Need Help with a Basic Camera Move

[Dave M]

I'm trying to make a shot for a documentary film that shows the way the water currents move in Hudson's Bay, all the way through to the Atlantic Ocean.....and I've been able to make a script that moves to the points (latitude/longitude) but I don't know how to make it move smoothly without stopping. I can only get it to move to each point, stop, then move to the next point. I've uploaded a version of what I've done and I'm wondering if anyone can help me with how to do this exact shot without the camera stopping at each point, but moving slowly on this path (like a camera move in a film).

Here is my clip
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kn4T56AUYak

[selden]

One technique would be to define an SSC object with an xyz trajectory relative to the rotating Earth. Have the viewpoint follow that object. Its motion will be smooth if the xyz positions are evenly spaced. xyz trajectories don't use latitude and longitude, so they're somewhat more awkward to generate.

[Fenerit]

Maybe I do not have well caught the question, but is the camera's path shown in your video, the path to be assigned to an object representing the water currents, or both to the water currents and to the camera?

[Dave M]

The water currents will be added into the shot later in an effects program....All I'm trying to do in Celestia is create a script that follows that general path without stopping. And right now all I know how to do is make it move to each of those points of longitude and latitude but it stops at each point for a second instead of continuing smoothly.

I don't really know how to do any scripting stuff at all, everything I did in that video example is from things I've copied from other people's scripts, and most of the reading I've done has not been very helpful. It also doesn't help that I'm not very good with scripting type stuff to begin with.

the SSC object suggestion from selden sounds like it could work but it's also kind of confusing (to me anyway). Does anyone know where I could find a script that might have something similar that I could copy the scripting from and modify? Because I wouldn't really know where to begin with the writing of it. Or if it's not that complicated could someone tell me the kind of text I would have to write? Thanks

[Fenerit]

Here : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mS59CihZu_I you can see a video made by Jogad that shows in a smooth way the path motion of the camera amongst points. Such points have been sampled through its wondrous script makers. That is, a script makers of scripts. You can find the thread and the download's link here: http://www.shatters.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=16165 The script is an automatic recorder of your control's actions: keyboard, mouse, joystick. Your points will be b-spline-interpolated, no pauses amongst them.

[Dave M]

^ thank you. That scripting program has helped a lot. I've been able to create the smooth movement I want...the only problem is that program is very glitchy and it often crashes Celestia when I try to run the script that I made multiple times....and if I try to modify the 'recorded' script, it crashes and won't work....has anyone else had this problem?

[Fenerit]

Maybe do you have the Celestia official 1.6.0 version? Notice that the script maker is for Celestia 1.6.1 (SVN version). You can download such a version from the script's thread above (.exe compiled by Jogad).

[Dave M]

No that's not the problem. I did download the 1.6.1 version....it's still pretty glitchy and if I try to edit the script or change the name of the file or do anything to it the script crashes the program.