Fading the transparency of a material

A feature of many games is for objects to fade away to invisible, or appear gradually from invisible to fully visible. Unity provides the special Rendering Mode of Fade for exactly this purpose.

In this recipe, we will create an object that, once clicked, fades out and disappears. We'll also look at how to enahnce the code, to take account of the GameObject's own initial alpha value, to self-destruct when fading has finished and so on.

How to do it...

Follow these steps:

1. Create a new 3D Sphere, named Sphere-Game. Choose menu: 3D Object | Sphere.
2. Select Sphere-Game and ensure it has a Collider (if you are using a custom 3D object, you might have to add a collider through menu: AddComponent | Physics | Box (or Mesh)Collider).
3. Create a new Material named m_fade.
4. With them_fade Material selected, change its Rendering Mode to Fade in the Inspector:

Note

The Fade rendering mode is specifically designed for situations such as this. Other rendering modes, such as Transparent...