Steam Audio

[xN31]

Phonon Probe Volumes and trace interactions

Also, talking about a different issue: Phonon Probe Volumes do not have collision settings as other Volumes and this may be a problem with trace interactions used in the VR template for teleporting. Would it be possible to change the collision preset for this object?

[xN31]

Model normals

On a different topic: checked out the generated .obj in blender and all or most of the normals seem to be inverted. Is this a problem?
I’m experiencing a weird behaviour in the generation of the probes, using “Uniform Floor” as placement strategy, could the two issues be linked?

[xN31]

Phonon Probe Volumes and Probes placement

As concerns probes placement, as reported in a previous post I’m experiencing some unexpected behaviour:

In this case probes get placed only in the central part of the volume (above a table in the scene)

In this case they get placed outside the volume. Please note that this may be linked to the 45 deg rotation relative to the Z axis of the volume:

[anonymous_user_873d0c81]

@xN31;712309

As concerns probes placement, as reported in a previous post I’m experiencing some unexpected behaviour:

In this case probes get placed only in the central part of the volume (above a table in the scene)

In this case they get placed outside the volume. Please note that this may be linked to the 45 deg rotation relative to the Z axis of the volume:

At the moment, we only support axis-aligned volumes (no rotation). I figured at some point folks would try to align - will probably disable rotating the volume in the next release.

I’m not sure why your first situation would be happening. What do the other views look like (front, side), and is all geometry that we’re looking at tagged and exported?

[anonymous_user_873d0c81]

[QUOTE=
On a different topic: checked out the generated .obj in blender and all or most of the normals seem to be inverted. Is this a problem?
I’m experiencing a weird behaviour in the generation of the probes, using “Uniform Floor” as placement strategy, could the two issues be linked?
[/QUOTE]

We don’t put restrictions on which way the normals face, so that should not be a problem.

[anonymous_user_873d0c81]

@xN31;712246

Also, talking about a different issue: Phonon Probe Volumes do not have collision settings as other Volumes and this may be a problem with trace interactions used in the VR template for teleporting. Would it be possible to change the collision preset for this object?

Can you be more specific? If you actually encounter this problem I’m happy to look into it.

[xN31]

@freeman_valve;713493

At the moment, we only support axis-aligned volumes (no rotation). I figured at some point folks would try to align - will probably disable rotating the volume in the next release.

I’m not sure why your first situation would be happening. What do the other views look like (front, side), and is all geometry that we’re looking at tagged and exported?

Ok, I will try using volumes without rotation. If it can be useful I will PM you th e generated .obj for debugging, not all the geometry is tagged and exported, just floor, walls and the table.

[xN31]

@freeman_valve;713500

Can you be more specific? If you actually encounter this problem I’m happy to look into it.

Re: Phonon Probe Volumes and trace interactions

In general, if you use raycasts (https://docs.unrealengine.com/latest/INT/Gameplay/HowTo/UseRaycasts/Blueprints/) to find intersections with the scene’s static objects (e.g. using the node LineTraceForObjects) you may want to pass as objects the type “WorldStatic”, because this is the default object type for all static objects.

Since some volumes by default are WorldStatic too (e.g.NavMeshBoundVolume), if you don’t change the collision preset for the volume to NoCollision or to Custom + a different Object Type inside this volume the LineTraceForObjects would not work because it would always intersect with the volume. This is for example the case for the “teleportation” raycast used in the VR template.

The Phonon Probe Volumes seem to be WorldStatic too, and do not allow at the moment to change object type or collision preset (so at the moment the only solution is to change the object type of all the other objects in the scene). Please let me know if you need more specific details, or let me know if I am missing something obvious

[xN31]

@xN31;712244

So, using raycast. Did some more testing:

• Object A is a blueprint with a static mesh which plays a sound each time the object collides with something. I’ve tried using “Play sound at Location”, “Spawn Sound at Location” and “Spawn Sound Attached”, setting in any case the same attenuation (which includes steam occlusions). Occlusions do not seem to work properly (I hear the object hitting even when behind other objects)
• Object B is a similar blueprint, but with also an audio component attached with a looping sound (same attenuation). Looping sound works fine with occlusions, bump sounds no (e.g. throw the object, stop hearing the looping sound and then hear the bump)

Any idea why?

Also, when the looping sound is occluded, it gets completely muted even if I enable indirect sounds (e.g. add a real time reverb). Is this something expected?

@freeman_valve Any feedback about this?

Should sounds played with “Play sound at Location”, “Spawn Sound at Location” or “Spawn Sound Attached” be affected by occlusion too?

Does an occluded sound have any indirect contribution or occlusion blocks both direct and indirect components?

