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Configure first person

First person works out of the box on the sample pawns and the shipped characters. This page covers the choices you make for your own characters and items. Background: First person system.

Where to find the settings:

  • Pawn without a visual override (UEFN mannequin): the pawn Blueprint's AC_FirstPersonRendering component.
  • Retargeted character: the visual override Blueprint's AC_FirstPersonRendering (for example BP_RetargetedCharacter_Manny).

Choose a mode

You want Mode
Classic shooter view with body and shadow FirstPersonOverlay
The same, without weapons clipping into walls FirstPersonOverlaySplit (needs arms and body meshes)
Immersive view of the real third-person animation TrueFirstPerson
A skeleton with non-standard bone names TrueFirstPerson

Set the meshes

  1. First Person Full Meshes: add the body mesh first, then clothing and accessories. A headless body variant avoids seeing the inside of the head; without one, leave the list empty and the component reuses the third-person mesh with the head bone hidden.
  2. Materials: nothing to do. Material overrides are copied from the third-person component that uses the same mesh, or whose mesh name starts the first-person mesh name (SKM_Hero for SKM_Hero_FP).
  3. Third Person Mesh Name: the name of the body component you copy from.

Split meshes

FirstPersonOverlaySplit needs an arms mesh (arms and hands, cut at the clavicles) and a body mesh without arms, neck and head. Author them in your DCC tool (keep a small overlap at the shoulders), or generate a first version:

  1. Duplicate your body mesh twice: SKM_Hero_FP_Arms and SKM_Hero_FP_NoArms.
  2. Open /GASPALS/Systems/FirstPersonSystem/Tools/EUB_SplitFirstPersonMesh and set Source Mesh, Arms Target and Body Target in its class defaults.
  3. Right-click the utility in the Content Browser > Run Editor Utility Blueprint.
  4. Put the results in First Person Arms Meshes and First Person Body Meshes.

Warning

The utility overwrites the target meshes. Never point it at meshes you authored by hand.

Place the camera at the eyes

The camera sits on the head bone plus First Person Eye Offset. On the UEFN mannequin the head bone is at the eyes (offset 0); on UE5 mannequins and MetaHumans it is at the base of the skull, so the shipped characters use (0, 12, 0): 12 cm forward.

  1. Play, switch to first person, and look straight ahead, then fully down.
  2. If you see the inside of the head or the chest, increase Y (forward). If the view is too high or too low, change Z. X moves the camera sideways.
  3. Equip the rifle and aim. The sights should line up with the screen center. The ADS hand targets use the same offset, so fixing the eye position also fixes the sights.

Tune the look-down behavior

Setting Effect
First Person Arm Pitch Down Limit (45) How far the arms follow the view down before the spine leans. Lower values lean more.
First Person Arm Pitch Up Limit (90) The same looking up.
First Person Camera Follow Lean (0.75) 1: the camera moves forward with the leaning head. 0: the camera stays, the body moves back.

Give an item first-person poses

Items without a first-person overlay show their third-person overlay in first person. To add one:

  1. Duplicate ABP_OverlayFirstPerson_Rifle (/GASPALS/Systems/OverlaySystem/FirstPerson/Rifle), name it ABP_OverlayFirstPerson_<Item>.
  2. In its class defaults, set the pose animations (Stand Relax, Ready, Aim... like the third-person overlay; see Add an overlay state) and their curve maps. Keep the first-person curves: enable_cr_fp_stable_arms, enable_cr_fp_stable_head, enable_cr_fp_ads, enable_cr_fp_aimoffset, and enable_handik_l or enable_handik_r for the support hand.
  3. Set it as Overlay Pose FP in the item's data asset (DA_Equipment_<Item>).
  4. Make sure the item mesh has an ADS socket (the sight point) and a HandIK socket (support hand).

Turn first person off

Remove FirstPerson from the camera perspective cycle (see Customize the camera), or keep players from switching by removing the perspective input. The first-person component costs nothing until first person is used.