Unity3D Position and Rotation matching on Waypoints

Question

I have a simple waypoint system. It uses a transform of arrays that act as the bucket what holds the waypoint values.

I use this waypoint system to move a camera throughout a scene by moving towards one point to another. The scene is not big - so everything is close to each other.

The camera moves from one position to another by button click/press. This works fine.

void Start()
{
    //Sets the Camera to the first point
    Camera = GameObject.Find("Main Camera");
    Camera.transform.position = patrolPoints[0].position
    currentPoint = 0;
}

//Fixed Update seems to work better for LookAt
void FixedUpdate()
{
    //Looks at initial Target
    Camera.transform.LookAt(TargetPoints[0]);

    if (click == true)
    {
        Camera.transform.position = Vector3.MoveTowards(Camera.transform.position, patrolPoints[currentPoint].position, moveSpeed * Time.deltaTime);
        //Camera.transform.rotation = Quaternion.Slerp(Camera.transform.rotation, patrolPoints[currentPoint].transform.rotation,  Time.deltaTime);
        Camera.transform.LookAt(TargetPoints[currentPoint]);
    }



}

public void onNextClick()
{
    if (currentPoint >= patrolPoints.Length)
    {
        currentPoint = 0;
    }
    if (Camera.transform.position == patrolPoints[currentPoint].position)
    {
        currentPoint++;
        click = true;
    }

}

I am having difficulty with one aspect of the transform that I haven't talked about yet. That is the rotation.

I have used lookAt for setting up the target of the first look at point and that works. However when it runs to the next target in the look at array - the change is sudden.

I have tried an Slerp in the shot as well - and this works when the waypoint has been placed in the appropriate rotation value - and the value Slerps from one position to the next. However, the timing isn't quite aligning up yet. Some position transitions get there quicker - meaning the rotation is trying to get caught up / while others are lagging behind.

I have tried getting the distance between the current waypoint and the next waypoint and treating that as an overall percentage in the update relative to the current position of the camera - I believe this could help work out how far the rotation should be orientated given the position update.

However, I am somewhat lost on it. Many examples suggest looking at iTween - and I wouldn't imagine this would work - however, I want to get into the math a bit.

Can anyone put me in the right direction?

Mark Quinn Mark Quinn · Accepted Answer · 2017-07-04T12:17:01

Looks like the Lerp for Position and a Slerp for Rotation done the trick. MoveTowards wasn't playing ball with a Slerp on rotation - so I believe the timings weren't aligning.

   if (click == true)
    {
        Camera.transform.position = Vector3.MoveTowards(Camera.transform.position, patrolPoints[currentPoint].position, moveSpeed * Time.deltaTime);
        Camera.transform.rotation = Quaternion.Lerp(Camera.transform.rotation, patrolPoints[currentPoint].rotation, moveSpeed * Time.deltaTime);

I've been led to believe the lerp values work like a percentage of such - so the same input value works for it.

Finally I used a range on the distance between current position and update on the click - this helped speed up the button click.

 if (Vector3.Distance(Camera.transform.position, patrolPoints[currentPoint].position) < PositionThreshold)
    {
        currentPoint++;
        click = true;
    }

Thank you for your time.

Unity3D Position and Rotation matching on Waypoints

1 Answers