@threlte/extras

Getting Started

The package '@threlte/extras' provides useful utilities, abstractions and plugins for your Threlte application.

Installation

npm install @threlte/extras

Usage

Components

Most components are abstractions of one or more <T> components and forward all props and event listeners to it.

Let’s look at an example, the <OrbitControls>. They are a common component in Three.js applications and can be used to easily manipulate the camera. Let’s implement it:

<script>
  import { OrbitControls } from '@threlte/extras'
  import { T } from '@threlte/core'
</script>

<T.PerspectiveCamera
  makeDefault
  position={[5, 5, 5]}
>
  <OrbitControls />
</T.PerspectiveCamera>

In a regular Three.js application, you would have to create a OrbitControls instance by passing the camera and a DOM element to it. In Threlte, you can just use the <OrbitControls> component and it will automatically use the default camera and the <canvas> element the renderer is rendering to. It will also automatically invalidate the frame on demand.

Under the hood though, there’s still a regular <T> component that is doing the work of applying props and registering event listeners. Internally, <OrbitControls> is forwarding all props and event listeners, so you can use it just like a regular <T> component.

Let’s add an event listener that’s called when the camera is moved:

<script>
  import { OrbitControls } from '@threlte/extras'
  import { T } from '@threlte/core'
</script>

<T.PerspectiveCamera
  makeDefault
  position={[5, 5, 5]}
>
  <OrbitControls
    onchange={(e) => {
      console.log(e)
    }}
  />
</T.PerspectiveCamera>

The event listener is forwarded to the <T> component and will be called when the camera is moved. Keep in mind that these events are not hand-wired in the component, but are forwarded to the underlying <T> component which in turn forwards them to the Three.js object. So you can use any event listener that is supported by the <T> component.

Plugins

The package also provides a few plugins that can be used to extend the functionality of Threlte and <T> components. The most notable one is probably the plugin interactivity that provides a way to interact with the scene. We can extend our example from above and implement interactivity:

<script>
  import { OrbitControls, interactivity } from '@threlte/extras'
  import { T } from '@threlte/core'

  interactivity()
</script>

<T.PerspectiveCamera
  makeDefault
  position={[5, 5, 5]}
>
  <OrbitControls />
</T.PerspectiveCamera>

<T.Mesh
  onclick={() => {
    console.log('clicked')
  }}
>
  <T.BoxGeometry />
  <T.MeshBasicMaterial color="red" />
</T.Mesh>

Now, when we click on the box, we will see a message in the console. The interactivity plugin registers a global event listener on the <canvas> element and forwards all events to the respective <T> components. Check out the guide on events for more information on how to use events in Threlte.

Hooks

Hooks are regular functions with the limitation that they can only be invoked from the top level of a component. '@threlte/extras' provides useful hooks for loading assets, creating animations and more. Let’s look at an example where we use the hook useGltf to load an asset:

<script>
  import { useGltf } from '@threlte/extras'
  import { T } from '@threlte/core'

  // Place the model in your public folder
  const model = useGltf('/model.glb')
</script>

The hook will return the special Threlte store AsyncWritable that makes it easy to consume the result of the loader. The store will be updated once the asset is loaded and can be used in the template either with the {#await} or the {#if} block. Let’s use the {#await} block to display a loading message:

<script>
  import { useGltf } from '@threlte/extras'
  import { T } from '@threlte/core'
  import LoadingPlaceholder from './LoadingPlaceholder.svelte'

  const model = useGltf('/model.glb')
</script>

{#await model}
  <LoadingPlaceholder />
{:then value}
  <T is={value} />
{/await}

Keep in mind that the hook useGltf caches the result as it’s using useLoader internally.