Unity Boilerplate Asset¶

Contents¶

1. Overview
2. Dependencies and Installation
3. Package Contents
4. General Usage
5. LeapManager.cs Class Reference

Overview¶

The Leap Motion Unity Boilerplate Asset is a core part of getting Leap Motion functionality into your Unity project. The LeapManager Prefab collects Leap data and provides a set of helper functions to convert between Leap device coordinates and Unity World coordinates. To get started simply drag the LeapManager prefab into your project. We’ve included a few simple example scenes to show some basic uses of the object, including physical interaction and mapping 3D coordinates to screen space for handling pointers.

This asset grew out of our own experience when working with Leap Motion and Unity as well as working with developers of all skills levels at hackathons around the country. We’re always looking for ways to make this simpler and more useful for developers so please let us know in our forums or by tweeting at us @leapmotiondev.

Download the Leap Motion Boilerplate Asset from the Unity Asset Store.

Dependencies and Installation¶

1. Import this package into your Unity project.
2. Drag the LeapManager prefab into your scene.
3. Go make a cool game.
4. When your cool game is done (or before!) show it to us via @LeapMotion on twitter.

Package Contents¶

The folders and files you must import for the helper to work have been marked here with “**” before the name. All other folders are example resources to help get you up to speed quickly.

• ** \Leap_Boilerplate\ # The root folder for the helper.

• \example_scenes\ # Scenes showing example implementations of basic concepts.

• Pointer_Movers.unity - Two game objects following a pointing finger in screen and world space
• Revolving_Camera.Unity - A camera controlled by your hand position moving around the earth
• Single_Hand.unity - Maps game objects to palm and fingers. Displays some stats about the hand
• Finger_Physics.unity - Adds some rigid bodies to your fingers so you can move some cubes

• ** \prefabs\ # prefab for the helper object.

• ** LeapManager - The LeapManager GameObject containing resources to get your project (and the examples) going!

• \resources_for_example_scenes\ - A bunch of resources and assets for the example scenes. Best to ignore this.
• ** \scripts\ # scripts for the helper object.

• ** LeapExtensions.cs - Extensions to the Leap Vector class for Leap to Unity unit conversions.
• ** LeapManager.cs - Centralizes LeapMotion data access and provides a wide variety of helper functions.

• \scripts_for_example_scenes\

• FingerCountChecker.cs - When attached to a text mesh, that mesh will say how many finger’s you’re holding up.
• HandController.cs - When attached to a palm and linked to fingers, will model a hand’s movement.
• HandOpenChecker.cs - When attached to a text mesh, that mesh will say if your hand is open or not.
• RevolvingCamera.cs - When attached to a camera and linked to a target, will rotate the camera around the target based on your hand position.
• ScreenMover.cs - When attached to a GameObject will move that object in screen space based on your pointing finger.
• WorldMover.cs - When attached to a GameObject will move that object in world space based on your pointing finger.

General Usage¶

This package is meant to act as a set of boilerplate functions and architecture to get your Leap enabled project up and running rapidly.

It solves the following problems:

• Providing a central point of access to the LeapMotion Controller data.

• Converting Leap data into Unity’s units and Vector3 objects.

  This is accomplished via three extension methods which return Unity Vector3 objects:

  1. myVectorInstance.ToUnity() - For things like direction vectors which are normalized.
  2. myVectorInstance.ToUnityScales() - For things like Acceleration/Velocity where units must be converted, but position is not a factor.
  3. myVectorInstance.ToUnityTranslated() - For things like positions where units must be scaled AND we want to offset the coordinates into our game’s coordinate space.

• Providing easy access to common data like pointing fingers and hand/finger locations in Unity screen or world coordinates.

• Providing helper methods for common concepts like “is this hand open?”, or “how many fingers am I holding up?”

To use the LeapManager in your scene, simply drag the LeapManager prefab from the “prefabs” folder in the root into your scene. It’s just an empty game object with the script attached.

A few of the class functions are static and can simply be accessed with a call to:

LeapManager.staticMethodName()

...but most require a reference to an instance. As you can see in the example scenes, grabbing this instance is as “simple” as:

LeapManager myLeapManagerInstance = (GameObject.Find("LeapManager") as GameObject).GetComponent(typeof(LeapManager)) as LeapManager;

Remember that GameObject.Find() is really slow so you probably only want to do this one in your MonoBehavior’s Start() function and store the reference for later. Again, see any of the example scenes for a full implementation.

For a listing of all the data and helper functions in the LeapManager use the next section, ‘LeapManager.cs Class Reference’.

LeapManager.cs Class Reference¶