Tool Presets

Build it once. Use it everywhere.

Dash includes many powerful tools, and the Preset system makes them even easier to reuse.

When you create a Dash tool setup you like, you can save it as a preset, including the input meshes. You can then reuse that preset later and instantly recreate the same setup in any scene.

Presets make it easy to build reusable workflows and avoid rebuilding the same setups over and over.

Presets Basics

Single Tool Presets

When you have created a tool you are happy with, it's incredibly easy to save it in a preset that you can re-use later. If it's your first preset of tool X, you will find it in the tool menu, and if you already have some presets of tool X, the preset button is right next to the tool name. In the preset creation window, you can add some basic info such as name, category, description, search tags, and thumbnail. And then there are two important settings:

1. Preset Scope: Here, you decide if the preset shall be local or global. Local presets are saved and accessible only in this project, while the global presets are saved in the AppData folder and are thus accessible from any UE project.

2. Include Interconnected Tools: This means that if your tool is connected to another tool, for example, through Proximity Mask or scattering on another Scatter, all interconnected tools will be included in your preset.

The Preset System not only makes it easier to create things with Dash, but it also lets you combine tools through our Compound System and basically create new complex tools where the existing Dash tools become building blocks.

Compound Presets

The compound system of Dash can, of course, also be used with the Preset System. So let's say you have created a forest with 3 Surface Scatters and 2 Path Scatters, then you can add the key settings from each into a Compound by right-clicking on the properties, name the compound Forest, and then create a preset of this forest directly from the Compound tool. Then, if you use the Forest compound from the preset list of compounds, all your 3 Surface Scatters and 2 Path Scatters will be re-created exactly how you saved them.

When creating presets and especially compounds, one should not forget about the Reference System. With this, you can right-click on any property in any Dash tool and convert it to a reference, and then you can right-click on another property, in the same or different tool, and connect this to the same reference. And this basically means that you can control several Dash settings through one property. For example, if you have three Surface Scatters, you can link them together through References for their scales, input surfaces, or densities, etc. And if you then add the references to a compound, they appear as Shared Properties, giving you maximal control and structure in your Compounds.

If you are unsure which tools are connected before you create your preset, you can open the Tool Graph from the tool menu to check what is connected to your tool.

More info on Compounds and References is available in the Getting Started Guide.

Here we have 1 Surface Scatter (Foliage), 1 Path Scatter (Lamps), and 1 Road tool. And then we firstly create a reference of the Road Width, and then connect the Parallel Width Distance of the Path Scatter to the same reference. This makes sure we can control both together. We then add this reference and also the density value of my Surface Scatter to a Compound, which we then create a preset out of.

Using Presets

You can see all your presets for any given tool by clicking the Preset Icon next to the tool name in the Tools Panel. For compounds, simply create a Compound from the Tools Panel and then click the Preset icon. To use a preset, simply select it in the pop-up list. This will re-create the preset at the same exact location where it was created. So if you aren't seeing it directly, select the tool that was created in the outlier and press F to focus on it in the viewport.

If you need to move a Preset result with all its dependencies, you can find an option, Select Movable Objects, in the tool menu. This will select all relevant parts of your tool and let you move them all at once without breaking the results. This option is also available in the Compound Tools.

In order for the presets to spawn the input meshes like scatter objects and surfaces, they have to exist in the exact same location in your project as they did when you created the preset. If they don't, the tools will still spawn but empty, so then you have to assign some input objects to the tools to see some actual results in the viewport.

Once you have spawned a preset, you can, of course, continue to adjust it however you like, including replacing any or all of the input meshes. And then, after some changes, you can save it as another preset. And as we expect most users to create a fair amount of presets to improve their UE5 workflows even further, we have also added all your presets to the Dash Content Browser.

Preset Library

To make it easy to browse, search, and use all your presets, we have now included a preset library in the Dash Content Browser. Once you find a preset you want to use, simply drag and drop it into your viewport. When your preset has appeared in the viewport, all the relevant dependencies are automatically selected so you can easily move it to the perfect spot.

