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ToolkitBillboarding

Billboarding

The master billboarding utility — the camera-facing behaviour behind Wisp, packaged so you can use it in your own shaders.

Making a quad face the camera is the easy half. The hard half is what happens when the camera climbs above it, and that’s what this is for.

Facing behaviours

A billboard is convincing until you look at it from the wrong angle. Past a threshold you choose, it can respond in one of four ways:

Always faceThe classic. The model tracks the camera at every angle.
PushPast the threshold the model starts rotating with the camera, flattening progressively rather than spinning on the spot. Best for grass and ground clutter seen from above.
Camera alignedPast the threshold it lies flat, scaled so the transition doesn’t read as a size change.
StretchNo threshold — the model eases toward flat continuously as you rise. The smoothest option when the camera moves vertically a lot.

Each takes a threshold you set, so you decide where “the wrong angle” begins for your art.

Axis handling

Billboards authored around either axis are supported directly. You don’t rotate the mesh to change orientation — which would rotate the texture with it — so a texture painted upright stays upright and unmirrored.

Two lines to add to a shader: one to bring it in, one to call it. Behaviour is configured where you bring it in, so it costs nothing to have options you aren’t using.

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