Post-Effect creation application (pixel shaders)

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Tanuki
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Post-Effect creation application (pixel shaders)

Post by Tanuki »

Hello everybody,

This is probably a not proper place to post, moreover what I propose is not directly related to Ogre.
I developped an application to create post-effects (post-processing), that means creation of pixel shaders with possibility to check the effects in real-time, also and especially the possibility to assemble the effects in a workflow, plugging effects to each other to create higher level effect compositions (it makes the application very accessible and easy to use also for designers).

Here is the application web site : http://sites.google.com/site/studioposteffect (Studio Post-Effect)
I would suggest you to visit the forum and subsribe the "New versions" post to be automatically notified of the new releases in the future.

It's free so please have a try. The "Tutorials" section of the web site contains video tutorials (YouTube) in English and French. The project file format is xml and the "Documentation" section explains how to use the project data, for exemple to use it to generate Ogre .compositor scripts or else.

I hope this application can help the game developpers community for post-effects creation and pixel shader programming in general, so it could be provided freely with Ogre engine.
Do not hesitate to ask questions or feedback.

Thank you all for your attention.

PS : I already adapted some of the pixel shaders from Ogre engine and created sample project for my application, I'd like to know if it's ok to provide them freely on my web site as an "Ogre pixel shaders package for Studio Post-Effect" ? Thanks for the answer.
Last edited by Tanuki on Tue Jun 09, 2009 1:57 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Post-Effect creation application (pixel shaders)

Post by spookyboo »

This is really cool. Looking great
Tanuki
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Re: Post-Effect creation application (pixel shaders)

Post by Tanuki »

Thanks,

By the way the application still does not work properly on Vista and Windows 7. I have no idea (I have some but no technical ones...) why the render is broken, and applying pixel shaders makes the whole render become gray.
I would take advantage of the situation to ask to people with experience programming in DirectX for Vista and/or Windows 7, some details/information about to solve render bugs.

Thanks for your help.
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madmarx
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Re: Post-Effect creation application (pixel shaders)

Post by madmarx »

This is impressive. :D Would love to see a special webcam/video texture inside such an app.
Tutorials + Ogre searchable API + more for Ogre1.7 : http://sourceforge.net/projects/so3dtools/
Corresponding thread : http://www.ogre3d.org/forums/viewtopic. ... 93&start=0
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Re: Post-Effect creation application (pixel shaders)

Post by Tanuki »

People can easily write a render plugin for Studio Post-Effect.
Basically the plugins receive a Microsoft.DirectX.Direct3D.Device instance (for the ones who know about Managed DirectX), it's something like a managed representation of a IDirect3DDevice9* instance. In this case it's easy for anybody to write a plugin that, for exemple, outputs YouTube videos or webcam streams to textures... And then any effects can be apply to these renders.

The "Documentation" section of the web site still does not explain properly about plugins system, but the ones confortable with .NET programming can explore the IScenePlugin.dll assembly file using Reflector and understand the way to proceed to develop such rendering plugins for Studio Post-Effect.
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RedEyeCoder
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Re: Post-Effect creation application (pixel shaders)

Post by RedEyeCoder »

I watched your first tutorial video and thought it was awesome, great work!
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Rasengan
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Re: Post-Effect creation application (pixel shaders)

Post by Rasengan »

Very interseting, thanks! Plugin system appreciated.
But...it crash on my XP64. :)
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nikki
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Re: Post-Effect creation application (pixel shaders)

Post by nikki »

Looks cool!

Have you guys considered GLSL/Cg support and Linux compatibility?
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Re: Post-Effect creation application (pixel shaders)

Post by Tanuki »

Hello Rasengan,

Thank you very much for feedback, unfortunatly I couldn't test with other than XP 32bits (just run Vista and saw it worked but render was strange and impossible to apply effects).
Could you feedback more accurately about your problem please ? In this case maybe I can help/fix.

At least what I know is, the Effect class of managed DirectX can't load shader file if there are some none-latin characters. (kanji, kana, etc...)


Hello nikki,

GLSL/Cg, maybe, the problem is that I think .NET framework can't compile these language natively, and I usually don't feel good to have to use an external compiler application through the command line... It implies several complications...
For Linux I'm sorry but I have to say that's just impossible. I wrote this application totally in C# and DirectX, so even if the Mono project is quite advanced, I'm afraid it might be not enough. Moreoever I have no confidence in DirectX support on Linux and I have no plan to make Studio Post-Effect OpenGL-compatible.

