Getting Started With UI3

How to get started with the UI3 in your own project:

Purchase, Installation of the Demo Project, and Migration to your project.

Video 1 and 2 are about creating a project and migrating the interface to it.

Video Tutorial Playlist

Updates are free, and the project should be available in future Unreal Engine versions. Ownership will be transferred from Marketplace to FAB.

UI3 on the Marketplace

Make sure you are using the correct engine version. The source projects are created for

• Unreal Engine 4.26
• Unreal Engine 5.0
• Unreal Engine 5.3

Not every major engine version release requires to update the demo project. You can use the next lower version. For example 5.4 would be the same as 5.3, so no need to create a 5.4 version if you already have the 5.3 version installed.

• create new level(s) in the demo project
• migrate UI3 to your own project.

If you decide to migrate, you can migrate the folder

• ArchVizUI_V3, which contains the UI plus the demo scene
• UI within the ArchVizUI_3 folder which only contains the UI.

Right click the folder and choose to migrate. Select the Content folder in the target project.

Do not just copy the folder using the windows explorer!

Some selected assets don't have a corresponding
content root in the destination.
/SunPosition

Place a Blocking Volume under the player start so the player doesn't fall through the floor in case the level geometry isn't loaded yet.

You have to set a few things in the Project Settings depending on what kind of lighting you are going to use. Lumen would be the default choice for most projects.

Unreal has a very good online documentation. Be careful what you change in the project settings. You may crash the project next time you load it.

Settings are stored in the /Config folder of your project. You can reset everything by renaming that folder to /Config.old.

Setting Up Your Project | Unreal Documentation

• Enhanced Input - controls input actions from keyboard or gamepad
• Sun Position Calculator - Accurate sun positioning for geo location
• OpenXR - standard used for VR headsets. - You may need a different one.

Packaging will fail if these plugins are missing.

Specific areas can have additional Volumes with a higher priority. Settings in this volume will overwrite settings in the volume with the lower priority. Infinite Extend would need to be disabled for the additional volumes.

The image shows my preferred settings for Unreal Engine 5.4. I still prefer ray-traced translucency without refraction over the Lumen translucency.

Increased quality will always reduce performance.

• SDotUI3_GameModeKeyboard for keyboard and mouse control. Optional mouse only controls available.
• SDotUI3_GameModeTouch for touch screen support.
• SDotUI3_GameModeGamepad for using an XBOX gamepad or other controllers.
• SDotUI3_GameModeVR for VR projects with a 3D interface in front of the player. VIVE and Oculus Touch controllers are set to be used.

This will set the Character and Game Controller blueprints for the current scene. Click the link below for more details about the different game modes.

In case you prefer Static Lighting I recommend these Lightmass settings:

• Static Lighting Level Scale = 0.75
• Indirect Lighting Quality = 1.25
• Num indirect lighting bounces = 5
• Num sky light bounces = 3

More details about Game Modes

Persistent Level

Every scene has to have at least one level which is commonly called the Persistent Level. I recommend to have just the Player Start and the Post Process and Blocking Volumes and (if needed) the Lightmass Importance Volume in it.

Sub Levels

Sub Levels are like layers that separate content from each other (furniture, building parts, details), make working in the scene easier, and allow multiple people to work on the same project.

They are added to the persistent level in the Level Browser and can be set to

• Streaming from within the UI (blue dot next to it)
• Always loaded (no blue dot)

Scenario Levels

Originally, they were introduced to store the entire lighting information in one level. This made baked lighting changes possible.

They can also be used for layout changes. They will be added later through the UI and can be set invisible in the level browser to make working with multiple layouts easier.

Use Transform to align the location and the rotation.