Mold: a real-time vector graphics library

[dklassic]

Hi everyone,

I’m making a real-time vector graphics library for Godot (free non-commercial version available):

Mold: vector graphics library by DK Liao

I’m personally working on a game that was rendered exclusively with 2D/3D primitives, and I always had this problem with engines, Godot and Unity alike, that for some reason these functionality weren’t built-in. Personally I would love to have something that allows me to “just draw a [insert shape] here.”

So I made it myself, and here are some rundown on the features:

• Abundance of 2D/3D geometry primitives. If it’s not in here, just tell me the name I’ll add it in!
• Capability of creating rounded 3D geometry, and can cheaply create different primitives by deforming through vertex shader.
• A monolithic MoldNode3D that can draw any shape you wanted, and will be batched into the efficient renderer in runtime.
• Linear or Catmull–Rom polyline centerlines, using MoldPolyline, with GPU backend available​ for cheap animating.
• Polygon with arbitrary vertices color interpolation, using MoldPolygon, with GPU backend available for cheap animating.
• A nice code centric API to create geometry so you don’t need to leave your IDE or Godot to make asset, and no Node overhead is needed so it can run blazingly fast.
• Using MultiMesh on Godot for efficient rendering.
• Abundance of color blending mode for all 2D/3D geometry primitives, and supports Oklab colorspace blending.
• Automatic dithering cross fade for 3D primitives.
• Designed around retained mode, but immediate mode API is also available with editor preview support.

Mold: vector graphics library for Godot (and Unity)

Anyways if these sounds useful, please do try it out! You can grab it free on itch for non-commercial projects.

[dklassic]

Just for reference, this is what my game looked like hence the need for massive 2D/3D primitives rendering:

[Toxe]

Oh, that looks great!

Edit: Yeah, this looks super interesting.

[Vachivenza]

This looks amazing, it would also indirectly help with debugging stuff too!

[dklassic]

DebugDraw3D would probably be much suited for that (since they have wireframe) but I guess there’s no stopping from using this to do the same!

Debug Draw 3D (4.4.1+) - Godot Asset Library

[dklassic]

Added a last minute addition: procedural strokes! I think I’m pretty happy with the whole feature set right now and maybe it’s time to wrap up for a full release.

[renevanderark]

Looks amazing!

Do you see any opportunity to combine / integrate functionality from Scalable Vector Shapes 2D as well?

Maybe some of the freehand drawing and converting polyline to bézier curves is useful to do in your tool?

Or the svg Importer code?

Link to the Github repository

[dklassic]

Mold did implement its own curve editor, as for SVG that’s cool but I think it’s out of scope atm.

Plus Mold is being maintained as a cross-engine library across Godot-Unity, so I’d rather not add too much complications outside of the premise of being an easy to use shape drawer thingy, for now.

[renevanderark]

@dklassic

Plus Mold is being maintained as a cross-engine library across Godot-Unity, so I’d rather not add too much complicatio

That’s cool. I may want to experiment with mold myself one of these days, I’ll contact you if/when I see time.

[gamesmetrics]

Thanks for sharing! This looks like a powerful tool.

[dklassic]

Implemented some final additions, with native Control node for UI instead of the hacky way of reusing the same 3D nodes previously. Feels like quite ready for a full release now.

[Vachivenza]

Yo this is huge!! You’re cooking up something amazing here, thanks a lot for taking your time to share it as well.

[dklassic]

Made some new much cooler example scenes to better showoff how far Mold can be pushed!

I hope these can make it easier for people to realize Mold is really capable of shipping a game on its own haha

[kraasch]

For people to easily use your assets it would also be nice to see the license explicitly stated.

[dklassic]

What do you mean? Isn’t it already explicitly stated in both the original post and the itch page?

[kraasch]

Maybe you have been clear enough, but I just don’t understand, but I want to try clarify.

@dklassic

in both the original post and the itch page

I meant the itch page’s license statement, because that’s where people would want to look for it.

So, I’m not an expert on licenses, nor a lawyer, but I was reading this:

Mold is currently under development, for any pre-release versions you’re free to use it to develop any commercial/non-commercial projects.
Once the development is complete, Mold is planned to be a paid release, but you can keep using the licensed pre-release versions as is without issue.

Maybe there is something I’m missing – wouldn’t be the first time --, but as I see this statement is a bit weak in two points.

[…] you’re free to use it to develop any commercial/non-commercial projects.

Firstly, what does free mean here and what does use mean? What are the exact freedoms you are granting the user? The discussion of the meaning of what free means is a common one (as in free beer or free as in free speech, etc). As a user of your software this makes me ask what is actually granted: altering the software, re-distributing, offering commercial support for the software or making it a technical part of another software, etc.

For established licenses these permissions, limitations and conditions are usually well known (like MIT). So for me as a user it is always nice if someone can point me to a well-known license.

[…] keep using the licensed pre-release versions as is without issue.

Secondly, this statement would be not necessary if the first one would be clear. This statement is just adding another way to interpret the first and makes it a bit vague. Again the question would be what does use mean and now on top of that the question arises what does without issue mean.

I didn’t mean to bother you and I find it cool that even such a project will be released in any way that is intended to make it accessible.

[dklassic]

You are correct about everything, as in there is no “well-known license pointed to”, because Mold is proprietary. It’s currently released with source available but the license is proprietary.

There’s a license file within the zipped files with “legally clear wordings” which made people confused, so that’s why I had to write those “layman’s term” repeating descriptions out here in case people get confused about what it truly entails.

Which is extra funny to me that it then confuses you haha but hey but if you need a clearer read it’s in the license file.

[kraasch]

@dklassic

if you need a clearer read it’s in the license file

Thanks for pointing that out!

[Vachivenza]

Yo this is insane! Everything shown in the gif is created using Mold??

[dklassic]

To be fair those are some extreme ways to make a game, probably only people like me who don’t poses the ability to use modeling software would think this is a good idea haha.

But I do want some cool looking “marketing materials” and I just think it would be dishonest to show any footage containing non-Mold asset. So that’s an intended limitation and challenge to myself while also being able to show that Mold is seriously capable of shipping a game on its own instead of just being a play thing or an UI tool.