In the future I plan to migrate this application to full WPF (if possible), and thus in this case if the project Moonlight reach a sufficient level for WPF 3.5 application support, why not.
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Rasengan
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Re: Post-Effect creation application (pixel shaders)

Post by Rasengan »

The crash happens at the very start:

Image

:)
Last edited by Rasengan on Sun May 17, 2009 5:15 pm, edited 4 times in total.
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Re: Post-Effect creation application (pixel shaders)

Post by spacegaier »

Ahmmm...where is the image :wink: ?

EDIT: Allright, now it is there...
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Tanuki
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Re: Post-Effect creation application (pixel shaders)

Post by Tanuki »

Sorry Rasengan, I just noticed my answer was incomplete
Tanuki wrote:the Effect class of managed DirectX can't load shader file if there are some none-latin characters. (kanji, kana, etc...)
But I meant, "the Effect class of managed DirectX can't load shader file if there are some none-latin characters in the path. (kanji, kana, etc...)"
So if you put the application (or even just the project file) in a path such as "C:\ひらがな\StudioPostEffect" for exemple, then the shaders have to be loaded from a path containing non-latin characters, and then the loader fails.

madmarx, I created a video plugin that loads up to 6 videos and bind them to textures on a cubes faces. Unfortunatly I have to use the AudioVideoPlayback.Video class from the Managed DirectX framework, which is uncomplete, full of bugs and moreover unsupported anymore. I'll provide the plugin soon as well as the source code because it crashes a lot, and crashes the application together so, I'll provide source code hoping that somebody can fix my bugs and/or find some tricks to avoid AudioVideoPlayback's bugs. This class have memory leak bugs, and the worst of all I think is that it can't be terminated without crashing...

Anyway I'll provide this plugin more for... fun... than for real production usage.
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Re: Post-Effect creation application (pixel shaders)

Post by Tanuki »

Now Studio Post-Effect have an official forum, so I invite you all to register and post there. (more appropriate place)
Sorry to Ogre community to have used your forums for non-Ogre, personal purpose, and thank you for your help.

Studio Post-Effect forum : http://studioposteffect.freeforums.org
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Re: Post-Effect creation application (pixel shaders)

Post by Crazy_Yellow_Rabbit »

English: This is an impressive work Thanks for sharing it !

French: C'est un travail impressionnant merci de le partager.

Japanese: You really think i can write this language ?
i am not crazy, no, no,no i'm not !!!
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madmarx
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Re: Post-Effect creation application (pixel shaders)

Post by madmarx »

I will check this, thanks!
Tutorials + Ogre searchable API + more for Ogre1.7 : http://sourceforge.net/projects/so3dtools/
Corresponding thread : http://www.ogre3d.org/forums/viewtopic. ... 93&start=0
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Re: Post-Effect creation application (pixel shaders)

Post by SpannerMan »

I just watched a couple of the tutorials, and this seriously looks very good indeed.

Are you using OGRE to render the 3D scene in your tool? And if not... why not? :)
Tanuki
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Re: Post-Effect creation application (pixel shaders)

Post by Tanuki »

Hello SpannerMan, thank you for your interest.

I'm not using Ogre to render the 3D scene, because the application is totally written in C#, and even if there is a good .NET wrapper for Ogre engine, the core purpose of this application is not rendering of beautiful scenes through the render plugins but "pixel shaders" creation (quick prototyping, checking parameter values on the fly, validating, etc...) and so as long as my need is very specific, I thought it's just useless to add an intermediary layer between DirectX and my application.

Since you post here I guess you have interest in Ogre, and so you can read the "Documentation" section of my web site, it explains the way to use the workflow data contained in the Studio Post-Effect project files (xml). It could be good that someone develop a converter to generate Ogre compositor files from the Studio Post-Effect workflows. Unfortunatly I have no knowledge in Ogre compositor files but I still think it could be a good idea that someone make it.
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Re: Post-Effect creation application (pixel shaders)

Post by Tanuki »

I released a new version, 1.0.204.
Several bug fixes, and it should be more flexible for older graphic card compatibility.
64-bit processors and Vista/Window 7 issues are still being investigating.

Also there are two new tutorial videos here.
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Re: Post-Effect creation application (pixel shaders)

Post by Tanuki »

New version released!! 1.0.269

This version has major fixes, and now works on Vista.
There are some new effects (one new pixel shader), there is a new interesting plugin to load complex scenes.
There are also all the source codes of the plugins for the one interested in creating new ones and learn how it works, there is also a new tutorial video to show that new scene plugin in action.

Enjoy!
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Re: Post-Effect creation application (pixel shaders)

Post by Tanuki »

There is a new verison available that fixes several bug and add some new little features.
From now on I would suggest you guys to use the forum to be notified of the new releases, for that you just have to subscribe to the following post : "New versions"

Thank you very much.
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