Add Footprints and Deep Marks

Global Snow marks the snow in two ways. Deep Marks dig into the Snow Accumulation of the Receivers. Surface Marks, the Footprints and the Collision Marks, are drawn on the snow and also work without the Snow Accumulation. This guide shows how to set them up for characters, animals, vehicles and a first person camera. To mark the snow from your own code, see Marks From a Custom Mover in Scripting Support.

Footprints for Bipeds

1. In the Footprints & Marks foldout, turn on Footprints > Enabled under Surface Marks.
2. Select the character and add the Global Snow Interaction component to its root, with Add Component > Effects > Global Snow Interaction.
3. On humanoid rigs the component finds the feet from the Animator. The top of its inspector shows Marks: footprints, 2 feet.
4. Enter Play mode and walk the character on the snow.

Each foot leaves its own print where it lands. To change the sole, how long the prints last, their size and how dark they are, use Texture, Duration, Scale and Obscurance under Footprints. See Surface Marks in Parameters.

Footprints for Animals

1. Turn on Footprints > Enabled as for bipeds, and add Global Snow Interaction to the root of the animal.
2. Press Detect Feet. On rigs that are not humanoid, it looks for bones named foot, paw or hoof, skips IK helper and target bones, and orders the feet left and right by name.
3. If the feet are not found, drag the foot or paw bones of the rig into Feet (skeleton bones): even entries are left feet, odd entries are right feet. Use the bones, not the GameObjects of the shoes or the colliders.
4. To give the animal its own print, assign a Sole Texture. The shape comes from the alpha channel with the toes at the top. Empty uses the Footprints texture of Global Snow.

Up to 7 sole textures of their own show next to the Footprints texture; more objects use the Footprints texture. See Global Snow Interaction for every option of the component.

Deep Marks in Snow

Deep Marks dig into the Snow Accumulation as deep as its Thickness, with raised rims and shadows.

1. In Snow Appearance, keep Snow Accumulation on with a Thickness above 0. It is on by default, with a Thickness of 0.15 m.
2. Press Add Terrains to add the terrains to the Receivers, and open List Receivers to drag other ground such as roads or roofs into the list.
3. In the Footprints & Marks foldout, turn on Deep Marks > Enabled.
4. Use a Performance Level other than Fastest, which turns off the Snow Accumulation.
5. Add Global Snow Interaction to each character or animal and set its Sink Depth: 1 reaches the ground, and a light animal needs a low value. Default 0.65.
6. Enter Play mode. Deep Marks work in Play mode, within about 34 m of the camera.

The marks fill back in after the Common Duration, and they are cleared when Snow or the Thickness reaches 0. See Snow Accumulation & Deep Marks and Deep Marks in Parameters. If no marks show, see Deep Marks do not appear.

Tracks for Vehicles

1. Add Global Snow Interaction to the root of the car or the motorcycle, the GameObject that has the Rigidbody.
2. The contact of each wheel collider with the ground leaves a mark every frame. With Deep Marks set up as above, the wheels dig ruts in the Snow Accumulation. Without them, turn on Collision Marks > Enabled under Surface Marks to draw the marks on the snow.
3. For a snowplow or a blade that pushes the snow away, turn on Plow Mode in the component. Its marks are as wide as the object and reach the ground.
4. For the body of the vehicle, take the scene snow off it and use the Moving Object Snow shader, as shown in Exclude Characters, Props and Effects.
5. For a vehicle you drive, keep Block Snow/Rain off in its Global Snow Ignore Coverage and turn on Include Transparents, so its windows fade in the whiteout like the rest of the vehicle.

For a vehicle without wheel colliders, such as a sled, mark the snow from a script with MarkTrail(), or register it with AddContactSource() so its shape digs Deep Marks. See Marks From a Custom Mover and Deep Marks From Any Object.

First Person Camera

1. In the Footprints & Marks foldout, turn on Footprints > Enabled.
2. Under Surface Marks, set First Person > Mode. Character Controller stamps steps while the Character Controller is grounded. Ray Cast, the default, checks the ground with a ray down from the camera.
3. With Character Controller, assign the Character Controller of the player in the Character Controller field.
4. With Ray Cast, set Ray Origin if the ray must start from another Transform than the camera, and Max Ground Distance, the longest distance from the ray origin to the ground. Default 1.

In Play mode the camera, or the Ray Origin, leaves one sole per step on alternate sides. The first person steps need Footprints on, also when Deep Marks are on.

Next Steps

• Parameters - every Footprints & Marks option.
• Scripting Support (C#) - marks, footprints and impacts from code.
• Troubleshooting - footprints or marks that do not appear.