How is this not a thing?
It’s not a thing because this thread is the first mention of this idea, ever. It’s an interesting idea, but I predict that it would be controversial, given the pushback we’ve already received about showing the CM icon in the hierarchy next to the object with the CMBrain.
Currently, you have the ShowDebugText option on the Brain that will display the name of the live vcam in the game view. Also, clicking on the Live Camera field in the Brain inspector will find the live camera in the hierarchy. Maybe that’s good enough.
not quite…
the ideal would be tapping a key that instantly selects the active vCam, and tapping that same key again reverting back to the prior selection.
And the ability to visually see which vCam is currently selected, thanks to it having a highlighted background hue and bolded name in the hierarchy, rather than an icon. Icons are almost always ugly, unless I design them, then they’re fully fugly.
Ouch. This just crashed Unity 2022.2.11
what?! I will try
Sounds like a custom editor script you should make for yourself.
If this happens again, please submit a bug report
Sounded, to me, like something everyone would benefit from…
It happens a lot… part of this fun aspect of modern Unity on modern hardware:
It’s not a bad idea. Though everything in unity uses the hierarchy window not just cinemachine. If every package adds something in it it will become a big mess. This kind of feature needs to add a lot of value to a lot of people to be justified.
You could always create a feature request here so we could mesure the need for it.
Apparently there is already a fix for it. Hasn’t landed in 2022 yet.
“The fix landed to 2023.2.0a11 and it’s in the process of being backported to 2023.1 and 2022.2 (both are in PR review stages).”
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With all due respect, if you think it’s a good idea (or merely not a bad idea) why isn’t there a way for Unity’s wise and sage staff to create ideas and suggestions, run them up flagpoles and figure out the interest?
Generally speaking, I don’t think there’s been nearly enough promotion of Cinemachine, and the documentation and discovery experience is such that those coming from somewhere other than real world cameras don’t get it because it’s not coming from gaming conventions or from 3D content app conventions. It’s its own thing, which requires some faith and hope that time taken learning it will reveal it to be suitable for any given game idea.
Cinemachine is, I know, one of the very best aspects of Unity. But I’m in a very small minority that know that for certain, and have enough experience with content creation software and real world cameras, so can instantly see where the source of inspirations for its conventions stem from.
I was also (un)lucky enough to begin using Unity when the general sentiment towards its packages and newer features was one of confidence, so I dived into CM sure that it would be good. That attitude has gone, that sentiment a memory, and newer users are trepidatious about every single feature and package of Unity, and rightly so… which means Cinemachine has to sell itself, ridiculous as that sounds, so that enough use it fully enough to begin discussing where its usability processes are short of ideal.
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There are already assets that help you organize your Hierarchy the way you like, and I kinda prefer the base Unity to not mess with that. (Yes, even the nonstandard Nabisco Red Corner icon that the Cinemachine Brain uses.)
For example, Hierarchy Icons has a predefined set of components or tags it will search, and show simple white icons for audio sources, players, rigidbodies, etc. Pretty sure that Odin has similar things available. There are several others which can color, iconize, folder-group, or otherwise munge with the Hierarchy to your personal taste. Leave it up to the users to customize the way they want.
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Ignores the importance of vCams once their workflow is embraced. They’re in every scene, they’re the presenters. They’re not merely another object. They host post processing, they determine blends and animations between themselves that control what’s being shown. They animate and respond in quite unique ways that are utterly imperative to the game experience at any given time, like no other objects, and it’s impossible to easily ascertain which is in command at any given point.
Yes, I’ll make a custom script to do what I want. But Cinemachine and its workflows and how they change Unity for the better should be embraced with consideration for their ideal use, together, in game making and game design, and experience control.
The same thing could be said of every single feature that Unity has. Have some sense of proportion.
That’s likely to be a full dozen releases since this was first noticed, and it’s truly a show stopping, work flow killing, experience ruining, nightmare of an array of catastrophic crashes that it causes. If you’re ever wondering why people get testy about their relationship with this product, this is a prime example.
I literally pointed out why that’s not true of vCams. If you can’t or don’t or won’t understand the enormous significance of views into a game, and the increasingly powerfully engaging experiences expected from players thanks to the control of those points of view becoming better with each game, I’m at a loss for words.
Hi Unifikation,
We think it could be a good idea. As others in this thread have mentioned, the scene hierarchy is a shared resource and we need to be mindful of the impact of adding complexity to it. We try to be data-driven, and the first step of building a case for this feature is showing user demand. You can help with that by filling out a feature request and posting it to this thread. If lots of people vote for it, then we have a pretty good signal that the value of adding more information to the scene hierarchy is worth the cost of the additional complexity.
Thank you for your kind words! We’ve been working hard on making Cinemachine more accessible. We think Cinemachine 3.0 is the best Cinemachine release we’ve put out so far. We’ve put together a blog with highlights here, but you’re absolutely right that the discovery experience is far from ideal. We’re working on that, and part of that work will include updates to existing learning material to make sure it is accurate for 3.0.
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I’m old enough to remember the cries for Nested Prefabs, and how that turned out for those of us keen on them for UI. I understand the desire to hide behind “Democratisation” whenever considering what to do next. And the power and reasoning of good product managers able to make decisions for the common uses that too severely damage general applicability.
Neither of these seem to have occurred with any degree of consistent success at Unity, and I already have to lose way too much time working around bugs, foibles, slowdowns, hiccups, poor documentation, inconsistent “updates” etc etc.
As does everyone else that uses the engine.
I think, for the sanity of all the myriad of users that are tired of the ineffectiveness of their votes and opinions and ideas resonating, that It really is time for Unity to invest in hiring sage and wise product managers, and letting them rule over the coders, especially now that the CTO is on a sabbatical.
Further, I don’t think there’s ever been a better example, in Unity’s stable, of the power of a great leading product manager and programming team than Adam and Gregory, and their result in Cinemachine. The limitation being documentation, explanation, insight, examples and onboarding. Give them a team of creatives funded to begin showing how to use it, what it is, etc.
As to your enthusiasms for 3.0… it’s not about thee API consistency. and the back end rewrite and all that… that’s not the major problem and won’t solve the approachability issues.
The biggest issues is one of conception. How do you help a newish user of Unity trust in the creative capabilities of Cinemachine AND learn to conceive of how it works and what can and can’t be done with it, in the fastest and most confidence inspiring manner?
This question hasn’t been asked internally?
We all saw what happened to TMP when this question wasn’t asked of its prowesses… and it was another exemplary example of actually great ideas, innovations, approaches and capabilities.
Furthermore…
You could add the two main suggestions above, and all manner of other CM user empowerment features, and have a switch that turns the whole lot of them on or off.
Default to OFF, so nothing changes for the users that don’t dig into using CM. Their sacred hierarchy and shortcuts remain unchanged.
For those of us that do live visual and audio production through CM, we can turn on Super CM Mode, and life becomes a little more awesome.