How do I do that? I know there is a LOD slider but I’m not sure how to use it and then create a reduced model.
1 Like
Unfortunately I haven’t found a free solution, the only way I found for this so far is this asset Poly Few | Mesh Simplifier and Auto LOD Generator | Utilities Tools | Unity Asset Store (80$) but depending on the tree you can only go up to a certain % reduction (55% for some, more for others) before the/some trees lose most of their leaves leaving you with only the trunk & branches which doesn’t look great but even 55% should be fine as long as you add a billboard in the next LOD.
To generate billboards (again here Unity offers us no usable tools) you can do it using this https://github.com/xraxra/IMP (tested it on Unity 2019.4.10 works perfectly, big thanks to xraxra).
If you can’t afford the LODs asset you can try this GitHub - Unity-Technologies/AutoLOD: Automatic LOD generation + scene optimization but it makes the trunk & some branches invisible for the trees I tested it on + some texture artifacts (basically not really a solution for trees).
Either way make sure to check the “Preserve Borders” option in either of the LOD tools when dealing with trees.
There’s another tool for creating better trees and auto-generates LODs + Billboard in the store Mtree - Tree Creation | Modeling | Unity Asset Store (50$).
@StellarVeil Thanks for the suggestions. I don’t know how you found this thread and decided to post some ways when Unity couldn’t be bothered to do it for their own tool. I have since then moved on from Unitys free systems since they almost always leave you short. I’m now actually using most of what you suggested.