Instanced mesh + custom depth material does not attach

[tommhuth]

When adding a custom depth material to an instanced mesh, the material never attaches, see this Codesandbox, using 8.6.2. I have gotten it to work previously with react-three-fiber v7.0.2. Am I missing something here? I would expect the console to log something as the material is in use.

[CodyJasonBennett]

It looks to be attaching to the mesh, just not compiling to fire the onBeforeCompiled hook. Can you share a working CSB to A/B with? It's difficult to debug lighting etc. otherwise.

[tommhuth]

I thought this would be easy to do as I have gotten this to work a while back, but surprisingly no matter what major version of R3F, React or Threejs I use, the custom depth material never seems to compile. I'll see if i can't dig deeper later tonight.

[armdz]

Hi ! Any news about this ? Im trying with a regular mesh and the compile never happends.

[drcmda]

if oncompile doesnt fire the material isn't being attached or used. i don't think there's an issue, i'm using onBeforeCompile daily. this is how you attach a custom material:

class SomeMaterial extends THREE.ShaderMaterial { ... }
extend({ SomeMaterial })


<mesh>
  <someMaterial />

oBC will fire before three compiles it. 🤷‍♂️

[drcmda]

it will attach properly, the material is there if you log it, i think that's all fiber can do.

<mesh>
  <fooMaterial attach="customDepthMaterial" />

is the same as

const mesh = new THREE.Mesh()
mesh.customDepthMaterial = new FooMaterial()

can it be that it just doesn't work with instanced meshes?

customDepthMaterial : Material
Custom depth material to be used when rendering to the depth map. Can only be used in context of meshes. When shadow-casting with a DirectionalLight or SpotLight, if you are modifying vertex positions in the vertex shader you must specify a customDepthMaterial for proper shadows. Default is undefined.