Needle Core Components
Here is a overview of some of the components that we provide. Many of them map to components and functionality in Unity, Blender or other integrations.
For a complete list please have a look at our API docs.
You can always add your own components or add wrappers for Unity components we haven't provided yet.
Learn more in the Scripting section of our docs.
Audio
Use to play audio
Animation
Animator with AnimatorController
Export with animation state machine, conditions, transitions
Most basic animation component. Only first clip is exported
PlayableDirector with TimelineAsset
Export powerful sequences to control animation, audio, state and more
Rendering
DirectionalLight, PointLight, Spotlight. Note that you can use it to bake light (e.g. Rectangular Light shapes) as well
Control when objects will be visible. E.g. only enable object when in AR
Control on which device objects will be visible
Experimental and currently not fully supported
Playback videos from url or referenced video file (will be copied to output on export). The VideoPlayer also supports streaming from MediaStream objects or M3U8 livestream URLs
Used to handle rendering of objects including lightmapping and instancing
See MeshRenderer
Used to render Sprites and Spriteanimations
Volume with PostProcessing asset
See table below
Postprocessing
Postprocessing effects use the pmndrs postprocessing library under the hood. This means you can also easily add your own custom effects and get an automatically optimized postprocessing pass.
:::tip For Unity Users For Needle Engine Postprocessing in Unity you need to use URP (Universal Render Pipeline) :::
Add effects below
Effects
Antialiasing
extra Unity Component
Bloom
via Volume asset
Chromatic Aberration
via Volume asset
Color Adjustments / Color Correction
via Volume asset
Depth Of Field
via Volume asset
Vignette
via Volume asset
ToneMappingEffect
via Volume asset or separate component
Pixelation
Screenspace Ambient Occlusion N8
Screenspace Ambient Occlusion
Tilt Shift Effect
SharpeningEffect
Your custom effect
Networking
SyncedRoom
Main networking component. Put in your scene to enable networking
Networking
Used to setup a custom backend server for networking. If none is provided the default Needle websocket servers will be used.
SyncedTransform
Automatically network object transformation
SyncedCamera
Automatically network camera position and view to other users in room. You can define how the camera is being rendered by referencing an object
Voip
Enables voice-chat (Sample)
Screensharing
Enables screen-sharing capabilities (Sample)
Interaction
DragControls
Allows objects to be dragged in the scene. Requires raycaster in parent hierarchy, e.g. ObjectRaycaster
Duplicatable
Can duplicate assigned objects by drag. Requires DragControls
Interactable
Basic component to mark an object to be interactable.
OrbitControls
Add to camera to add camera orbit control functionality
SmoothFollow
Allows to interpolate smoothly to another object's transform
DeleteBox
Will destroy objects with the Deletable component when entering the box
Deletable
The GameObject this component is attached to will be deleted when it enters or intersects with a DeleteBox
DropListener
Add to receive file drop events for uploading
SpatialTrigger
Use to raise event if an object enters a specific space or area. You can also use Physics events
SpatialTriggerReceiver
Use to receive events from SpatialTrigger
Add to make an object follow the cursor (Sample)
Add to bind scroll to other components (e.g. you can bind the scroll to a timeline animation or animator) (Sample)
Physics
Physics is implemented using Rapier.
Rigidbody
Add to make an object react to gravity (or be kinematic and static)
BoxCollider
A Box collider shape that objects can collide with or raise trigger events when set to trigger
SphereCollider
See BoxCollider
CapsuleCollider
See BoxCollider
MeshCollider
See BoxCollider
Physics Materials
All Collider components use physics materials that can be used to define e.g. the bouncyness of a collider
XR / WebXR
Add to scene for VR, AR and Passthrough support as well as rendering Avatar models
Add to enable USD and Quicklook support
Handles placement and scale of your scene in AR mode. The center and alignment of the AR scene when placed will be at the position of this component
WebARCameraBackground
Add to access the AR camera image and apply effects or use it for rendering
WebXRImageTracking
Assign images to be tracked and optionally instantiate an object at the image position
WebXRPlaneTracking
Create plane meshes or colliders for tracked planes
XRControllerModel
Can be added to render device controllers or hand models (will be created by default when enabled in the WebXR component)
XRControllerMovement
Can be added to provide default movement and teleport controls
XRControllerFollow
Can be added to any object in the scene and configured to follow either left or right hands or controllers
XRFlag
Control when objects are visible, e.g. only in VR or AR or only in ThirdPerson
Debugging
GridHelper
Draws a grid
BoxGizmo
Draws a box
AxesHelper
Draws XYZ axes
Note: When you're writing custom code you can use the static Gizmos methods for drawing debugging lines and shapes
Runtime File Input/Output
GltfExport
Experimental! Use to export gltf from web runtime.
DropListener
Receive file drop events for uploading and networking
UI
Spatial UI components are mapped from Unity UI (Canvas, not UI Toolkit) to three-mesh-ui. UI can be animated.
Canvas
Unity's UI system. Needs to be in World Space mode right now.
Text (Legacy)
Render Text using Unity's UI Text component. Custom fonts are supported, a font atlas will be automatically generated on export. Use the font settings or the FontAdditionalCharacters component to control which characters are included in the atlas.
Note: In Unity make sure to use the Legacy/Text component (TextMeshPro is not supported at the moment)
Button
Receives click events - use the onClick event to react to it. It can be added too 3D scene objects as well.
Note: Make sure to use the Legacy/Text component in the Button (or create the Button via the UI/Legacy/Button Unity context menu since TextMeshPro is not supported at the moment)
Image
Renders a sprite image
RawImage
Renders a texture
InputField
Allows text input
Note: Depending on your project, often a mix of spatial and 2D UI makes sense for cross-platform projects where VR, AR, and screens are supported. Typically, you'd build the 2D parts with HTML for best accessibility, and the 3D parts with geometric UIs that also support depth offsets (e.g. button hover states and the like).
Other
SceneSwitcher
Handles loading and unloading of other scenes or prefabs / glTF files. Has features to preload, change scenes via swiping, keyboard events or URL navigation
Editor Only
ExportInfo
Main component for managing the web project(s) to e.g. install or start the web app
EditorSync
Add to enable networking material or component value changes to the running three.js app directly from the Unity Editor without having to reload
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