3rd person mouse rotation
Author
I am curious as to how one would would use the mouse as to when it moves, it rotates around an object, such as if you moved the mouse to the right a little, it'd rotate the view to the right around the object.
Psuedo-code would be helpful as well as normal code. I am using SDL with OpenGL, of course, if anyone has code for them dealing with this.
You mean a 3rd person camera?
You could swap the Position vector and Target vectors and pass those to Glu lookat. Although my implementation is a lot diferent.
pseudocode
1. Rotate your players forward, right and up vectors on an arbitray axis. Like your first person camera
2. After rotation, make another vector and copy the values of your forward vector to it.
3. Rotate that vector (on the right vector n-degrees, I use -10 to -20) and subtract that vector from your position vector.
4. Make that vector the camera position to pass to gluLookat.
5. Set the camera target as the players position vector and pass to Glulookat.
Here's a demo with source if you want to see it in action:
glShooter
Controls:
WASD/ARROWS
Mouse move
Mouse Buttons
Space = shoot
1,2,3,4 = to change camera types
5 = show player axis
You could swap the Position vector and Target vectors and pass those to Glu lookat. Although my implementation is a lot diferent.
pseudocode
1. Rotate your players forward, right and up vectors on an arbitray axis. Like your first person camera
2. After rotation, make another vector and copy the values of your forward vector to it.
3. Rotate that vector (on the right vector n-degrees, I use -10 to -20) and subtract that vector from your position vector.
4. Make that vector the camera position to pass to gluLookat.
5. Set the camera target as the players position vector and pass to Glulookat.
Here's a demo with source if you want to see it in action:
glShooter
Controls:
WASD/ARROWS
Mouse move
Mouse Buttons
Space = shoot
1,2,3,4 = to change camera types
5 = show player axis
Author
i was thinking more along the lines of an object standing still and when you move your mouse, your view (or camera, if you want to say) rotates around it (sorta like in the Matrix, where Neo "freezes" and the camera seems to spin around him) - you were correct when you said a 3rd person camera, but i don't see how switching the target and position would achieve this? if you did that, it'd be like the opposite of what i'm attempting to achieve.
What I did is as follows:
I have a float containing the rotation angle.
camera_position.x = player_pos.x + sin(rotation_angle) * camera_distance_from_player;
camera_position.y = player_pos.y + desired_height_of_camera;
camera_position.z = player_pos.z + cos(rotation_angle) * camera_distance_from_player;
Your camera look direction is the camera_position vector minus the player_pos vector.
When I moved the mouse left or right, it decreased or increased the rotation angle. deltaRotAngle (the change in rotation angle per frame) is dependent on the time elapsed for the last frame multiplied by the desired camera rotation speed in radians per second. You should manually wrap it to the sin/cos period so that you don't lose floating point accuracy as time goes on with multiple same-direction rotations.
Keep in mind that I haven't done 3rd person code like this for a long time... I may have the sin and cos switched around.
I have a float containing the rotation angle.
camera_position.x = player_pos.x + sin(rotation_angle) * camera_distance_from_player;
camera_position.y = player_pos.y + desired_height_of_camera;
camera_position.z = player_pos.z + cos(rotation_angle) * camera_distance_from_player;
Your camera look direction is the camera_position vector minus the player_pos vector.
When I moved the mouse left or right, it decreased or increased the rotation angle. deltaRotAngle (the change in rotation angle per frame) is dependent on the time elapsed for the last frame multiplied by the desired camera rotation speed in radians per second. You should manually wrap it to the sin/cos period so that you don't lose floating point accuracy as time goes on with multiple same-direction rotations.
Keep in mind that I haven't done 3rd person code like this for a long time... I may have the sin and cos switched around.
Quote:Original post by codemastermm
i was thinking more along the lines of an object standing still and when you move your mouse, your view (or camera, if you want to say) rotates around it (sorta like in the Matrix, where Neo "freezes" and the camera seems to spin around him) - you were correct when you said a 3rd person camera, but i don't see how switching the target and position would achieve this? if you did that, it'd be like the opposite of what i'm attempting to achieve.
The above can do that. Use the same algorithm to get the offset vector and use the spherical system (which can also be found in the demo) to rotate manually. I mean after subtracting, you can rotate the camera forward vector anyway you want.
;*)
There was a smooth 3rd person camera tutorial on FireStorm's site (www.firestorm.go.ro). If that helps?
Author
i'm trying to use the mouse rather than the arrow keys, so it is definately a bit more tedious. I'm presuming that every change in the mouse's X and Y should be used to change the camera, such as if they move the mouse, i'll check for a change in X and the Y and move the camera accordingly? I hope I am correct in presuming this.
the only problem i have now is I still am not certain as to how to do this, as the tutorials and psuedo-code most of you have provided seem to be made for the keyboard keys rather than the mouse controls.
i have seen this - http://www.gamedev.net/reference/articles/article2160.asp
it somewhat helps, but i'm still very shaky on it, since it keeps using vTheta and hTheta and never really explains how it got them and such of that sort.
[Edited by - codemastermm on June 19, 2005 2:28:44 PM]
the only problem i have now is I still am not certain as to how to do this, as the tutorials and psuedo-code most of you have provided seem to be made for the keyboard keys rather than the mouse controls.
i have seen this - http://www.gamedev.net/reference/articles/article2160.asp
it somewhat helps, but i'm still very shaky on it, since it keeps using vTheta and hTheta and never really explains how it got them and such of that sort.
[Edited by - codemastermm on June 19, 2005 2:28:44 PM]
Both relsoft and myself posted code that will work with the mouse as well as the keyboard. In fact, there really is no difference between the two when you look at it.
During a frame, if you find that the left key was pressed. Assign the rotation speed scalar a value of: -1 * frameTime * maxRotVelInRadiansPerSec
During a frame, you moved the mouse left. Assign the rotation speed scalar a value of: -mouseInfo.mickeys.x * frameTime * maxRotVelInRadiansPerSec
Since the mouse left and right are just changes in sign for the mickeys.x, you could do the same calculation all the time without a check for if the mouse was even moved. Just remove the negative symbol and make sure that line is executed every frame.
As you can see, there really is no big difference between the two. Both are input events, and both rotate the camera if used in conjunction with the code we posted.
During a frame, if you find that the left key was pressed. Assign the rotation speed scalar a value of: -1 * frameTime * maxRotVelInRadiansPerSec
During a frame, you moved the mouse left. Assign the rotation speed scalar a value of: -mouseInfo.mickeys.x * frameTime * maxRotVelInRadiansPerSec
Since the mouse left and right are just changes in sign for the mickeys.x, you could do the same calculation all the time without a check for if the mouse was even moved. Just remove the negative symbol and make sure that line is executed every frame.
As you can see, there really is no big difference between the two. Both are input events, and both rotate the camera if used in conjunction with the code we posted.
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