelines • Write shaders and modify their behavior with C# scripting • Use Shader Graph for codeless development • Understand the important math behind shaders, particularly space transformations • Profile the performance of shaders to identify optimization targets.

Unity 2021 Shaders and Effects Cookbook

Unity 2021 Shaders and Effects Cookbook
Author: John P. Doran
Publisher: Packt Publishing Ltd
Total Pages: 485
Release: 2021-10-15
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 1839217693

Overcome the challenges and complexities involved in creating your own shaders with high-level realism using practical solutions, best practices, and the latest features of Unity 2021 Key Features Discover practical recipes for mastering post-processing effects and advanced shading techniques Learn the secrets of creating AAA quality shaders without writing long algorithms Create visually stunning effects for your games using Unity's VFX Graph Book Description Shaders enable you to create powerful visuals for your game projects. However, creating shaders for your games can be notoriously challenging with various factors such as complex mathematics standing in the way of attaining the level of realism you crave for your shaders. The Unity 2021 Shaders and Effects Cookbook helps you overcome that with a recipe-based approach to creating shaders using Unity. This fourth edition is updated and enhanced using Unity 2021 features and tools covering Unity's new way of creating particle effects with the VFX Graph. You'll learn how to use VFX Graph for advanced shader development. The book also features updated recipes for using Shader Graph to create 2D and 3D elements. You'll cover everything you need to know about vectors, how they can be used to construct lighting, and how to use textures to create complex effects without the heavy math. You'll also understand how to use the visual-based Shader Graph for creating shaders without any code. By the end of this Unity book, you'll have developed a set of shaders that you can use in your Unity 3D games and be able to accomplish new effects and address the performance needs of your Unity game development projects. So, let's get started! What you will learn Use physically based rendering to fit the aesthetic of your game Create spectacular effects for your games by testing the limits of what shaders can do Explore advanced shader techniques for your games with AAA quality Use Shader Graph to create 2D and 3D elements for your games without writing code Master the math and algorithms behind the commonly used lighting models Get to grips with the Post-Processing Stack to tweak the appearance of your game Who this book is for This book is for game developers who want to start creating their first shaders in Unity 2021 and take their game to a whole new level by adding professional post-processing effects. The book assumes intermediate-level knowledge of Unity.

Unity 2018 Shaders and Effects Cookbook

Unity 2018 Shaders and Effects Cookbook
Author: John P. Doran
Publisher: Packt Publishing Ltd
Total Pages: 384
Release: 2018-06-29
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 1788390954

Bring realism to your games by mastering post-processing effects and advanced shading techniques in Unity 2018 Key Features Learn the secrets of creating AAA quality shaders without writing long algorithms Master shader programming through easy-to-follow examples Create stunning visual effects that can be used in 3D games Book Description Since their introduction to Unity, shaders have been seen as notoriously difficult to understand and implement in games. Complex mathematics has always stood in the way of creating your own shaders and attaining the level of realism you crave. Unity 2018 Shaders and Effects Cookbook changes that by giving you a recipe-based guide to creating shaders using Unity. It will show you everything you need to know about vectors, how lighting is constructed with them, and how textures are used to create complex effects without the heavy math. This book starts by teaching you how to use shaders without writing code with the post-processing stack. Then, you’ll learn how to write shaders from scratch, build up essential lighting, and finish by creating stunning screen effects just like those in high-quality 3D and mobile games. You'll discover techniques, such as normal mapping, image-based lighting, and animating your models inside a shader. We'll explore how to use physically based rendering to treat light the way it behaves in the real world. At the end, we’ll even look at Unity 2018’s new Shader Graph system. With this book, what seems like a dark art today will be second nature by tomorrow. What you will learn Understand physically based rendering to fit the aesthetic of your game Write shaders from scratch in ShaderLab and HLSL/Cg Combine shader programming with interactive scripts to add life to your materials Design efficient shaders for mobile platforms without sacrificing their realism Use state-of-the-art techniques, such as volumetric explosions and fur shading Master the math and algorithms behind the most used lighting models Understand how shader models have evolved and how you can create your own Who this book is for Unity Shaders and Effects Cookbook is for developers who want to create their first shaders in Unity 2018 or wish to take their game to a whole new level by adding professional post-processing effects. A solid understanding of Unity is required to get the most from this book.

