What is Build->GPU Skinning?

Unity Engine
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1

Hi,

I cannot seem to find anything in the manuals about this and tried google searching.
Can a Unity developer or someone explain what this check box does?

Thank you.

2

The computation for skinned meshes usually takes place on the CPU, but with that flag, it can be performed on the GPU.

3

How would you know when to enable the flag?
Of course I’m creating project for multiple mobile devices, iOS and Android.
Any tips would be most useful to get better understanding.

4

yea would like more info also

5

I still do not get when to use this feature, also many new features in Unity 5 beta that one does not full understand when it comes to build options?

6

I assume you are looking for something like a golden rule?
There are often no such rules unfortunately. The best bet is often to just give it a try.
If you e.g. have a look at static batching, there is also no golden rule. On low end devices, you may waste a lot of memory with static batching and get in trouble because of it. On the other hand, it may lead to better performance on the average devices.

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7

I think you might look into mesh skining:

https://docs.unity3d.com/Manual/MobileOptimisation.html

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Enable/Disable GPU Skinning
The first tip involves a setting that eases the burden on the CPU or GPU Front End at the expense of the other, that is, GPU Skinning. Skinning is the process where mesh vertices are transformed based on the current location of their animated bones. The animation system, working on the CPU, transforms the object’s bones that are used to determine its current pose, but the next important step in the animation process is wrapping the mesh vertices around those bones to place the mesh in the final pose. This is achieved by iterating over each vertex and performing a weighted average against the bones connected to those vertices.

This vertex processing task can either take place on the CPU or within the Front End

Reference: Enable/Disable GPU Skinning - Unity 2017 Game Optimization - Second Edition [Book]

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Thank you !