You can right-click on any of your presets to delete them or change their details, such as the name, category, description, search tags, and thumbnail. And to make sure there is some structure in your Preset Library, you can expand the right side folder tree and see that your presets are separated by Local vs Global and by your own Categories you have added in your presets. And at the top of the folder tree, you will also see a folder called Built-In.

Drawable Presets

Draw presets directly in the viewport, with full control over shape and scale.

All presets that have the draw icon in the top right corner can be drawn in your environments by holding CTRL when dragging your presets into your scene. Then select Draw Preset, draw the curve, hit the STOP button, and see your preset appear in your scene.

Creating Drawable Presets

Single Tool Presets

All single tool presets from Surface Scatter, Path Scatter, Road Tool, Cable Tool, and Quick Pipe are by default drawable. So just save such a preset, and you will see it appear in the Preset Library with the draw icon in its corner.

When you draw a Surface Scatter preset, the area you draw will be used in the Object Mask to confine your scatter to this specific area. And all the surfaces/meshes under your curve will be used as Surfaces in the scatter.

When you draw a Path-based preset, such as Path Scatter, Road Tool, Cable Tool, or Quick Pipe, the results will use your drawn curve as the input Curve.

Compound Presets

Compound presets can seem more complex, as here you are in control of which containers/settings are used in the drawing process. But it is fairly simple! If you're saving a compound preset and want to be able to draw it, you need to first fill in the basic preset information and then switch to the tab "Make it drawable". Here you will see three containers, the first being the Curve Container, which is mandatory for a drawable preset. If you are using a Path-based preset, here you should drag and drop your Curve container. If you are using a Surface Scatter-based preset, you should drag and drop your Object Mask container from the main Surface Scatter.

The second is the optional Surface Container. For Path-based presets (Road Tool or Path Scatter), you can drop the Projection Mask container if you want the results to conform to the surface when you later draw the preset. For Surface Scatter-based presets, you must drop the Surface Container if you want to draw your preset. And the third and last, Containers to Discard, is also optional and only needed for very specific presets. For example, if you have created a preset of any type and used a proximity mask, you should then drag and drop the Proximity Mask Objects container here. By doing this, you make sure that you can still drag and drop your preset and keep the original look with the proximity mask, and also draw the preset in any other shape/form without having the proximity mask object affect the results.

Examples

Here is a Surface Scatter compound preset example; It has 4 Surface Scatters that all have their surfaces, and object masks linked through the reference system. And then it also uses the middle curve as a proximity mask for the trees and the big rocks, but this will be added as a "Containers to Discard".

Here is a Path Scatter-based compound preset; It uses two Path Scatters, one for the pillars and one for the wooden floor, and one Surface Scatter for the foliage on the pillars. Both Path Scatters are linked together using references for their curves and their projection masks.

Built-in Presets

In order to make it even easier for Dash users to get started creatively, we have also included 50+ built-in presets in the new Preset Library. You can filter these by expanding the right folder view in the preset library.

This collection is a mix of one-tool presets and compound presets that are all free to use however you like. So once you have dropped a Dash preset, you can adjust any of the settings and replace the placeholder meshes with any of your own meshes.

Huge thanks to Quaternius for creating and sharing some awesome CC0 assets that became perfect preset placeholder meshes. Check out all other Quaternius assets right here: https://quaternius.com/index.html

Below you can find all the currently included Dash presets that are available in Dash 1.10.0 and later.

Single Tool Presets

Presets using one tool instance.

Surface Scatter

Preset

Rocks_Noise

Tools

Surface Scatter

Description

Rocks scattered with a noise mask using Surface Scatter.

Preset

Bushes_Proximity

Tools

Surface Scatter

Description

Bushes around a rock using a Surface Scatter with proximity mask.

Preset

Basic_Forest

Tools

Surface Scatter

Description

A tree Surface Scatter confined with curves through Object and Proximity Mask.

Preset

Moss_Rock

Tools

Surface Scatter

Description

Moss scattered on a rock using Surface Scater with a noise mask.

Radial Scatter

Preset

Rock_Tower

Tools

Radial Scatter

Description

A Radial sScatter that stacks rocks in a tower-like shape. And it uses a proximity mask with a sphere.

