DoF effect from Code

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Hello.

I'm having a bit of trouble with the DoF effect. I'm trying to add the class as a component to my main camera at run time and set some of its settings.

 private DepthOfField mDOF;
 ...{other code here}...
 
 //Set up the DoF effect for the camera
 mDOF = mMyCamera.gameObject.AddComponent<DepthOfField>();
 mDOF.aperture = 0.5f;
 mDOF.focalSize = 0.0f;
 mDOF.focalLength = Vector3.Distance(mMyCamera.transform.position, mPlayer.CurrentPosition);
 mDOF.blurSampleCount = DepthOfField.BlurSampleCount.Medium;
 mDOF.enabled = true;

the problem is that I keep getting a null reference exception with the following; UnityStandardAssets.ImageEffects.DepthOfField.OnRenderImage

Am I missing something obvious or is it not possible to add the DoF component at run time?

thanks David

Answer 1

Best Answer

Answer by Naphier · Apr 19, 2016 at 10:33 PM

Apparently it needs shaders assigned to it. To determine what shaders I added the following line to DepthOfField.CheckResources() and I added the DOF effect. (Don't leave this in or you'll get spammed when playing the scene):

 Debug.LogFormat("dofHdrShader: {0}\ndx11BokehShader: {1}\ndofHdrMaterial: {2}\ndx11bokehMaterial: {3}", dofHdrShader, dx11BokehShader, dofHdrMaterial, dx11bokehMaterial);

That told me I needed to do this to instantiate this kind of component:

 UnityStandardAssets.ImageEffects.DepthOfField dof = Camera.main.gameObject.AddComponent<UnityStandardAssets.ImageEffects.DepthOfField>();
             dof.dofHdrShader = Shader.Find("Hidden/Dof/DepthOfFieldHdr");
             dof.dx11BokehShader = Shader.Find("Hidden/Dof/DX11Dof");
             dof.enabled = true;

And all seems to be just fine with it.

Caveat: If you want this to run in a build you will need to add those two shaders to the Graphic Settings "Always Included Shaders" section. The can be found in the "Standard Assets/Effects/Shaders/_DepthOfField" folder. The DepthOfFieldHdr is apparently names DepthOfFieldScatter.

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Riderfan · Apr 19, 2016 at 10:53 PM 0

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Thanks, that seems like the correct answer in that it makes the problem go away.

Still, I just wound up adding the DoF effect to the camera object in the inspector, disabling it, then getting a local instance and enabling it at run time.

I am really not a fan of adding components to game objects when I am only going to access them for a few seconds out of several minutes of play. I'm from the old school of "only create an object when you need to use it, and destroy it when you're done".

But adding at desgin time seems to be the best way to make this work.

thanks for looking into it though. I thought I was completely forgetting how to use AddComponent()

David

Naphier Riderfan · Apr 19, 2016 at 11:03 PM 0

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Yeah. If you're looking for easy then just add it in the editor and enable/disable when you don't need it. You could even have multiple disabled cameras to do all sorts of fancy stuff. Lots easier than trying to figure out what the heck Unity folks or doing under the hood.

DoF effect from Code

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