Visual artefacts using object blur on animated skinned mesh

[HiFiHair]

Dear Amplify Creations,

Thank you for your wonderful Amplify Motion technology. I owe you the highest gratitude for your work developing it.

I wanted to post a support query regarding using Amplify Motion Object on a Unity skinned mesh which is animated with root motion applied.

I have a sample scene set up in Unity 5 using assets from Standard Assets. I've attached Amplify Motion to the game camera and Amplify Motion Object to an animated character.

This is what I see when I run a build and keep the camera static. Note the motion blur visible on the moving spheres in the background:



This is what I see when I force more blur with rapid camera movement:



I'm noticing visual artefacts on the skinned mesh. Whereas objects in the background, such as some mesh spheres moving under physics, appear uniformly blurred, the skinned mesh has blurring at the edges, but retains fine detail, such as shadows on the legs and arms. These details remain visible with strong clarity as the character animates, even if the camera is shaken throughout, producing a blur effect elsewhere. This gives the appearance that some parts of the character are not blurred.

Is there any advice you can give regarding how to mitigate these artefacts? Any assistance would be much appreciated!

[Ricardo Teixeira]

Hello Jonathan,

Thank you for using Amplify Motion, we really apreciate it. The effect does seem a bit exaggerated and somewhat incorrect, we would be happy to help debug it.

What AM values are you currently using? A Amplify Motion component screenshot would be great.

Do you see the same problem when using the Auto-Register option?

Thanks!

[HiFiHair]

Hi Ricardo,

Great to meet you. Thank you for your reply!

Here's a screenshot of the component stack on the main camera, including the Amplify Motion component and settings:



This might not be good practice, but I have both Auto Register Objs enabled on the Amplify Motion component together with Amplify Motion Object attached to the parent of the animated character (it's an unmodified copy of the "Ethan" model from Standard Assets).

I hope this information is helpful!

[HiFiHair]

Just thought I'd give this a little bump.

Ricardo, did you have any suggestions for how I could tweak my settings to mitigate this visual issue?

[Ricardo Teixeira]

Just thought I'd give this a little bump.

Ricardo, did you have any suggestions for how I could tweak my settings to mitigate this visual issue?

Hello Jonathan,

Thank you for getting in touch. I was able to recreate the issue, it seems to only happen with that specific character model. I'm not entirely sure what could be causing the problem but we will get back to you as soon as we have an update.

Thanks!

All the best,
Ricardo Teixeira
@amplifycreates

[Ricardo Teixeira]

Hi Ricardo,

Great to meet you. Thank you for your reply!

Here's a screenshot of the component stack on the main camera, including the Amplify Motion component and settings:



This might not be good practice, but I have both Auto Register Objs enabled on the Amplify Motion component together with Amplify Motion Object attached to the parent of the animated character (it's an unmodified copy of the "Ethan" model from Standard Assets).

I hope this information is helpful!

Thank you for the additional info. It's quite alright, the Auto Register Option will ignore objects that already contain the AM Object Script.

[Ricardo Teixeira]

Hello Jonathan,

After a couple of tests I believe we found a solution for the problem you described.

Cause: The camera near plane was set to 0.01, such a low value will likely degrade depth precision. Amplify Motion relies on depth for depth-base sample rejection; adjustable via the Depth Threshold value.

Solution 1: Set the near plane to 0.3.

Solution 2: Since the Depth Threshold relies on the camera range/depth precision, changing the value to 0.00025 should fix it.

Also recommended: Use post AA and place any Image Effects that might alter edge information after AM, such as Depth of Field for example.

We hope the information above helps, let us know if that is not the case.

Thanks!

[HiFiHair]

Hello Ricardo,

Thanks ever so much for getting back to me. I really appreciate your assistance in this matter.

I have updated the settings you suggested. Here is an image of the new component stack on the camera:



Unfortunately this doesn't seem to have produced the desired effect with the motion blur.

Here is a screenshot taken whilst moving the camera and observing the animated character, using the new settings:



The fine detail remains on the character's body. Additionally the general feel of the motion blur appears degraded compared to when using the previous settings. I'm now noticing banding on blur, giving it an undesirable wispy quality.

Sorry these steps don't appear to have solved the problem.

I'll continue to investigate my end. And please don't hesitate to let me know if you have further suggestions, I'm very happy to experiment!

Thanks again for all your help.

[Ricardo Teixeira]

Hello Jonathan,

Thank you for the feedback, our apologies for the inconvenience. Please try to change the Quality Mode to Standard and adjusting the Depth Threshold to => 0.0001; the SoftEdge mode needs to be reworked. The near plane value should really be as high as possible, depth precision related problems are very common with various image effects.

Let me know if that helps, alternatively send us your test scene and we will tweak the values.

Thanks!

[KRGraphics]

Hello Jonathan and Ricardo,

I have been testing Amplify Motion a lot since it's inception and I got the same blurring issues you are showing. First and foremost, your velocity scale is WAY too high... unless this character is Sonic the Hedgehog, you need to turn this down...

Here is my screenshot with Amplify Motion.



https://www.dropbox.com/s/je1t8vhtnljd1 ... t.jpg?dl=0

You have to sacrifice something in order to get the correct blurring, and motion blur is something that should be subtle... human do not move fast enough to create that kind of blur and realistically, you should use lower scales... the settings I have are a bit extreme, but in most scenarios, motion blur is subtle.