[anonymous_user_873d0c81]

@xN31;713611

Re: Phonon Probe Volumes and trace interactions

In general, if you use raycasts (https://docs.unrealengine.com/latest/INT/Gameplay/HowTo/UseRaycasts/Blueprints/) to find intersections with the scene’s static objects (e.g. using the node LineTraceForObjects) you may want to pass as objects the type “WorldStatic”, because this is the default object type for all static objects.

Since some volumes by default are WorldStatic too (e.g.NavMeshBoundVolume), if you don’t change the collision preset for the volume to NoCollision or to Custom + a different Object Type inside this volume the LineTraceForObjects would not work because it would always intersect with the volume. This is for example the case for the “teleportation” raycast used in the VR template.

The Phonon Probe Volumes seem to be WorldStatic too, and do not allow at the moment to change object type or collision preset (so at the moment the only solution is to change the object type of all the other objects in the scene). Please let me know if you need more specific details, or let me know if I am missing something obvious

Okay - great - I’ll take a look at this for 4.17. Thanks!

[anonymous_user_873d0c81]

@xN31;713615

@anonymous_user_873d0c81 Any feedback about this?

Should sounds played with “Play sound at Location”, “Spawn Sound at Location” or “Spawn Sound Attached” be affected by occlusion too?

Does an occluded sound have any indirect contribution or occlusion blocks both direct and indirect components?

Sounds played dynamically should work correctly with occlusion. I will do testing to see if I can reproduce these errors.

Occluded sounds have indirect contribution if you’re using source-centric reverb, but not if you’re using listener-centric reverb.

[xN31]

@freeman_valve;713493

At the moment, we only support axis-aligned volumes (no rotation). I figured at some point folks would try to align - will probably disable rotating the volume in the next release.

I’m not sure why your first situation would be happening. What do the other views look like (front, side), and is all geometry that we’re looking at tagged and exported?

Figured it out. The volumes used “Uniform Floor” placement strategy, but were placed above the floor (I thought they should encompass only the area where I wanted probes). Including the floor fixed the issue.

[xN31]

@freeman_valve;713638

Sounds played dynamically should work correctly with occlusion. I will do testing to see if I can reproduce these errors.

Occluded sounds have indirect contribution if you’re using source-centric reverb, but not if you’re using listener-centric reverb.

Ok, I was using listener centric reverb. With source centric reverb both occlusions on sounds played dynamically and indirect contribution for occluded sounds work properly, thanks.

[anonymous_user_040292ea]

@freeman_valve

Is there an extra step to make Steam Audio work on Gear VR?
All the builds i have tried with Steam Audio activated always result in it crashing.

To eliminate my current project as the problem i set up a fresh project and configured it for Gear VR, same result.

The builds did not have Occlusion enabled.

This is using UE 4.16.0 with the builds running on a Samsung S7 Edge (Android 7.0, Kernel 3.18.14-10422490)

[JoeWintergreen]

Am I missing something, or isn’t it a bit laborious to add PhononGeometryComponents to every single non-negligible-sized StaticMeshActor in a level? Any way to automate it?

[MADHOUSE]

@freeman_valve;710585

Hey xN31,

I’m aware of the issue and have a fix for it coming out in 4.17. There are a few functions that were incorrectly #ifdef’d to compile only with the editor. The only workaround currently is to compile the engine from GitHub and apply the patch.

Greetings! Do you have a link to the pull that fixes this issue?

[anonymous_user_873d0c81]

Am I missing something, or isn’t it a bit laborious to add PhononGeometryComponents to every single non-negligible-sized StaticMeshActor in a level? Any way to automate it?

The fastest way to export is to use the hierarchy: add an empty actor, attach the geometry component there, enable “export children,” and attach any other actors you want under it.

[anonymous_user_873d0c81]

@cybersnik;714317

@anonymous_user_873d0c81

Is there an extra step to make Steam Audio work on Gear VR?
All the builds i have tried with Steam Audio activated always result in it crashing.

To eliminate my current project as the problem i set up a fresh project and configured it for Gear VR, same result.

The builds did not have Occlusion enabled.

This is using UE 4.16.0 with the builds running on a Samsung S7 Edge (Android 7.0, Kernel 3.18.14-10422490)

4.16 only supports Win64. We are aiming to support Android in 4.17.

[JoeWintergreen]

@freeman_valve;714749

The fastest way to export is to use the hierarchy: add an empty actor, attach the geometry component there, enable “export children,” and attach any other actors you want under it.

This isn’t convenient for me so I did a quick blueprint which adds those components to every smactor above a certain size. Seems to work.

[anonymous_user_040292ea]

@freeman_valve;714751

4.16 only supports Win64. We are aiming to support Android in 4.17.

Are there any early builds with android support available for testing?