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Question Lighting - how to creat a Matte shadow shader? (creat a shadow on a light baked imported object)

TheDJin

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Feb 20, 2021
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Hi community :)
before asking I've just want the community to all the contents tutorials and sharing.

I would like to know if it's possible to have a shadow matte shader in VAM.

to explain, a material shadow matte is a shader that we apply to an object. where the object will be transparent. except for the shadows. it will recieve the shadows but the object still transparent.

Indeed, I would like to use this shader if it exists to create shadow on unity assets imported with a baked light.

Because when I import a unity asset with a baked light, I don't have any shadow on it. And I thought of this solution to solve this problem.

Example:
I have a floor with a baked light on it.
the idea is to add a plane above the floor of a few millimeters in unity and apply a shadow map.
so in vam it will look like the floor is receiving the shadow.

good to know that i'm not an expert on unity, and i don't know how to do to have a shadow matte shader in unity too. ^^

Thank you in advance for all your help.
 
Last edited:
Unfortunately there is no custom shader support in VaM 1.x.
Maybe we will get one in the future 2.x version.
There are some ways to somehow inject advanced shadow-effects, but that is far above my horizon.

For your current shadow issue on custom unity assets, you maybe want to try out Nostage3's great "Unity-Asset-Vamifier" plugin.
This will add shadows even to some CUAs where the VaM lighting doesn't work.


You can also somehow bake in shadows with Unity or using ready made shadow maps on a CUA, or add one with a transparent plane.... but that would not affect VaM figures, of course.
 
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Unfortunately there is no custom shader support in VaM 1.x.
Maybe we will get one in the future 2.x version.
There are some ways to somehow inject advanced shadow-effects, but that is far above my horizon.

For your current shadow issue on custom unity assets, you maybe want to try out Nostage3's great "Unity-Asset-Vamifier" plugin.
This will add shadows even to some CUAs where the VaM lighting doesn't work.


You can also somehow bake in shadows with Unity or using ready made shadow maps on a CUA, or add one with a transparent plane.... but that would not affect VaM figures, of course.

thank you for your clear answer.

Yes, it's a sad that the VAM 1.X is so limited with lighting.
and I'm really looking forward to the 2.X. The latest video just released makes the wait even harder.
I just wonder how long it will take for the community to develop as much content as VAM 1.X.

Otherwise to come back to the subject, "Unity asset vamifier" is just a great plugin, and helps a lot. But what is sad with this plugin is that it removes the light baking. (my concern is that without lightbaking, there is no global illumination on a scene, wich makes it somehow better look).

But well, if there is no solution. I continue with what's in the box (and that's already a lot ) :)

Thanks again.
 
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