Integrating Leap Motion in Unreal Engine 4

Currently I am taking GSP 475, phew one step closing to graduating! For this class we essentially have a eight week project where student's have the option to create something with emerging technology. For me, I decided since I have the desire to continue expanding my knowledge in Unreal Engine 4 now that 3 is slowly becoming obsolete, I wanted to do a project with Unreal Engine 4. Being up to date I am, I actually read an article from Epic about Leap Motion. For those not aware, Leap Motion is a motion tracking device that tracks hand movement. It's pretty cool and can be integrated in many software such as; Unreal Engine 4. For this project my goal essentially was to create a small game where players can maneuver a ball based on hand movements as well as have the ability to pickup objects and place them in desire locations. For this project, I decided to call it Lift. Before jumping in to how I went about developing this project, I wanted to give a brief description on how to Integrate Leap Motion into Unreal Engine 4. Here it is!

Instructions for getting Leap Motion Running

To install and be able to use this product, first you must obtain a few other software such as Leap Motion SDK, Visual Studio Community 2013, as well as Unreal Engine 4’s source code. To continue this you will also need a Leap Motion Controller.

So let’s begin with the first software.

How to obtain Leap Motion SDK:

1.      Go to the Leap Motion site.

2.      From there jump in the Developer tab and the download should begin right away. If not, hit the download link to begin the download.

3.      After the download is complete, run the installer application.

4.      Assuming a Leap Motion Controller is on hand, connect the Leap Motion Controller to your computer.

5.      In the taskbar, a Leap Motion Controller Icon should appear. Right click>Visualizer to test that the software and hardware are working properly.

There you go, you officially have integrated the working software and hardware into your computer. The next step is downloading Visual Studio Community 2013.

Acquiring Visual Studio Community 2013:

1.      Go to the Visual Studio site.

2.      Hit Download.

3.      Run the .Exe

4.      Continue following the steps guided by Microsoft visual studio to fully install it

One more list of steps and then you’re done! We now have to download Unreal Engine 4 source code onto your computer through GitHub so that you can acquire the Leap Motion Plugin in the Engine.

How to obtain Unreal Engine 4 Source code through GitHub:

  Establishing an account with Unreal Engine:

1.      Go to the Unreal Engine 4 site.

2.      If an account has been created before, sign in otherwise sign up.

3.      After signing in or signing up, go to Account

4.      In the box Get UE4 Full Source Code, right click and open in a new tab linking your GitHub account

5.      In the steps below featured on the page, click the first step’s link GitHub.com which will take you to GitHub

  Creating an account on GitHub:

1.      If an account has been created before, sign in otherwise sign up.

2.      After signing in or signing up you should have been taken to Epic Game’s page on GitHub. If not, retrace your steps back to step 4 which assuming if logged in on GitHub. You’ll be taken to Epic Game’s page.

3.      Once on Epic Game’s page on GitHub, click Unreal Engine.

  Installing GitHub:

1.      Once on the page, scroll down to Getting Up and Running where you’ll click GitHub for Windows. Assuming you have windows.

2.      On the new page open, hit the download button to install GitHub on your computer.

3.      Before continuing any further, jump back to the previous tab in Unreal Engine to your account.

4.      Hit Profile and plug in your GitHub name to sync it to your Unreal account.

  Forking and Cloning a Repository:

1.      Back to the GitHub page, at the top right corner of Epic Game’s GitHub profile, hit Fork. Doing so will create a copy of the whole source code to your account.

2.      After doing this jump into the GitHub application that you installed.

3.      Hit + > clone.

4.      From there you should see Epic Game’s where you’ll have the option to cloning Unreal Engine or Unreal Engine Tournament. Clone Unreal Engine.

5.      Choose a destination you would like to clone the repository to on your computer.

6.      After doing so a folder of the repository shall appear on the desire designated location.

  Obtaining the Source Code:

1.      Go to the folder that was just created.

2.      Run the Setup.bat file

3.      After that’s completed run GenerateProjectFiles.bat

4.      Once the files have generated a solution file for visual studios called UE4.sln should be available.

5.      Open UE4.sln.

6.      Once Visual Studio has open up, in the solution explorer right click on UE4 > build. This may take some time to build.

Once the build has completed you shall have the entire source code project of Unreal Engine now officially on your computer plus giving you access to Leap Motion Controller Plug in. But the instructions doesn’t just end here! You still got to actually plug in the plug in in a project.

  Plugging in Leap Motion into an existing Project:

1.      Open the editor through clicking Epic Game’s Launcher or through going to Engine > Binaries > WIN64 > UE4Editor

2.      Once either or is clicked, Launch the most current version of the editor you have.

3.      Next, create a new project with whatever template you desire.

4.      Afterwards, go to Window > Devices and Enable Leap Motion. Doing so will restart your project to enable it.

There you have it. Leap Motion has been fully integrated in your project!