[0.90] Lazor System v35 (Dec 17)

[Romfarer]

I\'m not sure really, how does a laser guided missile track it\'s target?

Hmmmmmmm. A stationary target would be 'easy' to track. Because you could just get the distance and move the laser according to your own movements. But a stationary one? I guess you would have to somehow figure out how the target is moving. How exactly does a single laser do that?

[sal_vager]

I\'m going to have to look it up, as the only tracking laser I know of is the one in my mouse like I mentioned, it illuminates a very small area and watches the area change as the mouse is moved, comparing the new image to the old one to figure out which way and how far the mouse was moved.

But this operates at zero distance, I doubt a long range laser works on the same principles.

Edit:

Well, it looks like laser tracking works in two ways, plain and simple distance tracking with no lateral movement and the 'paint the target and blow it up' method.

In the first method, a laser is used at two angles with a retroreflective marker, and it can accurately judge the markers distance as shown here : http://www.qualitydigest.com/inside/metrology-article/how-laser-trackers-work.html

In the second with laser guided bombs, a laser is fired from afar and the bomb just homes in on the bright light : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_homing

I have not found any real world lasers that can tell if a target is moving and can then follow it aside from the aforementioned mouse, I guess you need a camera mounted with your laser, to act like an eyetoy or kinect.

[Romfarer]

I\'m going to have to look it up, as the only tracking laser I know of is the one in my mouse like I mentioned, it illuminates a very small area and watches the area change as the mouse is moved, comparing the new image to the old one to figure out which way and how far the mouse was moved.

But this operates at zero distance, I doubt a long range laser works on the same principles.

Edit:

Well, it looks like laser tracking works in two ways, plain and simple distance tracking with no lateral movement and the 'paint the target and blow it up' method.

In the first method, a laser is used at two angles with a retroreflective marker, and it can accurately judge the markers distance as shown here : http://www.qualitydigest.com/inside/metrology-article/how-laser-trackers-work.html

In the second with laser guided bombs, a laser is fired from afar and the bomb just homes in on the bright light : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_homing

I have not found any real world lasers that can tell if a target is moving and can then follow it aside from the aforementioned mouse, I guess you need a camera mounted with your laser, to act like an eyetoy or kinect.

Thanks for the info. This was very helpful. I guess we can say that the system can be expanded with some kind of distance tracking device and a laser target painting device.

[Lazurkri]

Well, maybe if you got a lock, the laser would be able to track it the same way a mouse laser tracks the surface you are using, it\'d see the surface move left and then tilt the laser left to follow it.

Or a prettier way might be to scan left to right then up and down like the laser at the start of Aliens, that\'d get you your bearing and you\'d rescan if you lost contact.

I\'m not sure really, how does a laser guided missile track it\'s target?

Essentially the same way, it 'Looks' for the brightest point of light thats the right frequency to follow (so it doesn\'t home in on, say, a ordinary laser pointer but instead follows the beam from a proper designator) then commands its control surfaces or motors to align with that point, and continues to do so until it impacts or gets close enough that the warhead detonates.

That\'s Laser Designated Bombs though, Missiles are different, in that they follow a beam to the target using a laser in their rear, unlike bombs which have it in the nose.

(Laser Guided Munitions, AKA bombs

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_guided_munitions

Missile Guidance Systems. Look under Line-Of-Sight Beam Riding Guidance (LOSBR) for Beam Rider missiles

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missile_guidance)

[Romfarer]

(Laser Guided Munitions, AKA bombs

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_guided_munitions

Missile Guidance Systems. Look under Line-Of-Sight Beam Riding Guidance (LOSBR) for Beam Rider missiles

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missile_guidance)

Thanks for the links.

I got another update coming up soon: Multi-lazor support. And then i will start the work on multi-module support, and then hopefully it will become a lot more clear where this project is going.

Do i have to add the sourcecode to the plugin files while the project is still in alpha? (Half of it is out-commented sections of code i use for reference :-[)

[Kreuzung]

You have to, but is it really useful to release it now?

[Romfarer]

You have to, but is it really useful to release it now?

Well, define useful? I think the lazor-system looks a lot better now at least.

