First Time Setup

About this Guide

This guide will walk you through setting up an empty Unreal scene, to start creating your own levels and experiences with the Unreal 360 camera system. It will also work you through the fundamentals used in the example scene so you gain a full understanding of the tools at your disposal.

The camera system comes with a premade starter scene where you can find the basic requirements for an Igloo 360 experience.

We have packaged this camera system in two ways, the first is as a plugin to be integrated into an existing project, the second is as a project template to start as a basis for your creation with all the correct settings applied.

When the guide refers to the plugin version, we will prefix that section with 'Plugin - ' and the same for template: 'Template -'

The rest of the document explores the components that make up the Unreal Igloo Camera system, and defines what everything does and the variables for each of those components.

If you are new to Unreal, we recommend exploring some of Unreal's Interactive Tutorials to familiarize yourself with the Unreal interface and concepts before continuing. More information on Unreal can be found at their Academy.

Installing the Unreal 360 Camera System

Before starting you must have completed the following steps.

1. Have the current version of Unreal installed. This may take some time as it is a large file.
2. During the Unreal Installation, you will also need to install Visual Studio Community, or VS 2015. Whichever is included in the installation at the time.
3. Have downloaded the Unreal Camera Package and either:
   1. Plugin - placed the Unreal 360 Plugin folder somewhere convenient, like your desktop. 
   2. Template - placed the Unreal 360 Template project folder in a dedicated location, with ample room for it to grow in size.
      for example: D:/UnrealProjects/*

Open the Epic Games Launcher, and select Library


Launch your version of Unreal, if you do not have one and have only installed the epic games launcher, click the + icon next to Engine Versions

Plugin - Adding to an existing project

For this example, a new project has been created that is completely empty. This will allow us to import the plugin and demonstrate the setting required to get it running correctly.

This should mirror the steps required to set up the plugin in your own project.

1. Open your project folder in windows explorer, and copy the Content and Plugin folders into your Project folder.
   
2. Open your project, and allow it to compile. If for any reason this doesn't work. you might be using the wrong version of our plugin for your Unreal Version.
   Please contact myAdvocate@igloovision.com, or your igloo account manager, to get the correct version for your requirements.
3. Your scene should now look like this, with the Igloo content folder in your Content Browser.
   
   

4. Adding the Igloo components to the scene.

   You can now add the required Igloo components into your scene, place them anywhere you would like. These are:
   1. The Igloo 360 Camera which is explained in detail HERE
      
   2. If required, the Igloo Flying Pawn. This is for instances where you are not using your own pawn, and wish to use ours.
      It is also explained in detail HERE
      

5. Configuring the Scene

   You now need to configure the scene for communication with our igloo system, and output via Spout.
   1. In Project Settings scroll down to the Plugins section, and select OSC.
      1. Set Receive From to 9008
      2. Set Send Targets[0] to 127.0.0.1:9001
   2. It should look like this:
      

Pressing Play for the first time

Igloo Preview

To check for any errors, and to demonstrate the project running, we have included a program called Igloo Preview. Please open that now and ensure it is allowed through any firewalls that may be active on your local machine.

It should look like this when its open. If it looks grey, just press 1 and it should turn black.

You can now press Play on your Unreal Scene, it should look like this. It is upside down, but that's okay. When you are using the Igloo Warper, it can easily be flipped the correct way around with a checkbox.