iOS OpenGL ES 2.0 Quaternion Rotation Slerp to XYZ Position - iphone

Question

I am following the quaternion tutorial: http://www.raywenderlich.com/12667/how-to-rotate-a-3d-object-using-touches-with-opengl and am trying to rotate a globe to some XYZ location. I have an initial quaternion and generate a random XYZ location on the surface of the globe. I pass that XYZ location into the following function. The idea was to generate a lookAt vector with GLKMatrix4MakeLookAt and define the end Quaternion for the slerp step from the lookAt matrix.
- (void)rotateToLocationX:(float)x andY:(float)y andZ:(float)z {
// Turn on the interpolation for smooth rotation
_slerping = YES; // Begin auto rotating to this location
_slerpCur = 0;
_slerpMax = 1.0;
_slerpStart = _quat;
// The eye location is defined by the look at location multiplied by this modifier
float modifier = 1.0;
// Create a look at vector for which we will create a GLK4Matrix from
float xEye = x;
float yEye = y;
float zEye = z;
//NSLog(#"%f %f %f %f %f %f",xEye, yEye, zEye, x, y, z);
_currentSatelliteLocation = GLKMatrix4MakeLookAt(xEye, yEye, zEye, 0, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0);
_currentSatelliteLocation = GLKMatrix4Multiply(_currentSatelliteLocation,self.effect.transform.modelviewMatrix);
// Turn our 4x4 matrix into a quat and use it to mark the end point of our interpolation
//_currentSatelliteLocation = GLKMatrix4Translate(_currentSatelliteLocation, 0.0f, 0.0f, GLOBAL_EARTH_Z_LOCATION);
_slerpEnd = GLKQuaternionMakeWithMatrix4(_currentSatelliteLocation);
// Print info on the quat
GLKVector3 vec = GLKQuaternionAxis(_slerpEnd);
float angle = GLKQuaternionAngle(_slerpEnd);
//NSLog(#"%f %f %f %f",vec.x,vec.y,vec.z,angle);
NSLog(#"Quat end:");
[self printMatrix:_currentSatelliteLocation];
//[self printMatrix:self.effect.transform.modelviewMatrix];
}
The interpolation works, I get a smooth rotation, however the ending location is never the XYZ I input - I know this because my globe is a sphere and I am calculating XYZ from Lat Lon. I want to look directly down the 'lookAt' vector toward the center of the earth from that lat/lon location on the surface of the globe after the rotation. I think it may have something to do with the up vector but I've tried everything that made sense.
What am I doing wrong - How can I define a final quaternion that when I finish rotating, looks down a vector to the XYZ on the surface of the globe? Thanks!

Answer 1

Is the following your meaning:
Your globe center is (0, 0, 0), radius is R, the start position is (0, 0, R), your final position is (0, R, 0), so rotate the globe 90 degrees around X-asix?
If so, just set lookat function eye position to your final position, the look at parameters to the globe center.
m_target.x = 0.0f;
m_target.y = 0.0f;
m_target.z = 1.0f;
m_right.x = 1.0f;
m_right.y = 0.0f;
m_right.z = 0.0f;
m_up.x = 0.0f;
m_up.y = 1.0f;
m_up.z = 0.0f;
void CCamera::RotateX( float amount )
{
Point3D target = m_target;
Point3D up = m_up;
amount = amount / 180 * PI;
m_target.x = (cos(PI / 2 - amount) * up.x) + (cos(amount) * target.x);
m_target.y = (cos(PI / 2 - amount) * up.y) + (cos(amount) * target.y);
m_target.z = (cos(PI / 2 - amount) * up.z) + (cos(amount) * target.z);
m_up.x = (cos(amount) * up.x) + (cos(PI / 2 + amount) * target.x);
m_up.y = (cos(amount) * up.y) + (cos(PI / 2 + amount) * target.y);
m_up.z = (cos(amount) * up.z) + (cos(PI / 2 + amount) * target.z);
Normalize(m_target);
Normalize(m_up);
}
void CCamera::RotateY( float amount )
{
Point3D target = m_target;
Point3D right = m_right;
amount = amount / 180 * PI;
m_target.x = (cos(PI / 2 + amount) * right.x) + (cos(amount) * target.x);
m_target.y = (cos(PI / 2 + amount) * right.y) + (cos(amount) * target.y);
m_target.z = (cos(PI / 2 + amount) * right.z) + (cos(amount) * target.z);
m_right.x = (cos(amount) * right.x) + (cos(PI / 2 - amount) * target.x);
m_right.y = (cos(amount) * right.y) + (cos(PI / 2 - amount) * target.y);
m_right.z = (cos(amount) * right.z) + (cos(PI / 2 - amount) * target.z);
Normalize(m_target);
Normalize(m_right);
}
void CCamera::RotateZ( float amount )
{
Point3D right = m_right;
Point3D up = m_up;
amount = amount / 180 * PI;
m_up.x = (cos(amount) * up.x) + (cos(PI / 2 - amount) * right.x);
m_up.y = (cos(amount) * up.y) + (cos(PI / 2 - amount) * right.y);
m_up.z = (cos(amount) * up.z) + (cos(PI / 2 - amount) * right.z);
m_right.x = (cos(PI / 2 + amount) * up.x) + (cos(amount) * right.x);
m_right.y = (cos(PI / 2 + amount) * up.y) + (cos(amount) * right.y);
m_right.z = (cos(PI / 2 + amount) * up.z) + (cos(amount) * right.z);
Normalize(m_right);
Normalize(m_up);
}
void CCamera::Normalize( Point3D &p )
{
float length = sqrt(p.x * p.x + p.y * p.y + p.z * p.z);
if (1 == length || 0 == length)
{
return;
}
float scaleFactor = 1.0 / length;
p.x *= scaleFactor;
p.y *= scaleFactor;
p.z *= scaleFactor;
}

Answer 2

The answer to this question is a combination of the following rotateTo function and a change to the code from Ray's tutorial at ( http://www.raywenderlich.com/12667/how-to-rotate-a-3d-object-using-touches-with-opengl ). As one of the comments on that article says there is an arbitrary factor of 2.0 being multiplied in GLKQuaternion Q_rot = GLKQuaternionMakeWithAngleAndVector3Axis(angle * 2.0, axis);. Remove that "2" and use the following function to create the _slerpEnd - after that the globe will rotate smoothly to XYZ specified.
// Rotate the globe using Slerp interpolation to an XYZ coordinate
- (void)rotateToLocationX:(float)x andY:(float)y andZ:(float)z {
// Turn on the interpolation for smooth rotation
_slerping = YES; // Begin auto rotating to this location
_slerpCur = 0;
_slerpMax = 1.0;
_slerpStart = _quat;
// Create a look at vector for which we will create a GLK4Matrix from
float xEye = x;
float yEye = y;
float zEye = z;
_currentSatelliteLocation = GLKMatrix4MakeLookAt(xEye, yEye, zEye, 0, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0);
// Turn our 4x4 matrix into a quat and use it to mark the end point of our interpolation
_slerpEnd = GLKQuaternionMakeWithMatrix4(_currentSatelliteLocation);
}