outline – Linden Reid

Rim Highlight in Unity

Hey y’all! Today, I have a quick tutorial on how to create the highlight effect featured in the gif above. I was inspired by artworks like this one by Loish which have strong rim highlights.

If you’re familiar with this tutorial on how to create a basic outline, then this technique will be super easy! However, that’s certainly not required reading 🙂

For your reference, here’s the link to the final code for the highlight shader. It also includes some custom diffuse lighting from this tutorial, but you really only need to look at the pass labeled “outline pass”!

On with the tutorial!

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Colored Outline Shader in Unity

It seems like I’m on a roll with outline shaders! I’ve already written a basic cel shader with outline tutorial and an animated dotted outline shader, and now I’m doing this colored outline.

The special thing about the color of this outline is that it’s using the color of the texture, so that the outline color always matches the pixel it’s closest to. I find it’s a common tool used by 2D artists to make outlines feel more natural, as opposed to using a solid color like black for the whole outline.

Here’s an example of the difference it makes with an example from 2D pixel art from u/croakiee on Reddit:

This tutorial teaches you how to do this effect in 3D.

IMPORTANT: Since I already went over the basics of how to do the outline here, I’m not going to repeat that explanation in this tutorial. Do the basic tutorial first if you’re not sure how to create an outline at all.

Here’s the full code for the shader for reference, under a non-commercial open-source license:

->> Link to full code for Unity Colored Outline Shader

Also, The 3D model is from this free asset pack.

Now, on with the tutorial!

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Animated Dotted Outline Shader in Unity

Earlier, I wrote a tutorial on how to create a cel shader with an outline effect. For the sake of not repeating that explanation, refer to that tutorial to learn how to draw the basic outline.

You can apply this outline effect to any kind of lighting or other shader properties, since it’s in its own pass.

Here’s the final code for you to reference:

–> Link to final code for Unity Dotted Outline Shader

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