In this part, I mainly animate the growth of tree roots. The whole scene gradually brightens from pitch black. As a tree, the player can see that his roots are gradually expanding. The blue-green fluorescence represents the transmission of nutrients, and when the big tree is burned, nutrients and information will be passed to other young trees through the root system.
When the player looks around his root system back and forth through the VR headset, he will move along one of the growing root systems. With the extension of this tree root, the player will also switch to the next scene, which is the small tree that is being transmitted nutrition.
In Unity, I use the particle system to complete the animation of tree root growth, adjust the shape change of the root through the particle system curve, and control the growth speed and sequence of different root systems through the delay time.
After the player explores for 20 seconds on their own, I add an animation of the camera to follow the trail of tree roots growing, which allows the player to feel the nutrients being transported through the roots from the first perspective.
I use shader graphs to create the glowing effect of the nutrition, and give the ball a blue glowing material. I use the Sample Texture 2D, Multiply and Unlit Master modules in shader graphs, then adjust their connections according to the tutorial, and finally adjust the color of the illuminant.
Then I add animation and set the timeline of each small ball, in order to let them circulate along the root of the tree over time.
Video: https://youtu.be/yU4OwkgqeTw
