Fun with the 3D coordinate system!

[Peteroid]

This is not so much a 'complaint' as it is a somewhat humorous observation (at least for a guy like me that studied math in college).

While I actually understand and appreciate why the decisions to design the coordinate system the way it is were made, it is completely non-standard from a pure-math pov!

In math, angles start out at value 0 degrees pointing 'right' (or 'east'), and then increases degrees as the angle rotates clockwise. For example, 90 degrees is forward, 180 degrees (or -180 degrees) is left, 270 degrees (or -90 degrees) is backwards.

In AS7PRO, there are 3 axes (plural of axis)... X, Y, Z. Typically, in math, X is oriented left-right with right being positive, Y is oriented up-down with up beling positive, and z is oriented into-out-to the screen with into being positive.

Well in AS7PRO, this is how it is:

* X and Y axes are the same as math! yeah!
* Z is reversed... into the screen is the negative direction.
* pan starts with 0 degrees facing FORWARD (north), and increases CLOCKWISE.
* tilt starts with 0 degrees facing parallel to ground (forward), with positive rotation in the upward (counterclockwise) direction.

Now, this makes math a bit hard to wrap your head around if you've been 'brainwashed' for years about how math does it. Also, the math functions built into computer languages assume the math convention.

Bu it makes sense because from a POV point of view (hehe), we do think of 'forward' as 0 degrees (not right), we do think of level with the horizon as 0 degrees, and it is natural to think of increasing Z as increasing the distance from the object (hence positive is move back to see it from a distance relative to being on top of it). Naturally we think of our 'heading' as 0 degrees, which is 'forward' (for most people)...

But I'm trying to write math formulas to give me the tilt and pan values to get the camera to point at a given (x,y,z) location, and the conversions are driving me INSANE!!!!! (LOL)