Unity 5.x Shaders and Effects Cookbook

Unity 5.x Shaders and Effects Cookbook
Author: Alan Zucconi
Publisher: Packt Publishing Ltd
Total Pages: 240
Release: 2016-02-26
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 1785289187

Master the art of Shader programming to bring life to your Unity projects About This Book This book will help you master the technique of physically based shading in Unity 5 to add realism to your game quickly through precise recipes From an eminent author, this book offers you the fine technicalities of professional post-processing effects for stunning results This book will help you master Shader programming through easy-to-follow examples to create stunning visual effects that can be used in 3D games and high quality graphics. Who This Book Is For Unity Effects and Shader Cookbook is written for developers who want to create their first Shaders in Unity 5 or wish to take their game to a whole new level by adding professional post-processing effects. A solid understanding of Unity is required. What You Will Learn Understand physically based rendering to fit the aesthetic of your game Enter the world of post-processing effects to make your game look visually stunning Add life to your materials, complementing Shader programming with interactive scripts Design efficient Shaders for mobile platforms without sacrificing their realism Use state-of-the-art techniques such as volumetric explosions and fur shading Build your knowledge by understanding how Shader models have evolved and how you can create your own Discover what goes into the structure of Shaders and why lighting works the way it does Master the math and algorithms behind the most used lighting models In Detail Since their introduction to Unity, Shaders have been notoriously difficult to understand and implement in games: complex mathematics have always stood in the way of creating your own Shaders and attaining that level of realism you crave. With Shaders, you can transform your game into a highly polished, refined product with Unity's post-processing effects. Unity Shaders and Effects Cookbook is the first of its kind to bring you the secrets of creating Shaders for Unity3D—guiding you through the process of understanding vectors, how lighting is constructed with them, and also how textures are used to create complex effects without the heavy math. We'll start with essential lighting and finishing up by creating stunning screen Effects just like those in high quality 3D and mobile games. You'll discover techniques including normal mapping, image-based lighting, and how to animate your models inside a Shader. We'll explore the secrets behind some of the most powerful techniques, such as physically based rendering! With Unity Shaders and Effects Cookbook, what seems like a dark art today will be second nature by tomorrow. Style and approach The recipes in this book contain step-by-step instructions, complemented by screenshots and code, and real-world examples.

Mastering Unity Shaders and Effects

Mastering Unity Shaders and Effects
Author: Jamie Dean
Publisher:
Total Pages: 204
Release: 2016-08-30
Genre:
ISBN: 9781783553679

Harness the power of Unity 5 tools to write shaders and create stunning effects for next generation gamesAbout This Book* Leverage the power of Unity 5 compatible shaders to create a variety of realistic surfaces* Create amazing visual effects for your Unity 5.x games by blending advanced post-processing techniques and lighting effects* Add that extra visual edge to your games by learning pro level techniquesWho This Book Is ForThis book is for users who are familiar with creating Unity projects and are looking for the next step to create stunning high-end visuals in their game project using the latest tools and features. You are expected to understand the creation of basic Unity projects, game object types, and scene navigation. You will need some basic programming experience in C# or JavaScript.What You Will Learn* Create amazing visual effects using Unity 5's improved toolset* See the comparative advantages of the Metallic and Specular workflows of Unity's Physically Based Shading system* Build your own custom shaders to suit a variety of organic and inorganic surfaces* Take your Unity 5 project to the next level with advanced real-time and baked lighting methods* Design powerful particle effects* Find out how shaders, materials, and scripts work together within the Unity framework* Develop high-end and optimized game visuals suitable for mobile devices and other platformsIn DetailWith the inclusion of Physically Based Shading and the Standard Shader, Unity has opened up new workflows to achieve realism and astounding visuals in your real-time application project.If you've been looking for an advanced guide to cater to your games' visual needs, then this is the right solution for you. This book will give you a good understanding of the level of detail and polish you can add to your games with a deeper knowledge of shader and lighting interaction with Physically Based Shading for PC, console, and mobile game projects.You'll see how to create custom lighting effects efficiently and how you can replace expensive lighting rigs with simpler alternatives. Moving forward, you will successfully create responsive graphics that automatically adjust to different mobile platforms. If you want to improve the post-processing of your games and are wondering how to make your game look like a AAA standard game, then this book provides all the necessary information to enable you to do so efficiently and effectively.