Sorry, you are probably right, perhaps it is too early to showcase the next stage in the alpha. Anyways here is a picture of the latest feature.

It works very well with Tosh Cart ;D

[Lazurkri]

It also looks quite neat when belly mounted under my Blimp thats outfitted with PPCs and Sunbeams ;D ;D

[sal_vager]

I thought I\'d try practicing with Blender and make you a Lazor turret, but my ability is very low, do you want the blend file anyway? Maybe someone else can finish it.

[Romfarer]

I thought I\'d try practicing with Blender and make you a Lazor turret, but my ability is very low, do you want the blend file anyway? Maybe someone else can finish it.

I\'m no wizard in blender either, but my parts are highly customizable. You can have them in any color you want, as long as it is black. Thanks for the part though. Once the multi-part support thing is done it will be possible to add all kinds of things to the system.

I have been struggeling with this silly exception all day. I think it has something to do with how KSP is compiled. Do they use Mono? I am getting MissingMedhodException system.type.op_equality when i try to run something like if(o.GetType() == o2.GetType()).

[sal_vager]

Unity does indeed use Mono for it\'s C#, and Monodevelop is recommended, I have never used it though so don\'t know how good it is.

My programming experience didn\'t get further than BlitzBasic.

[Romfarer]

New version available for review. See the main post for more details...

[Lazurkri]

Yay! now more reasons to clutter Munar orbit with crap to shoot down!

[Romfarer]

So i\'m trying to figure out what properties the different colored lasers should have. And also what combinations of these should yield the different systems. For example a distance measuring laser system could consist of two lasers of different color, but what colors should that be?

[sal_vager]

Well traditionally red has been for weapon lasers in movies, but then again I always preferred the green lasers of the TIE fighters, maybe a rangefinder can be blue or possibly yellow, it\'s your choice

Something that might be useful though would be a degree readout next to the direction buttons, especially if those degree readouts could be typed into for quick changes of direction.

The use I\'d have for the degree readouts would be that I could then set the Lazor directly forwards easily from a side mounted position, as then I could use it to see where I was pointing when making a rendezvous.

[Romfarer]

Well traditionally red has been for weapon lasers in movies, but then again I always preferred the green lasers of the TIE fighters, maybe a rangefinder can be blue or possibly yellow, it\'s your choice

So at the moment i have: red lazors are infrared and has something to do with heat. Purple lazors are ultraviolet and has something to do with......and this is where i would really like to hear your ideas. So i need to connect a property to the colors: red, green, blue, cyan(green,blue), purple/violet(red,blue) and yellow(red,green). And all these properties should make up the base properties one would need to construct any type of system.

Something that might be useful though would be a degree readout next to the direction buttons, especially if those degree readouts could be typed into for quick changes of direction.

The use I\'d have for the degree readouts would be that I could then set the Lazor directly forwards easily from a side mounted position, as then I could use it to see where I was pointing when making a rendezvous.

This is an interesting idea and one i would be interested to implement soon. Please explain exactly what you would like this readout to look like.

I can make the lasers point anywhere you would like, direction of gravity, the direction you are traveling, directions to other vessels, direction to the moon, anything.

[sal_vager]

Okay, the things I know lasers can be used for are these :

Weapon (dump heat into target) (red)

Cutting / Welding of metal (not sure of use in KSP, similar to weapon) (violet)

Range finder / Pointer / Designator (green)

Communications (can possibly be used for remote control of craft in range) (blue)

Scanning (either by spectral analysis of reflected light, interferometry or by scanning a barcode) (yellow)

Holograms (maybe can make images of ships?) (white)

(colours are just a guess, you can use any colour i think)

I\'ll try to do a pic of what I mean in Gimp, won\'t be long.

Edit: Here is what I mean with the controls, you could adjust as normal or type in the box and press enter, the boxes would show Azimuth and Rotation of the Lazor.

[Tosh]

Cutting / Welding of metal (not sure of use in KSP, similar to weapon) (violet)

In KSP: instantly detach target part off its vessel

[Romfarer]

Excellent ideas sal_vager. Thanks.

I\'ll add the Azimuth and Rotation displays to the system. Perhaps also some hotkeys to make the lazor point straight forward? Or buttons to make it point towards other directions?

