Forums | NoesisGUI

Is there any means to import SVG files? I can't seem to find anything in the UI or documentation about this. I was under the impression this was more or less the point of the product.
I'm coming from Rive where the interface and workflow leave much to be desired.

Edit: Figured it out.

FWIW.. I wouldn't mind seeing a more efficient workflow for dealing with styles and templating. I can see the depth and power of the studio editor but I can also see how much time its going to eat up getting my assets built into reusable components/resources. Just doing something as simple as a button seems really more complicated than it should be. Granted, as I mentioned I'm coming from a Unity+Rive context so I'm probably spoiled on the speed of that toolchain but... at the end of the day if it wants to compete, it needs to be more efficient than what I'm currently doing.

Hi Phil! Glad you figured this out!

Just going to post the link to our doc section about vector importing for anyone else coming across this thread looking for similar answers:
📘 Noesis Studio: Path Import Features

- Dorian

Just doing something as simple as a button seems really more complicated than it should be. Granted, as I mentioned I'm coming from a Unity+Rive context so I'm probably spoiled on the speed of that toolchain but... at the end of the day if it wants to compete, it needs to be more efficient than what I'm currently doing.

We're currently working on a new tutorial specifically about this, templating and styling a button. Could you please share more feedback about your experience? I want to make sure everything is addressed, clarified, or even fixed if needed.

Thanks!

@jsantos

I'll give you a couple of thoughts on my general experience thus far..

Docs

• The start of the documentation page for the Unity Tutorial is pretty good for the setup of the package, though the 'tutorial' pretty much ends once we get to the notes about the Noesis Project Settings.. from then on its more just descriptive notes of the different parts of the extension as they exist within the engine. So not so much a tutorial as it is a general Knowledge Center reference page? It contains valuable information but isn't presented in a way that says "Hey you REALLY should read these notes."
• As someone who works in technical support for a cloud company.. part of what makes for successful documentation is if its written in such a way that an 8-year old could follow it, so if it followed more of a step-by-step model, it'll probably start paying unseen support dividends. And it may very well need to be just a compendium to a YT video.
• From the screenshots of both Unity and VS, one can immediately deduce this is some old material, so my other immediate concern is "whether or not this content is still valid in [current date].", particularly since I'm working within Unity 6.x (2025)

Youtube

• As someone who's coming into NoesisGUI completely fresh, one of the first things I instinctively did was turn to Youtube and look for anything covering the Unity integration. Most of the videos I've come across are anywhere from 1-10 years old, so there's a heavy degree of uncertainty about the relevance of the material there as well.
• The one video I can point to that served to really help me understand the Studio UI thus far while is "Building a Main Menu in Noesis Studio (Z3L Walkthrough)" - with Dorian. Practical examples will always be king and there's much more of a learning curve to the editor than I was expecting.

Samples

• I'll be honest, I haven't really looked at these yet. Again.. the timestamps concern me, and I don't know that these will cleanly import into Unity past 2021.x.

Context about my Use-Case
I'm working in an existing project and I'm ultimately coming off of uGUI/GameObjects. I had spent the greater part of last week toying with Rive, but I'm not crazy about the 'Figma' model, and their editor is a little oversimplistic. It also doesn't help that I already have an existing UI that utilizes both SVGs/Rasters. Dream Tool: Import my existing GO hierarchy and setup the data bindings for me.

Bugs / FRs

• Importing the SVGs does not bring in their colors - Having to reset all of this is tedious.
• There appears to be an issue whereby toggling visibility on child objects doesn't actually cascade down, so to hide parented elements while working, you have to go through each child and toggle them off. I noticed this while working within a 'template' where the hierarchy was Viewbox > Grid > [Path1,2,3.4.......]

Final thought
I came to this tool because 1.) I want to get away from an elaborate tree of GameObjects in Unity cluttering up the scene and 2.) even though Unity doesn't really think so.. I see the value in using vector graphics for UI elements so things scale properly without leaving anything to chance. If I were Noesis, I'd lean into that. You don't have to be an Illustrator clone, but give me a few more shape building tools so I can create some more interesting visual elements. Drawing a path by hand will always be necessary but give me some presets I can easily transform like squares, circles, ovals, etc.. You might fire up Google Sheets sometime and look at the Shapes menu.

Thanks for the amazing feedback! I'm going to respond to your points for the benefit of other potential readers of this post.

As someone who works in technical support for a cloud company.. part of what makes for successful documentation is if its written in such a way that an 8-year old could follow it, so if it followed more of a step-by-step model, it'll probably start paying unseen support dividends. And it may very well need to be just a compendium to a YT video.

We've added a "Getting Started" video for Unity to our documentation queue.

From the screenshots of both Unity and VS, one can immediately deduce this is some old material, so my other immediate concern is "whether or not this content is still valid in [current date].", particularly since I'm working within Unity 6.x (2025)

We're currently reviewing all images in preparation for the upcoming 3.2.8 release. Our package is fully compatible with Unity 6.0 and 6.1, and you're absolutely right, outdated visuals could give the wrong impression.

I'll be honest, I haven't really looked at these yet. Again.. the timestamps concern me, and I don't know that these will cleanly import into Unity past 2021.x.[/list]

Our samples are compatible with all Unity versions. There are a few known issues (#3851, #4005, #3909]) with HDRP/URP in Unity 6.x, but these have already been addressed in the upcoming 3.2.8 release.

Importing the SVGs does not bring in their colors - Having to reset all of this is tedious.

Could you please create a support ticket and include one of the affected SVG files? We support standard paints (solid, linear, gradient), but it's possible the file uses complex paint setups, such as multiple fills or other advanced features.

There appears to be an issue whereby toggling visibility on child objects doesn't actually cascade down, so to hide parented elements while working, you have to go through each child and toggle them off. I noticed this while working within a 'template' where the hierarchy was Viewbox > Grid > [Path1,2,3.4.......]

We haven't been able to reproduce this issue. Could you please report it or share the steps needed to reproduce the behavior?

If I were Noesis, I'd lean into that. You don't have to be an Illustrator clone, but give me a few more shape building tools so I can create some more interesting visual elements. Drawing a path by hand will always be necessary but give me some presets I can easily transform like squares, circles, ovals, etc.. You might fire up Google Sheets sometime and look at the Shapes menu.

We completely agree, and vector graphics are at the core of NoesisGUI. Our technology is built around a fully vector-based renderer that we've been refining for over five years. Vectors are first-class citizens in our engine, and performance has always been a top priority.

We support several primitives including Rectangles, Rounded Rectangles, Circles, Ellipses, Stars, and Regular Polygons. You can find all of them in the Shape category of the Add Element panel in Studio. Each of these can also be converted into editable Paths. If there's a specific procedural shape you feel is missing, we’d love to hear your suggestion.

Thank you!

Love it!

Also duh.. idiot me. I was expecting these to be up here..