Adjusting Camera Target

iClone 2 use a camera type call “Target Camera”. a target camera has 2 nodes: the camera itself and the look-at target. When you use Roll X-Z tool to manipulate camera view, you are moving the camera around but keep the target at the same place.

The advantage of target camera is that it’s very easy to create camera animations which keep the focus on the character or other target. But you could meet unexpected camera flipping problem if you move the camera beyond where the target located.

Camera flipping problem

This is what happen when you keep zooming the camera. In the following figures, on the left is the top view of the 3D scene showing the relative position of the character, the prop (sphere), the camera and its target node, on the right is the camera view.

1. The initial view.

iClone cam target01 Adjusting Camera Target

2. Move the camera toward the target node.

iClone cam target02 Adjusting Camera Target

3. When the Camera is moved beyond the target node, the camera view suddenly flipped.

iClone cam target03 Adjusting Camera Target

To fix this flipping problem, you have to move the target node farther before dollying in.

 

To move the target node

Though iClone lacks the UI to manipulate the target node directly, there is a trick to complete camera target adjustment.

1. Use Pan iClone pantool Adjusting Camera Target tool to move the camera view to the object of interest, in this case, the sphere.

iClone cam target04 Adjusting Camera Target

2. Use Roll X-Z iClone rollxztool Adjusting Camera Target to move the camera to the left or right side of the current target.

iClone cam target05 Adjusting Camera Target

3. Use Pan iClone pantool Adjusting Camera Target tool to move the camera view to the sphere. This will move the target node to the new position.

iClone cam target06 Adjusting Camera Target

4. Use both Roll X-Z iClone rollxztool Adjusting Camera Target and Pan iClone pantool Adjusting Camera Target tools to move the camera back to near the initial position. Now the camera view looks the same as the start, but the target node has been moved to the desired position.

iClone cam target07 Adjusting Camera Target

 

Adjusting Camera Target