I think it is important to get the lazor colors properly paired with effects. What you have listed up definately helps to take the project forward. If the system uses 1 or 2 crystals to color the lazor, we get 6 lazor colors. And if we say each functioning system requires 2 lazors, it\'s possible to spawn 30 or 36 different systems depending on wether we allow for systems with two of the same colors or not. And that is from only 5 base parts. ;D

This can get really complicated fast. The challenge here will be to make the lazor coloring vs what system you will actually get intuitive enough so say for example you want a distance tracking device. Then you would automatically know, aha i need 1 green lazor combined with 1 yellow lazor.

Cool idea Tosh. So in terms of the lazor system you would use a violet + a red lazor to detatch the part. Then use a green and blue lazor to create a tractor beam effect, move the part to where you want to place it and veld it on with a violet and green lazor .... 8) Edit: oooooh and in theory you could use this same process to weld lazors on and off, creating new lazor systems in flight!!!

[sal_vager]

It seems Disperse already resets the Lazor\'s angle to it\'s starting position, but pointing side mounted Lazor\'s directly ahead of the ship would be useful as thats the first place most people will be looking.

Maybe start with single beams with basic effects, and have multiple beams increase effects? For example one yellow laser would scan slowly but three would scan much faster.

Also you have 7 basic colours if you add white

I suggest you try not to let the project get too complex too soon, as it\'ll become hard to handle, work on some basic effects first and then see what ideas come to mind about how those effects can be expanded.

One other thing to keep in mind, if you make it so other people can make their mods use the Lazor you\'ll soon see new exciting uses for it you never thought of.

[Romfarer]

One-liner of the week!! 8)

public Vector3 RotateAround(Vector3 point, Vector3 origin, Vector3 normal, float angle) {
      return new Vector3((origin.x * (Mathf.Pow(normal.y, 2) + Mathf.Pow(normal.z, 2)) - normal.x * (origin.y * normal.y + origin.z * normal.z - normal.x * point.x - normal.y * point.y - normal.z * point.z)) * (1 - Mathf.Cos(angle)) + point.x * Mathf.Cos(angle) + (-origin.z * normal.y + origin.y * normal.z - normal.z * point.y + normal.y * point.z) * Mathf.Sin(angle),
                (origin.y * (Mathf.Pow(normal.x, 2) + Mathf.Pow(normal.z, 2)) - normal.y * (origin.x * normal.x + origin.z * normal.z - normal.x * point.x - normal.y * point.y - normal.z * point.z)) * (1 - Mathf.Cos(angle)) + point.y * Mathf.Cos(angle) + (origin.z * normal.x - origin.x * normal.z + normal.z * point.x - normal.x * point.z) * Mathf.Sin(angle),
                (origin.z * (Mathf.Pow(normal.x, 2) + Mathf.Pow(normal.y, 2)) - normal.z * (origin.x * normal.x + origin.y * normal.y - normal.x * point.x - normal.y * point.y - normal.z * point.z)) * (1 - Mathf.Cos(angle)) + point.z * Mathf.Cos(angle) + (-origin.y * normal.x + origin.x * normal.y - normal.y * point.x + normal.x * point.y) * Mathf.Sin(angle));
    }

I\'ve been struggeling with finding good methods to rotate my lazors around. So i finally found this matrix rotation formula and made a c# program out of it. It does the same as Transform.RotateAround but in stead of being dependant on the Transform object you get a vector you can do whatever you want with.

Thats not against the rules right? I mean i almost need a formula to look at to draw a circle...haha ;D

[sal_vager]

I really should learn to code again, it seemed easy enough at the time but like always I got distracted, anyway what do you think of this?

[Romfarer]

That there looks cool. It\'s like a multi-lazor! A scanning device perhaps? That shoots beams everywhere.

[sal_vager]

Your Lazor beam would sometimes be between lenses on this but It shouldn\'t look too bad when it happens.

[Romfarer]

It will be better to use it as a larger device you need just a few of due to the higher complexity. It\'s possible to attach lasers to each attach point, just time consuming to get all the angles right i guess. And then the ball would have to be able to rotate. 360degrees around the z axis (that\'s covered). And approximately 30 degrees around the x/y axis.