Preset

Stone_Stairs

Tools

Radial Scatter

Description

A Radial Scatter that uses the Height setting to create a staircase out of a stone asset.

Preset

Circular_Garden

Tools

Radial Scatter

Description

A Radial Scatter that scatters flowers in concentric circles. An Proximity Mask curve creates the path.

Path Scatter

Preset

Tree_Avenue

Tools

Path Scatter

Description

A Path Scatter that scatters trees along a curve to create an avenue. It uses Parallel Width and Proximity Mask.

Preset

Cliff_Canyon

Tools

Path Scatter

Description

A Path Scatter that scatters rocks along two curves to create a canyon. It also uses some Jitter and Random Spin.

Preset

Hanging_Vines

Tools

Path Scatter

Description

Vines scattered on a wall along a curve. Using Path Scatter.

Preset

Farm_Fence

Tools

Path Scatter

Description

A single Path Scatter that places an fence asset along a curve.

Preset

Fence

Tools

Path Scatter

Description

A single Path Scatter that places an standing plank asset along a curve.

Preset

Pillar_Fence

Tools

Path Scatter

Description

A single Path Scatter that places a pillar and a plank assets in a fixed pattern along a curve.

Preset

Wooden_Pathway

Tools

Path Scatter

Description

A single Path Scatter that places an laying plank asset along a curve.

Preset

Tools

Description

Grid Scatter

Preset

Rock_Wall

Tools

Grid Scatter

Description

A Grid Scatter that stacks rocks in a wall-like shape. The breakups comes from a Proximity Mask and Remove Mask.

Preset

Rock_Floor

Tools

Grid Scatter

Description

A Grid Scatter that scatters rocks in a 2D pattern on the floor. And it uses the Noise Mask.

Road Tool

Preset

Projected_Road

Tools

Road Tool

Description

A Road Tool projected on its underlying curvy surface.

Preset

Bumpy_Road

Tools

Road Tool

Description

A Road Tool with some Noise added to make it bumpy.

Cable Tool

Preset

Cable_Robot

Tools

Cable Tool

Description

A Cable Tool that uses Self-Scatter on top of a single robot asset. It also uses Gravity, Radius and Duplicates settings.

Vine Tool

Preset

Overgrown_Car

Tools

Vine Tool

Description

A Vine Tool that covers a full car. The car is the surface and an actor is used as origin.

Preset

Tree_Roots

Tools

Vine Tool

Description

A Vine Tool that create roots when using the plane as surface and the tree as origin.

Compound Presets

Presets combining multiple tool instances.

Same-Tool Presets _{Multiple instances of one tool}

Preset

Double_Cliffs

Tools

Path Scatter x2

Description

This is a compound of 2 Path Scatters, using 1 curve. The 1st forms the outer layer of rocks. The 2nd forms the inner layers.

Preset

Light_Pathway

Tools

Path Scatter x2

Description

This is a compound of 2 Path Scatters, using 1 curve. The 1st scatters the pathway of rocks. The 2nd scatters lights outside of the pathway.

Preset

Real_Road

Tools

Road Rool x3

Description

This is a compound of 3 Road Tools and one curve. One for the main road, one for the side markings, and for the the center markings.

Preset

Mossy_Rocks

Tools

Surface Scatter x2

Description

This is a compound of 2 Surface Scatters. The 1st scatters rocks on the plane. The 2nd scatters moss on top of the rocks.

Preset

Dense_Forest

Tools

Surface Scatter x3

Description

Compound of 3 Surface Scatters. Tight trees, heavy bushes, almost no empty ground.

Preset

Open_Forest

Tools

Surface Scatter x3

Description

Compound of 3 Surface Scatters. Wide Spacing, lots of grass, few bushes.

Preset

Young_Forest

Tools

Surface Scatter x3

Description

Compound of 3 Surface Scatters. Small trees and bushes, few large ones. Lots of bushes and grass

Preset

Rocky_Forest

Tools

Surface Scatter x3

Description

Compound of 3 Surface Scatters. Trees mixed with lots of rocks.

