💎 vscode-glsl-canvas

The extension opens a live WebGL preview of GLSL shaders within VSCode by providing a Show glslCanvas command.

It use glsl-canvas a modified and improved version of glslCanvas javascript library from Book of Shaders and glslEditor made by Patricio Gonzalez Vivo.

Now supporting WebGL2. just add #version 300 es at the very start of the file.

Now supporting nested includes with relative paths.

Optimized video recording options, with record size and duration. Choose between MediaRecorderApi or CCapture for high quality compression.

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Run ⌘ ⇧ P on mac os, ctrl ⇧ P on windows.
Then type Show glslCanvas command to display a fullscreen preview of your fragment shader.

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Features

• Both supports WebGL and WebGL2. Automatically create WebGL2 context by adding #version 300 es as the first line of file.
• Integrated support of error handling with lines hilight.
• Drawing modes: flat, box, sphere, torus and mesh with default mesh.
• Mesh loader and parser for .obj format.
• Vertex in fragment with VERTEX macro.
• Multiple buffers with BUFFER macro.
• Play / pause functionality.
• Recording and exporting to .webm video with resolution and duration settings, using MediaRecorder or CCapture for high quality video.
• Activable stats.js performance monitor.
• Custom uniforms.
• Activable gui for changing custom uniforms at runtime.
• Export to html page with live reload.
• Glsl code formatter standard and compact mode.
• Glsl Snippets.

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Attributes

The attributes provided are a_position, a_normal, a_texcoord, a_color.

Type	Property
vec4	a_position
vec4	a_normal
vec2	a_texcoord
vec4	a_color

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Uniforms

The uniforms provided are u_resolution, u_time, u_mouse, u_camera and u_trails[10].

Type	Property
vec2	u_resolution
float	u_time
vec2	u_mouse
vec3	u_camera
vec2[10]	u_trails[10]

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WebGL Extensions

You can include any supported WebGL extension through the glsl-canvas.extensions array option modifying the workspace's settings.json file.

{
    "glsl-canvas.extensions": [
		"EXT_shader_texture_lod"
	]
}

You can then enable the extension in the shader

#extension GL_EXT_shader_texture_lod : enable  

vec3 color = texture2DLodEXT(u_texture, st, 0.0).rgb;

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WebGL2

For WebGL2 context creation just add #version 300 es at the very start of the file.

no other characters allowed before macro!

#version 300 es

precision mediump float;

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IO Buffers

You can use shader buffers by requiring definition with #ifdef or defined directly in .glsl code.
Just ask for BUFFER_N definition and a u_bufferN uniform will be created for you:

uniform sampler2D u_buffer0;

#ifdef BUFFER_0

void main() {
    vec4 color = texture2D(u_buffer0, uv, 0.0);
    ...
    gl_FragColor = color;
}

#else

void main() {
    vec4 color = texture2D(u_buffer0, uv, 0.0);
    ...
    gl_FragColor = color;
}

#endif

Playground

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Textures

You can define the texture channels (u_texture_0, u_texture_1, ...) by modifying the workspace's settings.json file.

{
    "glsl-canvas.textures": {
        "0": "./texture.png",
        "1": "https://rawgit.com/actarian/plausible-brdf-shader/master/textures/noise/cloud-1.png",
        "2": "https://rawgit.com/actarian/plausible-brdf-shader/master/textures/noise/cloud-2.jpg",        
    }
}

As of today VSCode do not support video element or audio element. You can use video texture with the Export to html feature.

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u_camera

u_camera is a vec3 array with coordinates for an orbital camera positioned at world zero, useful for raymarching.

Playground

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u_trails[10]

u_trails[10] is a vec2 array with stored inertia mouse positions for mouse trailing effects.

Playground

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Custom Uniforms

You can also define custom uniforms by modifying the workspace's settings.json file.

{
    "glsl-canvas.uniforms": {
        "u_strength": 1.0
    }
}

Types supported are float, vec2, vec3 and vec4. Vectors structures are converted from arrays of floats. Range values goes from 0.0 to 1.0.

Type	Property
float	"u_float": 1.0,
vec2	"u_vec2": [1.0, 1.0],
vec3	"u_vec3": [1.0, 1.0, 1.0],
vec4	"u_vec4": [1.0, 1.0, 1.0, 1.0],

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Uniforms Gui

By clicking the option button you can view and modify at runtime uniforms via the dat.gui interface.

