Lens Studio 2D UI — Reference Guide

Lens Studio's 2D UI layer uses ScreenTransform components to position elements in screen space. All screen-space elements are children of a Full Frame Region or Safe Render Region at the top of the scene hierarchy.

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ScreenTransform — Coordinate System

ScreenTransform uses a normalised coordinate system:

• Origin (0, 0) = centre of the parent region
• (1, 1) = top-right corner
• (-1, -1) = bottom-left corner

const st = this.sceneObject.getComponent('Component.ScreenTransform')

Anchors

Anchors pin an element to a region of its parent. Both anchors.setMin and anchors.setMax use a [0, 1] space (not the ScreenTransform [-1, 1] space):

// Fill the entire parent
st.anchors.setMin(new vec2(0, 0))
st.anchors.setMax(new vec2(1, 1))

// Pin to the top-right corner only
st.anchors.setMin(new vec2(1, 1))
st.anchors.setMax(new vec2(1, 1))

// Top half of parent
st.anchors.setMin(new vec2(0, 0.5))
st.anchors.setMax(new vec2(1, 1))

Offsets

Offsets add inset (in canvas units) from each anchor edge:

st.offsets.setLeft(10)    // 10 units inset from left anchor
st.offsets.setRight(-10)  // 10 units inset from right anchor
st.offsets.setBottom(20)
st.offsets.setTop(-20)

Position and size (point anchor)

When both anchors are the same point, the element is positioned by position and sized by size:

st.anchors.setCenter(new vec2(0.5, 0.5))  // pin to parent centre
st.position = new vec2(0, 0.3)            // offset 30% up
st.size = new vec2(300, 60)               // 300×60 canvas units

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Coordinate Conversions

// Screen-space (pixels) ← ScreenTransform local
const screenPx: vec2 = st.localPointToScreenPoint(new vec2(0, 0))

// ScreenTransform local ← screen-space pixels
const local: vec2 = st.screenPointToLocalPoint(touchPosScreenPx)

// World space (3D) ← ScreenTransform local
const worldPt: vec3 = st.localPointToWorldPoint(new vec2(0, 0))

// ScreenTransform local ← World space
const localPt: vec2 = st.worldPointToLocalPoint(hit.position)

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ScreenImage

ScreenImage renders a texture on a 2D quad in screen space.

const screenImage = this.sceneObject.getComponent('Component.Image')

// Assign a texture
screenImage.mainPass.baseTex = myTexture

// Tint color (RGBA)
screenImage.mainPass.baseColor = new vec4(1, 0.5, 0, 1)

// Reset to white (no tint)
screenImage.mainPass.baseColor = new vec4(1, 1, 1, 1)

// Show/hide
screenImage.enabled = false

Stretch modes (set in the Inspector)

Mode	Behaviour
Stretch	Fills the ScreenTransform bounds, ignoring aspect ratio
Fit	Letterboxes to preserve aspect ratio
Fill	Crops to fill the bounds while preserving aspect ratio
Pixel Perfect	1:1 pixel mapping (for UI icons)

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Text Component

const textComponent = this.sceneObject.getComponent('Component.Text')

// Set text content
textComponent.text = 'Score: ' + score

// Change font size
textComponent.size = 48

// Alignment
textComponent.horizontalAlignment = HorizontalAlignment.Center
textComponent.verticalAlignment   = VerticalAlignment.Center

// Color
textComponent.textFill.color = new vec4(1, 1, 1, 1)  // white

// Bold / italic via the text property (HTML-style tags)
textComponent.text = '<b>Bold</b> and <i>italic</i>'

Setting text from untrusted sources (network data, user content)

Never assign network or user-provided strings directly — unclosed HTML tags crash the renderer. Strip tags first:

// Strips HTML-style tags and caps length before displaying untrusted content
function safeSetText(component: Text, value: string, maxLength = 200): void {
  const stripped = (value ?? '')
    .slice(0, maxLength)        // cap length
    .replace(/<[^>]*>/g, '')   // strip all tag-like sequences
  component.text = stripped
}

// Usage — safe even if serverName contains malicious tags:
safeSetText(textComponent, serverName)

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Touch Input

TapEvent (phone lenses, simple tap)

const tapEvent = this.createEvent('TapEvent')
tapEvent.bind((eventData) => {
  const screenPos: vec2 = eventData.getPosition()  // screen pixels
  print('Tapped at: ' + screenPos.x + ', ' + screenPos.y)
  handleTap(screenPos)
})

TouchComponent (multi-touch, drag, phone lenses)

const touchComponent = this.sceneObject.getComponent('Component.TouchComponent')

// Touch start
touchComponent.addMTouchStartCallback((eventData) => {
  const pos = eventData.getPosition()
  print('Touch start at: ' + pos.x + ', ' + pos.y)
})

// Touch move (drag)
touchComponent.addMTouchMoveCallback((eventData) => {
  const pos = eventData.getPosition()
  drawAtPosition(pos)
})