Preset

Rock_Path

Tools

Path Scatter x2

Description

Rocks scattered with a Path Scatter and then foliage on the sides using another Path Scatter.

Preset

Farm_Land

Tools

Grid Scatter x3

Description

3 Grid Scatters, using different assets and proximity masks to control their placement.

Mixed-Tool Presets _{Combinations of different tools}

Preset

Rock_Bridge

Tools

Cable ToolQuick PipeSurface Scatter x3Path Scatter x3

Description

This compound consisting of various tools creates a non-hanging rope bridge, controlled by a single curve.

Preset

Rope_Bridge

Tools

Cable ToolQuick PipePath Scatter x2Surface Scatter

Description

This compound consisting of various tools creates a hanging rope bridge, controlled by a single bent curve.

Preset

Mossy_Wall

Tools

Grid ScatterSurface Scatter

Description

This compound combines a Grid Scatter and a Surface Scatter to create a rock wall with foliage scattered on it.

Preset

Mossy_Tower

Tools

Radial ScatterSurface Scatter

Description

This compound combines a Radial Scatter and a Surface Scatter to create a rock tower with foliage scattered on it.

Preset

Abandoned_Parking

Tools

Grid ScatterSurface Scatter x3

Description

This compound combines a Grid Scatter and a Surface Scatter to scatter cars, foliage and rocks with several proximity masks.

Preset

Park_Path

Tools

Surface ScatterPath ScatterRoad Tool

Description

This compound creates an road with lights and foliage on its side using the Road Tool, Path Scatter and Surface Scatter.

Preset

Overgrown_Cliffs

Tools

Path Scatter x2Surface Scatter x2

Description

This is a compound that creates 2 layers if cliffs with Path Scatters and then scatters foliage on the cliffs and on the ground using Surface Scatter.

Preset

Overgrown_Pathway

Tools

Path Scatter x2Surface Scatter x2

Description

This is a compound that creates an overgrown rock path with lights on each side. It uses Path Scatters and Surface Scatters.

Preset

Suburb

Tools

Grid Scatter x2Surface Scatter

Description

This compound scatters a street mesh and houses with two different Grid Scatters and then scatters some bushes with Surface Scatter. (You need to use 2x divisions on the houses compared to the streets)

Preset

Power_Lines

Tools

Path ScatterCable Tool

Description

Light Poles scattered with Path Scatter and cables from the cable tool.

Preset

Overgrown_Fence

Tools

Path ScatterSurface Scatter

Description

A single Path Scatter that places an standing plank asset along a curve. And foliage is added using Surface Scatter.

Preset

Overgrown_Pillar_Fence

Tools

Surface ScatterPath Scatter

Description

A single Path Scatter that places two wood assets along a curve. And foliage is added using Surface Scatter.

Preset

Board_Walk

Tools

Path Scatter x2Surface Scatter

Description

One Path Scatter for the standing planks, one the for flat planks. And a Surface Scatter for the foliage.

Preset

Border_Fence

Tools

Path Scatter x2Surface Scatter

Description

One Path Scatter for the standing planks, one the for flat planks. And a Surface Scatter for the foliage.

Preset

Overgrown_Pier

Tools

Path Scatter x2Surface Scatter

Description

One Path Scatter for the pillars, one for the flat planks. And a Surface Scatter for the foliage.

Preset

Custom_Fence1

Tools

Quick PipeCable Tool

Description

A Quick Pipe is used for the poles and a Cable Tool is used for the strings.

Preset

Custom_Fence2

Tools

Quick PipeCable Tool x2

Description

A Quick Pipe is used for the poles and two Cable Tools is used for the strings.

Preset

Wire_Fence

Tools

Quick Pipe x2Cable Tool

Description

A procedural fence using 2 Quick Pipes and 1 Cable Tool.

Preset

Road_Rails

Tools

Road ToolCable ToolQuick Pipe

Description

A road tool with rails on the side using a Quick Pipe and a Cable Tool.

Preset

Railway

Tools

Road ToolPath Scatter x2

Description

The planks and the rocks comes from 2 Path Scatters, and the track comes from the Road Tool using Parallel Width.