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Export to html

You can export your shader, assets and uniforms to an html page with livereload for testing in browser.

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Color Picker

Waiting for a more customizable code inset feature, vec3 and vec4 arrays can be modified with the integrated color picker.

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Including dependent files with #include

You can now include other GLSL code using a traditional #include "file.glsl" macro.

// example
#include "common/uniforms.glsl"
#include "common/functions.glsl"

void main(){

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Antialias

Enables or disables antialias in the WebGL context.

{
    "glsl-canvas.antialias": false
}

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Change detection

You can set the timeout change detection option by modifying the workspace's settings.json file.

{
    "glsl-canvas.timeout": 0
}

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Refresh on save

Enables or disables refreshing the glslCanvas when saving the document.

{
    "glsl-canvas.refreshOnSave": true
}

Refresh on change

Enables or disables refreshing the glslCanvas when changing the document.

{
    "glsl-canvas.refreshOnChange": true
}

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Use formatter

Enables or disables glsl code formatter.

{
    "glsl-canvas.useFormatter": true
}

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Use compact formatter

Enables or disables glsl code formatter compact mode.

{
    "glsl-canvas.useCompactFormatter": false
}

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Install on export

Enables or disables installing the Npm packages on export.

{
    "glsl-canvas.installOnExport": true
}

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Record duration

Specify automatic recording duration in seconds. Set to 0 to disable this feature.

{
    "glsl-canvas.recordDuration": 10
}

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Record width

Specify canvas recording width in pixels. Default value is 1024.

{
    "glsl-canvas.recordWidth": 1024
}

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Record height

Specify canvas recording height in pixels. Default value is 1024.

{
    "glsl-canvas.recordHeight": 1024
}

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Fragment shader

An example of fragment shader. You can copy paste this code in an empty .glsl file:

precision mediump float;

uniform vec2 u_resolution;
uniform vec2 u_mouse;
uniform float u_time;

void main() {
    vec2 st = gl_FragCoord.xy / u_resolution.xy;
    st.x *= u_resolution.x / u_resolution.y;

    vec3 color = vec3(0.0);
    color = vec3(st.x, st.y, abs(sin(u_time)));

    gl_FragColor = vec4(color, 1.0);
}

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Glsl snippets

Snippet	Purpose
glsl.animation	Staggered animations
glsl.modifiers.blend	Blend functions
glsl.modifiers.boolean	Boolean functions
glsl.colors	Colors palette
glsl.coords	Pixel units utility functions
glsl.drawing	Signed distance drawing methods
glsl.ease.back.in	Ease equation back in
glsl.ease.bounce.in	Ease equation bounce in
glsl.ease.circular.in	Ease equation circular in
glsl.ease.cubic.in	Ease equation cubic in
glsl.ease.elastic.in	Ease equation elastic in
glsl.ease.expo.in	Ease equation expo in
glsl.ease.quad.in	Ease equation quad in
glsl.ease.quart.in	Ease equation quart in
glsl.ease.quint.in	Ease equation quint in
glsl.ease.sine.in	Ease equation sine in
glsl.main.new	Main function, uniforms & utils
glsl.core.object	Object struct with distance and color
glsl.shapes.2d.arc	Shape 2D arc
glsl.shapes.2d.circle	Shape 2D circle
glsl.shapes.2d.grid	Shape 2D grid
glsl.shapes.2d.hex	Shape 2D hexagon
glsl.shapes.2d.line	Shape 2D line
glsl.shapes.2d.pie	Shape 2D pie
glsl.shapes.2d.plot	Shape 2D plot
glsl.shapes.2d.poly	Shape 2D poly
glsl.shapes.2d.rect	Shape 2D rect
glsl.shapes.2d.roundrect	Shape 2D roundrect
glsl.shapes.2d.segment	Shape 2D segment
glsl.shapes.2d.spiral	Shape 2D spiral
glsl.shapes.2d.star	Shape 2D star
glsl.modifiers.tile	Tiling function
glsl.units	Pixel unit conversion function

Snippets library documentation and playgrounds here.

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Requirements

• A graphics card supporting WebGL.

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Todo

• Glsl 3d snippets.

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Contributing

Pull requests are welcome and please submit bugs 🐞

Thank you for taking the time to provide feedback and review. This feedback is appreciated and very helpful 🌈

• Github Project Page
• Visual Studio Marketplace

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Contact

• Luca Zampetti lzampetti@gmail.com
• Follow @actarian on Twitter

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Release Notes

Changelog here.