Vertex Animation

Vertex Animation displaces mesh vertices in the shader’s vertex stage, GPU-side, with zero CPU overhead. Genesis ships more than seventeen pre-built modes covering wind on foliage, pulses on magic crystals, jelly wobbles on slimes, and ripples on water surfaces, each maskable by vertex color or texture.

Video

A foliage patch swaying under the Wind mode while a nearby slime jiggles under the Jelly mode, both deforming smoothly with correctly relit normals.

features/vertex-animation/vertex-anim-overview.mp4

Wind sway on foliage and a Jelly wobble on a slime, both GPU-driven.

When to use it

Foliage and trees — wind sway driven by vertex color.
Magic crystals and runes — a pulsing scale or twist.
Water surfaces — ripple and wave modes on a plane.
Slimes and blobs — jelly and wobble for organic movement.

Normals are recomputed analytically

Each mode includes an analytic normal derivative so lighting tracks the deformed mesh. If you write a custom mode, recompute the normals or the shading reads wrong on moving surfaces.

Modes

Genesis bundles more than seventeen modes. The most-used are Wind (gusting sway for foliage), Pulse (uniform scale oscillation), Wave (a sinusoidal traveling wave), Bounce (vertical periodic offset), Wobble, Jelly (spring-mass damped wobble), Ripple (radial wave from a point), Twist (axial rotation along height), Squash, and Bend. Sway, Vibrate, Flow, Wiggle, Breathe, Shake, and combinations round out the set.

Animated GIF

A grid of identical spheres each running a different vertex animation mode — Wind, Pulse, Wave, Bounce, Jelly, Ripple, Twist, Squash, Bend — looping so the distinct motion of each mode is visible, with mode names labelled.

features/vertex-animation/vertex-anim-modes.gif

A sampling of the built-in modes, each looping on an identical sphere.

Properties

Inspector label	Shader property	Type	Default	Description
Mode	_VertexAnimMode	Enum	Off	Off, Wind, Pulse, Wave, Bounce, Wobble, Jelly, Ripple, Twist, Squash, Bend, Sway, Vibrate, Flow, Wiggle, Breathe, or Shake.
Amplitude	_VertexAnimAmplitude	Float (0–2)	0.05	Displacement strength in world units.
Frequency	_VertexAnimFrequency	Float (0–10)	1.0	Oscillation rate in Hz.
Direction	_VertexAnimDirection	Vector4	(0,1,0,0)	Axis or seed direction (mode-dependent).
Mask Source	_VertexAnimMask	Enum	VertexR	VertexR/G/B/A or a texture mask.
Mask Texture	_VertexAnimMaskTex	Texture2D	white	Optional UV mask alternative to vertex color.
Phase Offset	_VertexAnimPhase	Float (0–1)	0.0	Per-instance phase offset; randomize via MaterialPropertyBlock.

Usage

Pick a Mode that matches the desired motion.
Paint vertex color R as the per-vertex amplitude, or assign a texture mask.
Set Amplitude in world units and Frequency in Hz — wind around 0.1m at 0.5Hz, jelly around 0.05m at 3Hz.
Vary Phase Offset per instance via MaterialPropertyBlock so a forest does not sway in lockstep.


material.SetFloat("_VertexAnimMode", 1); // Wind
material.SetFloat("_VertexAnimAmplitude", 0.12f);
material.SetFloat("_VertexAnimFrequency", 0.5f);

Tips & gotchas

Vertex animation runs after skinning, so it stacks on top of bone deformation; watch the amplitude on tight rigs.
Static batching strips per-renderer phase — use GPU instancing for forests.
Cost is 1–4 ALU per mode, cheap, but high-poly meshes amplify it.
Vertex animation is per-eye consistent in VR with no special handling.

Vertex Colors — drive per-vertex amplitude.
UV Animation — the fragment-side animation cousin.
Mesh Utility — paint amplitude masks.
Animation API — drive parameters from script.