Unreal Engine VR Cookbook: Developing Virtual Reality with UE4

“With his YouTube channel, Mitch’s VR Lab, Mitch has helped thousands of people understand the foundations of locomotion and interaction mechanics with clear and concise UE4 videos. I’m thrilled that he has taken the time to bring all his knowledge and experience in working with Unreal Engine and Virtual Reality to the Unreal® Engine VR Cookbook…. Mitch is uniquely qualified to share this book with the world.” —Luis Cataldi, Unreal Engine Education, Epic Games, Inc.   For game developers and visualization specialists, VR is the next amazing frontier to conquer—and Unreal Engine 4 is the ideal platform to conquer it with. Unreal ® Engine VR Cookbook is your complete, authoritative guide to building stunning experiences on any Unreal Engine 4-compatible VR hardware.   Renowned VR developer and instructor Mitch McCaffrey brings together best practices, common interaction paradigms, specific guidance on implementing these paradigms in Unreal Engine, and practical guidance on choosing the right approaches for your project. McCaffrey’s tested “recipes” contain step-by-step instructions, while empowering you with concise explanations of the underlying theory and math.   Whether you’re creating first-person shooters or relaxation simulators, the techniques McCaffrey explains help you get immediate results, as you gain “big picture” knowledge and master nuances that will help you succeed with any genre or project.   Understand basic VR concepts and terminology Implement VR logic with Blueprint visual scripting Create basic VR projects with Oculus Rift, HTC Vive, Gear VR, Google VR, PSVR, and other environments Recognize and manage differences between seated and standing VR experiences Set up trace interactions and teleportation Work with UMG and 2D UIs Implement character inverse kinematics (IK) for head and hands Define effective motion controller interaction Help users avoid motion sickness Optimize VR applications Explore the VR editor, community resources, and more   If you’re ready to master VR on Unreal Engine 4, this is the practical resource you’ve been searching for!   Register your product at informit.com/register for convenient access to downloads, updates, and corrections as they become available.

Table of Contents:
Preface xiii Acknowledgments xvii About the Author xix   Part I: Getting Started 1   Chapter 1: Terminology and Best Practices 3 Terminology 4 Best Practices 10 Summary 11   Chapter 2: Head Mounted Display Setup 13 Gear VR 14 Rift and Vive 32 Summary 42   Chapter 3: Toolkit 43 Generic Function Library 44 Oculus Function Library 45 Steam VR Function Library 47 Summary 47   Part II: Recipes 49   Chapter 4: Trace Interaction 51 Understanding Trace Interaction 52 Understanding Interfaces 55 Setting Up Trace Interaction 57 Setting Up a Basic Interactive Object 75 Summary 79 Exercises 80   Chapter 5: Teleportation 85 Setting Up Teleportation 86 Visualizing the Teleport 92 Simple Teleportation Volume 95 Summary 101 Exercises 101   Chapter 6: Unreal Motion Graphics and 2D User Interfaces 103 Challenges with 2D UI in VR 104 History and Compatibility of UMG 105 Basic VR Menu 105 Custom Menu Interaction 113 Summary 123 Exercises 123   Chapter 7: Character Inverse Kinematics 125 Introduction to Inverse Kinematics 126 Setting Up Head IK 127 Setting Up Hand IK 137 Summary 144 Exercises 145   Chapter 8: Motion Controller Interaction 147 Why Motion Controller Interaction Works 148 What to Look Out For: The Importance of Affordance 148 Shared Input of the Current Generation of Motion Controllers 149 Setting Up the World Interaction Project 149 Interacting with Objects 151 Creating the Interactive Objects 163 Summary 187 Exercises 188   Chapter 9: VR Locomotion 189 Simulator Sickness 190 Locomotion Types 190 Locomotion Implementation 194 Summary 205 Exercises 205   Chapter 10: VR Optimization 207 Requirements of VR Rendering 208 Latency Mitigation 209 Performance Improvements 215 VR Project Settings 221 Summary 229 Exercises 229   Part III: Appendices 231   Appendix A: VR Editor 233 Enabling the VR Editor 234 Controlling the VR Editor 235 Summary 241   Appendix B: Resources 243 Epic 244 Oculus 244 Valve 244 Google 245 Community 245 Physical Meetups 245 Conferences 246   Index 247