[v0.24] Tarsier Space Technology (v4.5c Now with GALAXIES!!!)

[Galileo Kerbonaut]

i love this telescope, but its quite a hassle to keep it straight =/

is there any way, to finecontrol the craft, so i can focus more easily?

When testing I was using Mechjeb and setting it to look at the target (which was set to a planet), otherwise it's pretty difficult to find things that are too far away. I have been thinking on how it could be controlled better, but the difficulty is that the angles become so small when you are looking far away that controlling the craft is very difficult.

I think this has more to do with the weight of the telescope. 1.5 tons is more then enough to unbalance a small craft (center of mass). That's how I found out about the lag in the first place; I slammed on a 2nd scope to fix the balance issues. Maybe make the part a little lighter? I set the weight 0.5 tons and that seems to work a little better.

Fixed low FPS issues with camera closed, turns out the camera was still rendering in the background.

When open you will still see a drop in FPS, as it has to render everything twice, but this will only be when the camera is open and activated.

Cool, I'll try it out tonight! Love what you're doing. I also like the science you get from the pictures; makes everything more interesting instead of just taking a picture.

Idea for the future: Maybe it's possible to make different scopes with lower resolution pictures (and less science) in the beginning of the tech tree? Kinda like how Scansat is integrated in the game?

Keep up the great work...

Edited December 23, 2013 by Galileo Kerbonaut

[Galileo Kerbonaut]

EDIT: It would also be useful if you could name the directory "Tarsier" instead of just parts so I have a better conspectus of what mods I have installed. Or is this something I can change for myself without any consequences? I didn't want to try it since the .dll is placed outside the parts directory, so I thought it might break up the path.

This should have been an edit... guess I accidentally pressed reply.

[1of6Billion]

Nice! Love telescopes!

[tobyb121]

I think this has more to do with the weight of the telescope. 1.5 tons is more then enough to unbalance a small craft (centre of mass). That's how I found out about the lag in the first place; I slammed on a 2nd scope to fix the balance issues. Maybe make the part a little lighter? I set the weight 0.5 tons and that seems to work a little better.

This is certainly true, also the telescope control point is right at the very front of the camera arm, because this is away from the reaction wheels you get rotations about all the axes at once instead of one at a time. I might reduce the weight and have a go at adding reaction wheels to the camera itself.

All the files can be put into a sub-folder inside of GameData, the only reason I hadn't done that is in my workflow I usually right click on the zip and use 7-zip and extract to folder, which creates the folder automatically. I've noticed that mods have the subfolder included in the zip so I'll do that next time.

Edited December 23, 2013 by tobyb121

[Galileo Kerbonaut]

Hey Toby,

I did some more testing and I found that not only the weight is a little too much, put the part itself isn't centered as well. (see pic - the red line is perpendicular) You might wanna look into this.

I've also been messing around with the weight itself some more and found that 0.25 tons is a fair number. This way you can still compensate for the part in an a-symmetrical build.

Edited December 23, 2013 by Galileo Kerbonaut

[EvilotionCR2]

Could I request a robotic sample colector please ?

[Rokker]

That telescope looks sweet!

Of course it does, NASA didn't design it to not look sweet

[Rokker]

Could I request a robotic sample colector please ?

Already exists. Not sure if it works on .23, but it does exist.

http://kerbalspaceprogram.com/samplecollector/

[Helix935]

Already exists. Not sure if it works on .23, but it does exist.

http://kerbalspaceprogram.com/samplecollector/

well actually here is a better one on page 2

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/60642-Artist-looking-for-some-help?highlight=scoop-o-matic

[tobyb121]

I've got a fix for the centre of mass and I'll bring the weight down as well.

For my next project I'm planning to make a surface sample collector, but my plan is to recreate the ChemCam on the Curiosity rover (http://www.msl-chemcam.com/)

[kiwiak]

I wish i coudl move around this telescope without moving whole craft (or using infernal robotics parts).

Well, still much better than ordan telescope that didnt provided GUI window and zoom (only fulscreen view).

[kookoo_gr]

very nice mod indeed. a couple of suggestions

1. At the display could you add a crosshairs, ie something like this without the center dot so we can aim the scope better at a target

2. if possible at the display screen can you add fine control movement arrows that will allow the whole ship to move slowly at high magnifications? Currently when looking at a target at high magnifications and moving the ship (even with the caps lock on) the image moves very fast.A finer movement for the ship or the scope itself will enable the player to look for targets more easy. Also i believe a track target function would be good.

