Playing with Image Effects in Unity
published Thursday, 25 Aug. 2011, 12:00 by ZPSHicks
Last night I sat down to satisfy my inner graphics-whore (please excuse my French) and started fooling around with the new and updated Image Effects in Unity 3.4, testing performance, spending a bit of R&R adjusting various settings to extreme "over-the-top" effects! (I've been watching a few Frostbite 2, CryEngine and UDK videos lately)! :)
Playing with Image Effects in Unity
Not much to say really; the scene was made quick with a few assets you've already seen a million times (except maybe the trees). The Image Effects active are Screen Space Ambient Occlusion, Bloom and Lens Flares, New DLAA Antialiasing, Depth Of Field 34 and Vignetting (Which you can toggle on 1-5 keys).
- Warning:
- Open Door Development is ALL about showing "Work in Progress" ... We hope you can take it! :)
- Warning:
- This Prototype is not optimized for optimal performance so if you're "playing" on a small notebook, please do not expect the best frame-rates in the world!
- Warning:
- Deferred lighting and post-process image effects are calculated based on screen-space pixels, so please be sure to bring down the resolution if your native default is too high!
"Over-the-top" exaggerated realism with Image Effects

Interstellar Marine in T-pose, with the background completely blurred by DOF including a few hexagon BOKEH's working to bring a bit more realism in terms of out-of-focus glow distortion.
Take the map for a spin and post your frame-rates below if possible ... The scene clocks +60FPS (720p) on our old but still rather powerful GTX280 / 2.4 Core2Quad which leaves room for a lot of optimization from both Unity and our side.
For the love of the game!
/ZPSHicks


Koolfox:
1 year, 9 months ago
Press 'C' to see boobies...
LordMord:
1 year, 9 months ago
you really overdid it with the effects. You can't see anything that is not in 20cm range of yourself.
But it is nice to have another Unity Demo, i want more of these.
forgefire:
1 year, 9 months ago
haha thnx koolfox ;)
No idea what my fps was (maybe you could include a fps counter in the previews?) but it sounded like my old 4850 was working quite a bit.
The trees are awesome btw !
DarKSeeD:
1 year, 9 months ago
It would be nice to see the On/Off effects text on screen.
xalener:
1 year, 9 months ago
Lord mod, this was for demoing purposes. The effects were exaggerated in order to show them more clearly.
Adidas25:
1 year, 9 months ago
with my PC specs (xp sp3, gtx460 1gb, 4gb ddr3, i5 750 4x2.66GHz) i've got about 50fps in 1280x800 and 30fps in 1980x1080:)
Pretty good shadows and T-pose man details. Couldn't see the whole tree structure because of deph of field =) but from what i saw I think it looks really nice, good color atmosphere.
Good work, keep it up guys!!!
Adidas25:
1 year, 9 months ago
to forgefire:
Use Fraps http://www.fraps.com
ZPSHicks:
1 year, 9 months ago
@Adidas25: Crazy that you're not getting more FPS on your gtx460 i5 750; ever tested your rig using 3DMark 11, would love to know your score?`- and no doubt Fraps is a very reliable FPS displayer.
@All: Toggle Image-Effects using your keyboard (1 = Screen Space Ambient Occlusion / 2 = Bloom and Lens Flares / 3 = DLAA Antialiasing / 4 = Depth Of Field 34 / 5 = Vignetting)
AnusCondus:
1 year, 9 months ago
It was like wearing my gf's glasses ... so I got lost! http://tinyurl.com/43qff7n
Great job ... ran smoothly on this machine (which I have no idea what is since it isn't mine) and I must admit, the post effects looks a hell of a lot better than the version I played with a few versions ago ...
Could I use this picture in the card game? Hmmm ... Maybe a 'You forgot your glasses at home' card? (no, I'm not serious :D)
Cheers!
ZPSHicks:
1 year, 9 months ago
Mr. AnusCondus you can do anything you like ... you can even have my wife, kids, house and car for being so Awesome! :) - BTW: When are you coming back to work full-time on Interstellar Marines? ;)
Suubersnake:
1 year, 9 months ago
Looks pretty good, however it feels like the depth of field is a wee bit too intense. Other than that, it was nice to see a lighting demo in action. Should be good :D
LordMord:
1 year, 9 months ago
Okay i tested the fps with fraps
@1600x900 i got about 8-9 FPS
@800x600 i got about 18 FPS
Specs of my Laptop
Windows 7 SP1
Intel Core 2 Quad 2GHz
Nvida Geforce GT 130M 1GB
4GB of DDR3 RAM
@xalener i know but i felt like saying that cause it was so extrem.
CzechDeath:
1 year, 9 months ago
Looking great ! I love that leaf transparencly thingy, its very crysis-ish. I wondered out of map and I fell to the void of nothingness, still couldn't see anyhing. and soon as i looked up even cube shape of map sunk to out of focus fog.
It felt very disturbing ... you should make horror game with passage where main charater looses his glasses.
Kendzi:
1 year, 9 months ago
Great to finally see another unity prototype.