Practical Shader Development

Practical Shader Development
Author: Kyle Halladay
Publisher: Apress
Total Pages: 391
Release: 2019-04-10
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 1484244575

It’s time to stop thinking that shaders are magical. You can use shaders to turn data into stunning visual effects, and get your hands dirty by building your own shader with this step-by-step introduction to shader development for game and graphics developers. Learn how to make shaders that move, tint, light up, and look awesome, all without cracking open a math textbook. Practical Shader Development teaches the theory behind how shaders work. The book also shows you how to apply that theory to create eye-popping visual effects. You’ll learn to profile and optimize those effects to make sure your projects keep running quickly with all their new visuals. You’ll learn good theory, good practices, and without getting bogged down in the math. Author Kyle Halladay explains the fundamentals of shader development through simple examples and hands-on experiments. He teaches you how to find performance issues in shaders you are using and then how to fix them. Kyle explains (and contrasts) how to use the knowledge learned from this book in three of the most popular game engines today. What You'll LearnUnderstand what shaders are and how they work Get up to speed on the nuts and bolts of writing vertex and fragment shaders Utilize color blending and know how blend equations work Know the coordinate spaces used when rendering real-time computer graphics Use simple math to animate characters, simulate lights, and create a wide variety of visual effects Find and fix performance problems in shaders See how three popular game engines (Unity, UE4, Godot) handle shaders Who This Book Is For Programmers who are interested in writing their own shaders but do not know where to start, anyone who has ever seen shader code on a forum and wished they knew how to modify it just a little bit to fit into their own projects, and game developers who are tired of using the default shaders found in the game engines they are using. The book is especially useful for those who have been put off by existing shader tutorials which introduce complex math and graphics theory before ever getting something on the screen.

Unity Game Optimization

Unity Game Optimization
Author: Dr. Davide Aversa
Publisher: Packt Publishing Ltd
Total Pages: 393
Release: 2019-11-29
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 1838552294

Get up to speed with a series of performance-enhancing coding techniques and methods that will help you improve the performance of your Unity applications Key FeaturesOptimize graphically intensive games using the latest features of Unity such as Entity Component System (ECS) and the Burst compilerExplore techniques for solving performance issues with your VR projectsLearn best practices for project organization to save time through an improved workflowBook Description Unity engine comes with a great set of features to help you build high-performance games. This Unity book is your guide to optimizing various aspects of your game development, from game characters and scripts, right through to animations. You’ll explore techniques for writing better game scripts and learn how to optimize a game using Unity technologies such as ECS and the Burst compiler. The book will also help you manage third-party tooling used with the Unity ecosystem. You’ll also focus on the problems in the performance of large games and virtual reality (VR) projects in Unity, gaining insights into detecting performance issues and performing root cause analysis. As you progress, you’ll discover best practices for your Unity C# script code and get to grips with usage patterns. Later, you’ll be able to optimize audio resources and texture files, along with effectively storing and using resource files. You’ll then delve into the Rendering Pipeline and learn how to identify performance problems in the pipeline. In addition to this, you’ll learn how to optimize the memory and processing unit of Unity. Finally, you’ll cover tips and tricks used by Unity professionals to improve the project workflow. By the end of this book, you’ll have developed the skills you need to build interactive games using Unity and its components. What you will learnApply the Unity Profiler to find bottlenecks in your app, and discover how to resolve themDiscover performance problems that are critical for VR projects and learn how to tackle themEnhance shaders in an accessible way, optimizing them with subtle yet effective performance tweaksUse the physics engine to keep scenes as dynamic as possibleOrganize, filter, and compress art assets to maximize performance while maintaining high qualityUse the Mono framework and C# to implement low-level enhancements that maximize memory usage and prevent garbage collectionWho this book is for The book is intended for intermediate Unity game developers who wants to maximize the performance of their game. The book assumes familiarity with C# programming.

