Creator

Updated: 2019-07-22

The Creator tool lets you quickly create new game objects directly from the scene view. Using a smart fuzzy finder, you can search for any entry from the Game Object menu (e.g. Cube, Camera, etc.), or search for any Prefab, Model or Sprite in your project.


Gizmo

Hold Ctrl+Shift (or Cmd+Shift on Mac) to display the creator gizmo at your mouse position. This gizmo looks exactly like Unity's scale tool with an added plus symbol below. Use the creator gizmo to pick a spot in your scene where you want the new object to be created. The gizmo will scale according to the depth of the picked location to better represent where it's currently aiming.

Once you're happy with your spot, simply click to bring up the search.


Adjusting gizmo size

By default, the creator gizmo has a scale of one unit per side. If your project uses a different scale, you can increase or decrease this setting in the Peek preferences.


Adjusting targeting layers

By default, the creator gizmo will throw a raycast against all default physics layers to pick the spot where to create the new object. If your project uses special layers that you would like to ignore, you can toggle them on or off in the Peek preferences.


Finder

The creator tool uses Ludiq's fuzzy search engine to let you quickly find the object you're looking for. At the root of the menu, you'll first find all primitives under the editor's Game Object menu (e.g. Cube, Sphere, Lights, Camera, etc.), followed by the prefabs, models and sprites in your own project folders below. You can either browse these folders with the mouse or keyboard arrows, or enter a query in the search field if you know exactly what you're looking for.

The search engine allows for fuzzy query matching, meaning abbreviations and initials are supported. For example, typing "ChrWpn2" or "cw2" with or without whitespace will return results for "CharacterWeapon2".

This is where good naming conventions come in handy!

Screen Shot 2019 08 06 at 6 08 05 PM
Create primitives at the root
Screen Shot 2019 08 06 at 6 09 05 PM
Browse asset folders
Screen Shot 2019 08 06 at 6 08 21 PM
Search by name

Excluding Models and Sprites

By default, the search includes raw imported models and sprites in its results. However, best Unity practices encourage you to only include prefabs in your scene, not the raw source for them, in case you want to mass-edit them later. On larger scale projects, you should exclude models and sprites from the search results by unchecking their respective checkboxes in the Peek project settings.


Parenting

New objects are created as siblings of the object that was hit by the targeting gizmo. This helps you keep your scene tidy without having to reorganize your hierarchy all the time. For example, if you create a cube on a "Ground" plane under an "Environment" transform, the cube will become a child of "Environment" automatically.

If you wish to precisely control where an object is created, start by selecting the reference object in the scene or hierarchy. Then, open the context menu on the Game Object tool and select one of these three options:

  • Create Parent
  • Create Sibling
  • Create Child

The fuzzy finder will then appear. Once your new object is selected, it will be placed in the hierarchy according to the option you selected.


Bounds Alignment

By default, newly created objects are aligned to the bounds of the reference object hit by the targeting gizmo instead of their pivot. This means, for example, that a new cube will lay flat on a plane instead of intersecting with it. If you don't want this behaviour in your project, you can disable it from the Peek project settings.

Screen Shot 2019 08 06 at 6 14 25 PM
Bounds alignment enabled
Screen Shot 2019 08 06 at 6 14 40 PM
Bounds alignment disabled
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