Detail this asset from Unity Store: Original Link
This is a paid asset, but now you can download Simple LOD Free.
Simple LOD v1.6
Merge skinned and non-skinned meshes.
Create atlases.
Remove hidden triangles.
Decimate meshes.
Create LOD levels with 1 or 2 mouse clicks.
Recognize this problem?
You downloaded a model. It looks great, but is way too heavy for it’s purpose.
SimpleLOD fixes this problem in a very easy way: By merging skinned and non-skinned meshes, by baking atlases and by generating the LOD meshes for you. Your GameObject is operational with just a few mouse clicks.
Merge meshes
Bake atlases
Remove hidden triangles
Generate LOD levels
Reduce triangles
Reduce draw calls
Supports skinned meshes
Can run in background thread
The name “SimpleLOD” only refers to how easy it is to use it. There is nothing “Simple” about it’s functionality or it’s performance.
SimpleLOD does a pretty good job at reducing the triangles in your meshes and it combines meshes and sub meshes to reduce draw calls. Depending on the complexity and shape of the original mesh, the end result may have less than half the triangles with no visible changes. When you ramp up the compression for higher LOD levels, the reduction goes much further than that. Up close you may notice differences, but when viewed from the distance that goes with the LOD level, the model will still look great. It is recommended to play with the compression levels for optimal results.
Baking a texture atlas for your merged gameobject has suddenly become a very easy process as well. Simply drag & drop materials or textures and the atlas gets baked on the spot. In the background it creates identical atlases for normal maps, specular maps, etc.
There are many mesh combine packages, many mesh decimators and many atlas baking packages, but SimpleLOD combines this all in 1 product and…..”
– it produces very good compression results,
– bakes atlases for normal maps,
– supports skinned meshes,
– support models bigger than 64K vertices,
– runs entirely inside Unity (no external services),
– has all C# source code included (no dll)
– and can be used at runtime (also in background thread) as well as in the editor.
With SimpleLOD you can have an avatar model, apply several clothes meshes to it, add non-skinned meshes to the bones (like weapons or a helmet), combine it all into 1 skinned mesh, bake atlases and generate decimated meshes for LOD levels.
Of course the end result would still be better when you model everything by hand. But not everyone is a master 3D modeler and sometimes models are procedurally created at runtime. This package is for those people that want an easy solution for a complex problem.
Like all other Orbcreation packages, it has online documentation.
YouTube demonstration video.
Online webplayer demo (also included).
Read the full release notes.
Version 1.5e:
Perserve hierarchy when using LODGroup
Version 1.5d:
– Code changes for compatibility with Unity 4.6, 5.0, 5.1 and 5.2
Version 1.5c:
– Making textures readable triggered an error when using the new standard shader
Version 1.5b.:
– skinned meshes with blendshapes would cause Unity 5 to crash
Version 1.5a.:
– fixed a bug that would cause atlas window to flicker
Version 1.5.:
– new interface
– new tools for merging, removing submeshes, and removing hidden triangles
Version 1.4.:
– massive performance increase
Version 1.3.:
– drag & drop material editor for baking atlas
– enhanced control panel with more options
– improved inspector panel that shows camera distance
Version 1.2.:
– Improved support for skinned meshes
– Improved compression algorithm
– Auto-split merged meshes over 64K vertices
– Supports lightmaps, uv3, uv4 and vertex colors
– Supports blend shapes (in 1 mesh, LOD 0 only)
Version 1.1.:
– Increased performance by 2.5
– Removes small parts invisible at big distances
– Prevents UV stretching