I was ran a 30sec benchmarktest with fraps on 1680x1050 and got 38fps. But it felt much slower due to minifreezes (I don't know how to explain it properly).
My system:
Win 7 64bit
GTX 280
Core2Quad @ 2.8GHz
8GB RAM
(almost the same as yours?)
And I want to say, that this is 3 years old. I should have replaced the MoBo ages ago, though...
Anyways. Kepp up the good work!
My regards, Kendzi
SwissyJim:
1 year, 9 months ago
WAY cool!!
Had fun trying all the settings (1-4) and ranged from a low of 48 to a high of 98 @ 1920
Asus G73 Laptop
I7 Q720
8GB ram
Win7 64bit
ATI 5870 mobility (11.6 drivers)
Can't wait for more...
Gortos:
1 year, 9 months ago
Oooh shiny, looks like you can build a lot of atmosphere with unity. Great!
I got 31-32 FPS in 1280x1024 with
Intel Core2Duo E7300
3 GB of RAM
Win Vista 64 Bit
NVidea GeForce 9600GT
Kosai106:
1 year, 9 months ago
Hicks, look at what you've done! Now I have to change my pants... Urgh, what a mess. :(
Either way, I get 66-90 FPS with everything turned on, on Fantastic settings on my 1280x1024 monitor. (Yes, my 1680x1050 kinda died on me last week.)
AMD Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition,
Sapphire Radeon HD 6870 1GB GDDR5,
4GB RAM,
Windows 7 64 Bit.
"BTW: When are you coming back to work full-time on Interstellar Marines? ;)" - ZPSHicks to AnusCondus.
Well, if he ain't, then I'll gladly take his old position! ;)
Kosai106:
1 year, 9 months ago
Oh yeah I forgot to mention, you might want to look into a new skin shader, the current one looks a little dull. :) Just my two cents.
Crawing:
1 year, 9 months ago
Ok so I have the GTX580 and for comparison reason did I set the res to 720 as well and I got 95+ frames with all settings on and maxed.
So only 40 frames more with a GPU that is 2 generations ahead of the GTX280. It really shows it can't pay to upgrade with every new series :)
On 1080P did I get 60+.
specs are:
GTX580
i5 2500
8GB RAM
One thing I noticed that I think is cool is that the Vignette does not only create a black shadow, but is also distorting the RGB channels...pretty cool I think. kinda gives the feeling of looking through glass.
TheSargeGuy:
1 year, 9 months ago
Specs:
Win7
4 gb RAM
Core2Quad
vortec Geforce 430GT
FPS:14-45
running: 1680x1050
with the fantastic setting
Older computer I know but I can run modern games on max without the fps issue. Had that problem in running man when things get crazy so you might want to look into that. but other then that...*sniff* its beautiful *sniff*
Jerom:
1 year, 9 months ago
Wow, that is quite amazing what little bit of "simple" lighting can do. Kudos.
flopapotamus:
1 year, 9 months ago
Apparently you can fall off the map.
Adidas25:
1 year, 9 months ago
Jerom +1
Lighting and shadows are great!
FirstDagger:
1 year, 9 months ago
Press "m" for more boobies.
ClaymoreMD:
1 year, 9 months ago
Phenom 965 3.4 gHz
ATI 6970
1680*1050
default settings: 81-108
fantastic settings: 68-90
fast settings, only DOF and SSAO disabled: 145-200 (only because it can't go over 200)
Whenever I feel like blowing dust from inside of 6970, I can just run this demo with on fantastic settings, which makes the fan go crazy :-)
But it's looking great even on fast settings without DOF and SSAO, which is great news :-) For some reasons the deterred lighting is faster than forward lighting this time.
Alex1212:
1 year, 9 months ago
What the hell? huh
ngilford:
1 year, 9 months ago
Things get farther away when you look straight at them than when they are in the side of the screen. Feels like your eyes are a flat, widescreen camera.
battleofvalmy:
1 year, 9 months ago
My eyes started watering the instant it loaded up.
luis_cobo85:
1 year, 9 months ago
53-60 FPS @ 1680x1050 on:
AMD Athlon II X3 445 3.1 Ghz
4 GB RAM
Sapphire Radeon HD6870 1GB
luis_cobo85:
1 year, 9 months ago
oh, I forgot to say, it was at fantastic settings
larsbertram:
1 year, 9 months ago
make sure, you buy the birch tree package as well – because i think it is the best one…
updates to the others might come in the future ;-)
btw. i think you should clip the ssao-effect to something like 20 or 30 meters as it doesn’t go well with blur/fog. there is a hacked version on the unity forum somewhere…
lars
Antonio38425144:
1 year, 9 months ago
I hope the marines will have different faces. What i've seen of the male ones, they look like their middle aged.
jaaasemam:
1 year, 9 months ago
jak mam spusti tuto hru
Rockboy:
1 year, 9 months ago
Manero
RobloxKillers:
1 year, 5 months ago
You Enlisted Move Good.
Fireniner3:
3 weeks ago
I about jumped out of my seat when i accidentally pressed c
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