I have a few instances in my app where I’d like to use shaders on some TMPro text. Not the standard outlines or drop shadow, but specifically something like a computer console, with live text being output (so it can’t be a prefab animation of text, the text is responsive to what the player is doing), but with effects like scanlines, or digital glitching.
I have these effects working in all other aspects of my app, but for the life of me, TMPro is like a whole other beast. Various shaders I’ve tried all SEEM to work, but dont… like the text will just stay a very dark gray, or be whole black blocks.
I saw a suggestion on a forum to overlay something over the text, but havent figured out how to make that work, as the shaders I’ve found or purchased are meant to effect an object, and not be a transparent effect.
I think. I’m a programmer coming from a history of C and PHP and some Python… anything with graphics and shaders are extremely new to me. I only learned what a shader WAS about 3-4 months ago. So forgive any lack of fundamental understanding.
What is it about TMPro text that makes it so different that it cant have a ‘regular’ shader applied to it? Is there a way to ‘fake’ it? Could I put a piece of ‘glass’ in front of the text with a shader on that, and only have the shader affect what shows through the glass (without affecting anything else further back… say it only affects a short distance behind?)? How would I go about doing that?
I can live without the cool effects on the text… it just looks weird to have the rest of the screen be affected and the text remain static and unmoving.
I have been entering into this area too driven by future needs.
In Amplify shader you can grab the color of the camera capture and manipulate it that way with other nodes. Its like a post processing stage. This is the area of suggestion I have been running into.
The caveat is: Beware of the channels that deal with one product. Unity forum is where I have ended up because after one learns packages or processes they need to ‘hook’ them together and this can be done a myriad of ways that the single product people or soap boxers have no need of or don’t care. You get my drift. The product channels have a lot of great answers though. I am in Amplify and have been pulling Substance, ShaderForge, SurForge and Unity Shader files and images to reverse engineer into ASE otherwise know as Amplify. 3dTextures.com opened my design eyes into porting Substance to Amplify. I realized what the process was and then start re-crafting the materials into my own. I hope this helps. And I feel your pain. I am a coder too and the shader world was a huge leap but oh the beauty of the outcome! It is another way to dissect reality.
Maybe it’s because I’m new to shaders and all that, but I understood literally nothing in your post. I recognize the assets Amplify and some of the others, but aside from that, I’ve no idea what you’re even trying to tell me. Beware of channels that deal with one product? What? I don’t even see any connection to TMPro working with other shaders here. I’m thinking I might need an ELI5 on this one.
The post before your last one should give you insight. There is another realm you are stepping into that has to be addressed at this point by what you stated previously wanting to do with TMP.
You have a need to connect two processes together, TMP and your own shader need.
You mentioning that you don’t understand me is what I am getting on a regular basis. Connecting assets together is heavy lifting in some cases. Formulating questions and getting matching answers using the correct terminology takes some getting used to in this effort.
Theres no insight in the post before my last one. It’s a link to a webinar thats happening next week. And it also looks like it’s a general overview of TMP starting at the very beginning. While I’m sure a lengthy webinar next week would give me infinitely more information that I would ever have use for, none of that answers my basic question.
I didn’t ask about connecting assets together. I don’t own any of those shader assets, and have no interest in purchasing them or learning how to connect them.
I feel like I asked on a car mechanic forum if I can use a Snap-On RT-12 oil filter wrench on a Nissan Sentra, and I’m being directed to take a course on internal combustion engines and maintenance. Next week.
Yeah, maybe I could get something out of that, but none of that is what I’m asking. You mention learning how to formulate questions to get the right answers takes getting used to… yet you’re insisting on the answer being a webinar, unreleased yet so you don’t know if they even cover it or not, which makes no mention of actually providing the answer I’m looking for. Because you assume I’m trying to do what you’re doing, connecting different asset workflows together?
Thats not helpful. I’ll look for answers elsewhere. Thanks.