[Galileo Kerbonaut]

I've got a fix for the centre of mass and I'll bring the weight down as well.

For my next project I'm planning to make a surface sample collector, but my plan is to recreate the ChemCam on the Curiosity rover (http://www.msl-chemcam.com/)

Sounds good. I really like this mod. Can't wait for the update

[TyrannoFan]

Can there please be an option to make the display go fullscreen? Like an IVA view, but with all the mod's gui buttons and the zoom sliders, and maybe keep the navball too to find the target. Or if you take kookoo_gr's suggestion, there won't be a need for a navball in the view. I find that it is very laggy when it has to render essentially two screens at once, and I shouldn't have to turn down settings to make the game as smooth as it normally is. Just a suggestion. I don't really mind it all that much.

[wbcundiff]

very nice mod indeed. a couple of suggestions

1. At the display could you add a crosshairs, ie something like this *snip* without the center dot so we can aim the scope better at a target

2. if possible at the display screen can you add fine control movement arrows that will allow the whole ship to move slowly at high magnifications? Currently when looking at a target at high magnifications and moving the ship (even with the caps lock on) the image moves very fast.A finer movement for the ship or the scope itself will enable the player to look for targets more easy. Also i believe a track target function would be good.

I will try this out soon, but as far as the track target function goes, I think you would be able to do this with the KOS mod. You can target a craft or planetary body via a script and then lock steering to that target. I haven't tried it yet but I believe this should be possible.

[Rokker]

well actually here is a better one on page 2

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/60642-Artist-looking-for-some-help?highlight=scoop-o-matic

but... but... r4mon coded the one i posted

[Helix935]

but... but... r4mon coded the one i posted

the one i posted is also animated and balanced

also do the hard drives on here actually save power?

[JeffreyCor]

I love the telescope! The hard drives however don't seem to serve a useful purpose at least with the science update in .23. The data is transferred from the interments to the drives, but the interments are then unusable unless cleaned by the new science module. Maybe I'm missing something.

[Beetlecat]

I love the telescope! The hard drives however don't seem to serve a useful purpose at least with the science update in .23. The data is transferred from the interments to the drives, but the interments are then unusable unless cleaned by the new science module. Maybe I'm missing something.

Well --- the drives themselves could be attached to something that leaves the telescope (temporary docked data storage?) and gets sent back home or to a lab...

Perhaps if the hard drives could be used to store multiple versions of the same crew report / eva report, etc.

[tobyb121]

I love the telescope! The hard drives however don't seem to serve a useful purpose at least with the science update in .23. The data is transferred from the interments to the drives, but the interments are then unusable unless cleaned by the new science module. Maybe I'm missing something.

The hard drives were made for .22, where being able to store science was quite useful. I realise that there have been some changes in .23 that have changed the balance of the game, and so the hard drives are not as useful now. I had added in the limitations on the hard drive (e.g. one report per experiment type) to try and balance them in .22, but I suppose it would be reasonable to change them. If there is a consensus on what should be changed then I'm happy to implement it.

[UAL002]

I think it is still useful to add it to a pod to have the ability to add a second experiment to one already in your command pod. Just make the experiments addable and removeable by Eva in addition to its current "suck all data" function.

[Redhotita1]

I just love this mod, but i noticed when i pointed on Kerbin that the Visual Enhancements doesn't work. Could you try to fix it?

[tobyb121]

Unfortunately I don't think getting this to work with city lights/clouds will be possible. I believe the clouds etc. are drawn by a separate camera which I think would be very hard to incorporate, and would be very difficult to maintain (any changes to visual enhancements could break this, any changes to KSP could break this, and even changes to KSP could break VE, which in turn would break my mod!!!)

I'm just adding the finishing touches to a new version which draws a target on the window to help zoom into distant planets. I can see planets most of the way across the solar system now without using mechjeb.

[Redhotita1]

Unfortunately I don't think getting this to work with city lights/clouds will be possible. I can see planets most of the way across the solar system now without using mechjeb.

Well doesn't really matter, was just for a better looking of planets , Well, i manually looked to Jool, Duna, Eve, needed some minutes for find them lol

[tobyb121]

Well doesn't really matter, was just for a better looking of planets , Well, i manually looked to Jool, Duna, Eve, needed some minutes for find them lol

You should find it much easier with the new version, if you switch on the targetter.