Camera rotation limits not right

Question

I have a camera rotating left/right/up/down, I am trying to
limit the rotation to 150 degrees in any direction.
I have this code working for the left/right:
if gPanLeft then pCamera.rotate(0,1,0)
pCamera.transform.rotation.z = max(-150,
min(150,pCamera.transform.rotation.z))
I'm using the same code for up/down (using the x axis), but
the camera stops about 50 degrees in the up direction and about 210
in the downwards direction.
I thought I might have a problem with the starting angle of
my camera (as saved from 3DS Max) and I have tried using different
angles to compensate, but they don't seem to do much. I have also
checked to see if my camera collision is stopping the rotation, but
it isn't.
Can anyone help?

Answer 1

Hello,
I think the problem is that we can't rely on the camera's
rotation vector to
detect extents of movement, as the y axis can flip -180 if
the camera is
rotated a certain amount, this will screw up your max
rotation checking and
make the camera appear to jam.
I think if you work with seperate properties for each axis of
rotation, edit
and check against the properties rather than the camera's
transform, then
apply them to the camera rotation vector in one go this
should fix the
problem. Some pseudo code to give the idea...
property pCamera,pCamRotX,pCamRotY,pCamRotZ
on beginSprite
pCamera = sprite(the currentSpriteNum).camera
pCamRotX = 0
pCamRotY = 0
pCamRotZ = 0
end beginSprite
on exitFrame
if gPanLeft AND pCamRotY < 150 then
pCamRotY = pCamRotY + 1
end if
pCamera.transform.rotation =
vector(pCamRotX,pCamRotY,pCamRotZ)
end exitFrame
Hope this may help
Richard Smith
www.funpods.com