// Touch end
touchComponent.addMTouchEndCallback((eventData) => {
  print('Touch ended')
  finalizeStroke()
})

ScreenRegionComponent (define touch-active area)

ScreenRegionComponent on a scene object marks it as a specific region type. Use it to prevent touches from passing through your UI:

// In Inspector: add ScreenRegionComponent, set region type to TouchBlocking
// This stops the world from receiving taps that hit the UI panel

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UI Buttons for Phone Lenses

For phone lenses (not Spectacles), use tap regions rather than SIK PinchButton:

// Pattern: invisible ScreenImage + TouchComponent as a button

@component
export class TapButton extends BaseScriptComponent {
  @input label: string = 'Button'
  onTapped: (() => void) | null = null

  onAwake(): void {
    const touch = this.sceneObject.getComponent('Component.TouchComponent')
    touch.addMTouchStartCallback(() => {
      if (this.onTapped) this.onTapped()
    })
  }
}

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LSTween for UI Animations

Use LSTween (part of the Spectacles Interaction Kit) for smooth UI transitions:

import { LSTween } from 'SpectaclesInteractionKit.lspkg/Utils/LSTween/LSTween'

// Fade in a screen image
LSTween.colorTo(screenImage, new vec4(1, 1, 1, 1), 0.3).start()  // fade to opaque

// Fade out
LSTween.colorTo(screenImage, new vec4(1, 1, 1, 0), 0.3).start()  // fade to transparent

// Slide in from the right
const startPos = new vec2(1.5, 0)    // off screen right
const endPos   = new vec2(0, 0)      // on screen centre
screenTransform.position = startPos
LSTween.moveToScreen(screenTransform.sceneObject, endPos, 0.4)
  .easing(TWEEN.Easing.Quadratic.Out)
  .start()

// Scale pop (bounce-in a button)
LSTween.scaleTo(this.sceneObject, new vec3(1, 1, 1), 0.2)
  .easing(TWEEN.Easing.Back.Out)
  .start()

Chain animations with .onComplete:

LSTween.colorTo(panel, new vec4(1, 1, 1, 0), 0.3)  // fade out
  .onComplete(() => panel.enabled = false)           // then hide
  .start()

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Color Picker Pattern

From the Drawing example — multiple color swatches, with a visual selection indicator:

@component
export class ColorPicker extends BaseScriptComponent {
  @input swatches: SceneObject[]   // one per color
  @input colors: vec4[] = []       // matching color values
  @input selectionRing: SceneObject

  private selectedIndex: number = 0

  onAwake(): void {
    this.swatches.forEach((swatch, i) => {
      const touch = swatch.getComponent('Component.TouchComponent')
      touch.addMTouchStartCallback(() => this.selectColor(i))
    })
  }

  selectColor(index: number): void {
    this.selectedIndex = index
    // Move the selection ring to the chosen swatch
    const swatchST = this.swatches[index].getComponent('Component.ScreenTransform')
    const selST    = this.selectionRing.getComponent('Component.ScreenTransform')
    selST.position = swatchST.position    // match position

    // Apply color to the drawing material
    drawingMaterial.mainPass.penColor = this.colors[index]
  }
}

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Undo Stack Pattern

From the Drawing example:

class UndoStack {
  private readonly maxSize = 20
  private stack: (() => void)[] = []  // each item is a "undo function"

  push(undoFn: () => void): void {
    if (this.stack.length >= this.maxSize) {
      this.stack.shift()  // drop oldest
    }
    this.stack.push(undoFn)
  }

  undo(): void {
    const fn = this.stack.pop()
    if (fn) fn()
  }

  get canUndo(): boolean {
    return this.stack.length > 0
  }
}

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Common Gotchas

• Anchors use [0, 1] space, not the [-1, 1] ScreenTransform local space — mixing them up is the most common ScreenTransform bug.
• position only works when both anchor points are the same — if anchors.min ≠ anchors.max (stretch mode), position is ignored; use offsets instead.
• Touch events don't automatically block — a touch on a UI panel passes through to the world unless a ScreenRegionComponent with TouchBlocking is present.
• ScreenRegionComponent region types: TouchBlocking is the most common for UI; SafeRender and FullFrame define the playfield boundaries.
• touchComponent.addMTouchStartCallback vs TapEvent: TapEvent fires only on completed, non-moved taps; TouchComponent callbacks fire immediately on contact — use TouchComponent for drawing and drag interactions.
• Pivot point affects how a ScreenTransform rotates and scales — a pivot of (0, 0) rotates around the centre, (-1, -1) around the bottom-left corner.
• Text HTML tags: Lens Studio supports <b>, <i>, <color=#rrggbbaa>, <size=N> tags in textComponent.text. Non-closing tags crash the text renderer.
• Never set textComponent.text to untrusted string content directly (e.g., data from the network or from Dynamic Response). Untrusted strings containing unclosed HTML tags will crash the renderer; strip or escape them first.