SurfaceGui

Show Deprecated

Allows for the rendering of GUI elements onto a part's surface in the 3D world, while allowing for basic user interaction to occur. SurfaceGuis must be descendants of PlayerGui in order to know which player is interacting with it.

Caching static UI for performance improvements

A Gui's appearance is cached until one of the following events occurs:

  • A descendant is added to the Gui.
  • A descendant is removed from the Gui.
  • A property of a descendant of the Gui changes.
  • A property of the Gui changes.

If any of these events occur, the Gui's appearance will be recomputed the next frame it gets rendered.

Summary

Properties

  • read parallel

    Determines whether the SurfaceGui will always be rendered on top of other 3D objects.

  • read parallel

    Determines the factor by which the GUI's light is scaled when LightInfluence is 0.

  • read parallel

    The size of a 'virtual screen', in 'virtual pixels', which makes SurfaceGuis pixel-to-pixel compatible with ScreenGuis.

  • read parallel

    When set to true, portions of GuiObjects that fall outside of the SurfaceGui's canvas borders will not be drawn.

  • read parallel

    Controls how much the SurfaceGui is influenced by the lighting in the game world.

  • read parallel

    Controls how far away the SurfaceGui can be displayed before it stops rendering.

  • read parallel

    Determines the number of screen-space pixels per world-space stud used to render the contents of the SurfaceGui.

  • Determines whether SurfaceGui will render at fixed size or scale with its size in studs.

  • Sets the distance left clicking starts acting on the surface gui instead of the held tool.

  • read parallel

    Offsets the SurfaceGui relative to the normal of the surface it is attached to.

Properties inherited from SurfaceGuiBaseProperties inherited from LayerCollectorProperties inherited from GuiBase2d

Events

Events inherited from GuiBase2d

Properties

AlwaysOnTop

read parallel

Determines whether the SurfaceGui will render over top of 3D content, or be occluded by it.

When set to false, the SurfaceGui will render like other 3D content, and will be occluded by other 3D objects.

When set to true, it always renders on top of 3D content, and the appearance changes significantly:

Brightness

read parallel

Brightness determines the factor by which the GUI's emitted light is scaled. By default, this property is 1 and can be set to any number on the range [0, 1000].

By modifying this property, the apparent brightness of a GUI can be better matched to its environment. For instance, a video billboard like those found in Times Square can be made brighter to be clearly visible on a bright day.

This property won't produce any effect in the following scenarios wherein the GUI does not emit light.:

  • When AlwaysOnTop is true, the color of each pixel is the color shown on-screen.
  • When LightInfluence is 1, all light from the GUI is reflected from the environment instead of being emit.

CanvasSize

read parallel

The size of a 'virtual screen', in 'virtual pixels', which makes SurfaceGuis pixel-to-pixel compatible with ScreenGuis.

ClipsDescendants

read parallel

When set to true, portions of GuiObjects that fall outside of the SurfaceGui's canvas borders will not be drawn.

Even when this property is false, objects that are completely outside of the canvas of the SurfaceGui will not render.

LightInfluence

read parallel

Controls how much the SurfaceGui is influenced by the lighting in the game world.

MaxDistance

read parallel

Controls how far away the SurfaceGui can be displayed before it stops rendering. A value of 0 means there is no limit, and it will render infinitely far away.

For experiences with many SurfaceGuis, it's recommended to set this to an appropriate value for each SurfaceGui. The default value when inserting a SurfaceGui in Studio is 1000, which should be fine for most usages.

For UIs that are outdoors, you should set the MaxDistance far enough away so that the UI is small on the screen when it pops out, around 10 pixels across. This makes it less noticeable when it pops in or out.

You can reduce the pop in effect even more by adding a similar looking decal underneath the SurfaceGui, or by changing the part color to match the background color of your UI.

For indoor spaces, the MaxDistance should be set slightly larger than the size of the room, so that the UI won't render when the player is in a different room.

PixelsPerStud

read parallel

PixelsPerStud determines the density of pixels used for each world-space stud to render the contents of the SurfaceGui.

Higher values will cause the various GuiObject within to appear smaller if they are kept the same size. Conversely, lower values will cause objects to appear larger. However, if the GuiObjects are scaled proportionally (either by using a UIScale or modifying Size or TextLabel.TextSize etc.), this property allows for higher definition to be used. It's important to select a value based on how far away you expect a player to view the SurfaceGui. Be mindful that a large pixel density could negatively affect performance if the face of the adorned part is large enough.

Three parts with SurfaceGuis, each including a 200x50 TextLabel within them. From left-to-right, their PixelsPerStud values are 25, 50 and 75. These values cause the apparent size of each TextLabel to change.

read parallel

When set to Enum.SurfaceGuiSizingMode.FixedSize, SurfaceGui renders with a fixed size set using SurfaceGui.CanvasSize.

When set to Enum.SurfaceGuiSizingMode.PixelsPerStud, SurfaceGui renders with a variable size based on SurfaceGui.PixelsPerStud and the SurfaceGui's size in studs.

ToolPunchThroughDistance

read parallel

Sets the distance left clicking starts acting on the surface gui instead of the held tool. If a character is within this distance of the surface gui, then the tool will not activate on click.

ZOffset

read parallel

Offsets the SurfaceGui relative to the normal of the surface it is attached to.

Methods

Events