This article was created for Unity 2019.
Table of Contents
Because I noticed that the great FlowMap Painter by teckArtist can not paint very detailed 4k flow maps, I just create my own simple editor inside the Unity Editor.
You can download the whole Unity project here.
General Instructions
- Click the Play button to edit the flow map.
- The very first time you start the scene PaintFlowMap you need to click the Reset Canvas button to set the proper, neutral background color.
- All files are saved to the Resources folder when you click Toggle Preview or Save To PNG.
- Paint slow and steady for the best result.
- The editor script Flow Map Editor is attached to the gameObject PaintCanvas.
Features
Brushes
Set them in the Inspector of the script Flow Map Editor. Some brushes are located in the folder Assets/Textures/Brushes. They are POT or NPOT grayscale PNG files with no transparency.
Zoom & Move
Change the zoom by changing the gameObject Main Camera's Size property in the inspector. Change its X and Y position to move it.
Undo
Click the Undo Last Stroke button to undo the last. Only one undo step is supported.
Overlay
You can use an overlay image to paint your flow map. You can set it and its transparency in the Inspector of the gameObject OverlayCanvas.
Preview
You can activate a colorful checker image to see your flow map in action. Change the shader's FlowPower and FlowSpeed properties of the FlowPreview gameObject.
FlowPower is the length respectively the scale of the flow vectors.
Saved Filenames
Set them in the Inspector of the script Flow Map Editor.
Known Issues
- If you move the mouse pointer too fast while painting the result is not sufficient. The bigger the brush the slower you should paint.
- If you zoom out too much and your brush is too small you'll paint dotted lines. Zoom in with the camera to fix this.
- If you paint very small you should also reduce the FlowPower and FlowSpeed.