Immersive Media Design

AR Book Map Part 2

A Saga of Globes in Unity

Asset Experimentation

I started out this week by downloading the globe by Maurice Svay on Sketchfab, because it seemed like a good idea to experiment with using available assets before worrying about making my own.

via Maurice Svay on Sketchfab

When I clicked download, I got these options (below). I downloaded the original format, but I also downloaded the augmented reality format because that is after all what I intend to use it for. However, the USDZ format did not import into Unity and the original format downloaded as a blender file of a sphere, and separate images for the texture.

So, I watched this YouTube tutorial and learned how to UV Wrap an image onto a globe. It totally worked, according to the rendered view in blender. However, when I exported the file as an FBX, it exported without the image texture. I previewed the FBX in FBX Review and also looked at it in Unity, but in both applications it showed up as only a plain, white sphere. There is probably an easy solution to this, but I couldn’t come up with anything that worked (I’ve never used blender before).

my blender file showing the uv wrapped globe

Mapbox to Unity

Next I investigated how to connect Mapbox and Unity. Lo and behold, Mapbox has a whole Unity SDK. They are the best.

Unity

Install the Maps SDK for Unity

When I downloaded Mapbox’s Unity SDK, I was prompted to preview some of the Unity sample scenes that come with the Mapbox SDK. According to their site, most Mapbox Unity creations begin with one of these sample scenes. And one of them was a globe! Praise be.

I don’t know this for sure, but I would guess that I don’t even need to worry about translating longitude and latitude coordinates onto a Unity sphere anymore, because I would assume that this is automatically built into the Mapbox SDK.

One thing to note is that the Mapbox examples do not show up in your Unity scene until you press play.

the Mapbox globe sample scene in Unity olay!

In the globe sample scene, there are default example markers placed on the globe. I am sure there is a way for me to connect my Mapbox data set to Unity so that those default markers will be replaced by my own markers.

I am stoked to have found the Mapbox SDK and excited to explore it more!

Next Steps:

1. Experiment more with customizing the Mapbox globe sample scene.
2. Figure out how to connect my Mapbox data set to my Unity file.
3. Figure out/remind myself how to build a simple AR Foundation app in Unity, and make sure this is compatible with the Mapbox data.