camera follow terrain

[icecream_pirate]

well in my map the camera view is set to follow the character in third person closely (like default WoW camera). The problem is, when theres an elevation, the unit goes up but the camera doesnt follow, it justs clips with the hill. If anyone can help me i'd greatly appreciate it.

 

[Eleandor]

I've been thinking of this, and you actually might be able to do this.

What normally happens is that the camera checks the camera target height, and then increases / decreases its height accordingly. Which means your camera eye height might potentially be lower than the height of the hill at the eye. To fix it, you'd need to check the height of the eye and the height of the hill at the eye position. Then increase / decrease the height accordingly.

 

[thedeathunterxx]

you neeed to make regions, and then when you enter those regions, then you have to change the camera height field high enough to not clip with the hills.

 

[Eleandor]

Actually, I just noticed that there's an action "Pan camera at position with height offset", which avoids collision with hills...

 

[thedeathunterxx]

that works?

i tried that, and for me, it doesn't seem to work.
in fact it doesn't even pan the camera for me.

 

[Eleandor]

Download Warcraft III Spells - Camera System
Then replace the "Pan camera" action with "Pan camera with height offset"

 

[warbucket]

Download Warcraft III Spells - Camera System
Then replace the "Pan camera" action with "Pan camera with height offset"

Damn! I wish this map still existing. I'm currently trying to implement the same thing in my RPG.

This gives me my "hero" cam.

Note: Set mPlayer[PlayerCount] above just refers an array of characters because it's a multiplayer game. You can just use Player 1 (Red) or whatever.

• Events
  • Time - Every 0.03 seconds of game time
• Actions
  • Camera - Lock camera target for mPlayer[PlayerCount] to mHero[PlayerCount], offset by (0.00, 0.00) using Default rotation
  • Camera - Set mPlayer[PlayerCount]'s camera Rotation to (Facing of mHero[PlayerCount]) over 0.00 seconds
  • Camera - Set mPlayer[PlayerCount]'s camera Distance to target to 300.00 over 0.00 seconds
  • Camera - Set mPlayer[PlayerCount]'s camera Angle of attack to 330.00 over 0.00 seconds
  • Camera - Set mPlayer[PlayerCount]'s camera Height Offset to 80.00 over 0.00 seconds
  • Camera - Set mPlayer[PlayerCount]'s camera Far Z to 5000.00 over 0.00 seconds
  • Camera - Set mPlayer[PlayerCount]'s camera Field of view to 1000.00 over 0.00 seconds

I wonder if you can calculate the current hero height and subtract the minimum terrain height and then pan the camera's height offset by that amount.

EDIT:

So I have a very rudimentary solution. It's not elegant by any means and I'm unsure if there will be any memory leaks. I created a "Height Dummy" character. I based it off the Shade and gave it permanent invisibility, invulnerability (neutral), and made it so it can't attack. That should keep the unit out of sight and out of mind.

Then I swapped the height offset function above with this:

• Camera - Set mPlayer[PlayerCount]'s camera Height Offset to (((Position - Z of mHero[PlayerCount]) + 80.00) - (Position - Z of Aiden Hait 0108 <gen>)) over 0.00 seconds

Since this dummy (yes, Aiden Hait is a pun) is placed at the lowest point of the map it should always offset your camera in the Z direction by the difference between you and the dummy.

EDIT 2: Unfortunately, this doesn't work very well at higher heights because it doesn't update the Angle of Attack.