Hands-On Unity 2020 Game Development

Hands-On Unity 2020 Game Development
Author: Nicolas Alejandro Borromeo
Publisher: Packt Publishing Ltd
Total Pages: 581
Release: 2020-07-29
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 1838647600

Build immersive game experiences using the new Unity 2020 features with this practical guide Key FeaturesUnleash the capabilities of C# scripting for creating immersive UI, graphics, Game AI agents and much moreExplore Unity's latest tools, including Universal Render Pipeline, Shader Graph, and VFX graph, to enhance graphics and animationGet started with building augmented reality experience using Unity’s AR FoundationBook Description Over the years, the Unity game engine has extended its scope from just being about creating video games to building AR/VR experiences, complex simulations, real-time realistic rendering, films, and serious games for training and education. Its features for implementing gameplay, graphics, and customization using C# programming make Unity a comprehensive platform for developing professional-level, rich experiences. With this book, you'll be able to build impressive Unity projects in a step-by-step manner and apply your knowledge of Unity concepts to create a real-world game. Complete with hands-on tutorials and projects, this easy-to-follow guide will show you how to develop your first complete game using a variety of Unity tools. As you make progress, you'll learn how to make the most of the Unity Editor and create scripts using the C# programming language. This Unity game development book will then take you through integrating graphics, sound, and animations and manipulating physics to create impressive mechanics for your games. You'll also learn how to code a simple AI agent to challenge the user and use profiling tools to ensure that the code runs in a performant way. Finally, you'll get to grips with Unity's AR Foundation for creating AR experiences for 3D apps and games. By the end of this book, you'll have developed a complete game and will have built a solid foundation using Unity's tooling ecosystem to develop game projects of any scale. What you will learnWrite scripts for customizing various aspects of a game, such as physics, gameplay, and UIProgram rich shaders and effects using Unity's new Shader Graph and Universal Render PipelineImplement postprocessing to increase graphics quality with full-screen effectsCreate rich particle systems for your Unity games from scratch using VFX Graph and ShurikenAdd animations to your game using the Animator, Cinemachine, and TimelineImplement game artificial intelligence (AI) to control character behaviorDetect and fix optimization issues using profilers and batchingWho this book is for This book is for game developers looking to migrate to the Unity game engine. If you are a developer with some exposure to Unity, this book will help you explore its latest features. Prior experience with C# programming is required to get the most out of the book.

Unity Game Development Essentials

Unity Game Development Essentials
Author: Will Goldstone
Publisher: Packt Publishing Ltd
Total Pages: 427
Release: 2009-10-01
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 1847198198

Build fully functional, professional 3D games with realistic environments, sound, dynamic effects, and more!

Unity in Action

Unity in Action
Author: Joseph Hocking
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 586
Release: 2018-03-27
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 1638356211

Summary Manning's bestselling and highly recommended Unity book has been fully revised! Unity in Action, Second Edition teaches you to write and deploy games with the Unity game development platform. You'll master the Unity toolset from the ground up, adding the skills you need to go from application coder to game developer. Foreword by Jesse Schell, author of The Art of Game Design Purchase of the print book includes a free eBook in PDF, Kindle, and ePub formats from Manning Publications. About the Technology Build your next game without sweating the low-level details. The Unity game development platform handles the heavy lifting, so you can focus on game play, graphics, and user experience. With support for C# programming, a huge ecosystem of production-quality prebuilt assets, and a strong dev community, Unity can get your next great game idea off the drawing board and onto the screen! About the Book Unity in Action, Second Edition teaches you to write and deploy games with Unity. As you explore the many interesting examples, you'll get hands-on practice with Unity's intuitive workflow tools and state-of-the-art rendering engine. This practical guide exposes every aspect of the game dev process, from the initial groundwork to creating custom AI scripts and building easy-to-read UIs. And because you asked for it, this totally revised Second Edition includes a new chapter on building 2D platformers with Unity's expanded 2D toolkit. What's Inside Revised for new best practices, updates, and more! 2D and 3D games Characters that run, jump, and bump into things Connect your games to the internet About the Reader You need to know C# or a similar language. No game development knowledge is assumed. About the Author Joe Hocking is a software engineer and Unity expert specializing in interactive media development. Table of Contents PART 1 - First steps Getting to know Unity Building a demo that puts you in 3D space Adding enemies and projectiles to the 3D game Developing graphics for your game PART 2 - Getting comfortable Building a Memory game using Unity's 2D functionality Creating a basic 2D Platformer Putting a GUI onto a game Creating a third-person 3D game: player movement and animation Adding interactive devices and items within the game PART 3 - Strong finish Connecting your game to the internet Playing audio: sound effects and music Putting the parts together into a complete game Deploying your game to players' devices