[Bf-funboard] Track constraint proposal

[Konrad Haenel]

I can find nothing wrong with this proposal. I faced the problem myself 
from time to time and your solution seems to really solve it.

Matthew H. Plough wrote:

> I propose an extension to the Track constraint that would allow the  
> "up" direction to be specified intuitively, while also allowing it to  
> be animated.
>
> The Track constraint is not affine invariant.  It needs to be; there  
> is a unique "up" direction.
>
> One common use for tracking is to create a target camera -- instead  
> of directly specifying the camera rotation, the user specifies it  
> indirectly by placing an empty where the camera should look and  
> causing the camera to track the empty.
>
> Right now, this has two parts:
> 1) The camera looks at the empty.  The camera is rotated so that its  
> y axis (for example) points toward the empty.
> 2) A global "up" axis, generally the global z axis, then constrains  
> the rotation about the camera's local y axis, providing a steady camera.
>
> Consider the implementation of part 2:
>
> Let the line through the camera's location and the empty's location  
> be called line L.  Let a plane normal to L be called P.  Let the  
> projection of the global z axis onto P be called U, for "up".
>
> The camera is rotated about its y axis until U is parallel to the  
> camera's local z axis.  This works fine until L is nearly parallel to  
> the global z axis.  When this happens, U is nearly zero length, and  
> the camera rotates wildly.
>
>
> For scenes shot indoors, or outdoor scenes without a lot of motion,  
> this implementation works fine.  It's really bad, though, when the  
> camera does a lot of maneuvering -- what if I want my shot to fly in  
> a half-circle, and then straight down a hole?  The camera will rotate  
> like crazy unless I painstakingly align things manually, which is  
> time consuming and inefficient.
>
> A simple extension to the current implementation would work great.   
> Instead of using a global "up" axis, use a local "up" axis; allow the  
> tracked empty's z axis to supply the "up" direction.
>
> Now, instead of projecting the global z axis onto P, the empty's  
> local z axis would be projected onto P.  This way, when I fly the  
> camera down a hole, all I have to do is rotate the empty through 90  
> degrees, thereby keeping U nondegenerate, and making the necessary  
> rotation about the camera's y axis unambiguous and stable.  Also, as  
> I'm flying the camera around, I can bank it by rotating the empty  
> left to right.
>
>
> Any crits?
>
>
> Cheers,
> Matt
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