Pushing a ball in a direction

Questions & Answers
1

Gawd, I really hope someone on here can help me out here. I’m testing basics of physics - similar to a golf putting game.

The Scenario
I’ve got a default Unity scene, with a sphere and a terrain. The camera is in default position. The ball has the size and mass of a golf ball and all physics settings and friction etc are default. The ball has a rigid body and sphere collider.

I also have this bit of code attached to the ball…

Rigidbody rigidBody;
bool StartedShot;
Vector3 shotStart;
Vector3 shotEnd;
Vector3 direction;
float distance;
float forceAdjust = 0.05f;


void Start () 
{
    rigidBody = this.GetComponent<Rigidbody> ();
    StartedShot = false;
}


void Update () 
{
    if (Input.GetMouseButtonUp(1))
    {
        rigidBody.velocity = Vector3.zero;
        this.transform.position = Vector3.zero;
        StartedShot = false;
    }

    // Starting shot
    if (!StartedShot && Input.GetMouseButtonDown (0)) 
    {
        StartedShot = true;
        shotStart = Input.mousePosition;
    }

    // Ending shot
    if (StartedShot && Input.GetMouseButtonUp (0)) 
    {
        shotEnd = Input.mousePosition;
        direction = shotEnd - shotStart;
        float distance = direction.magnitude;
        StartedShot = false;

        Vector3 shootDirection = new Vector3(direction.x, 0.0f, direction.y);

        rigidBody.AddForce(shootDirection * rigidBody.mass * forceAdjust, ForceMode.Impulse);
    }
}

Now, when I run this - I can click and drag the mouse to apply a force on the ball. And although the ball does appear to go in the right direction, when you fire it in any other direction than left - it jumps (sometimes really high). If you fire it left, it ‘rolls’ more like I’d expect on a flat surface.

I’m guessing this has something to do with the lack of translation from the camera position to pushing the golf ball. I’m a bit confused by how the world space coordinates relate to the screen coordinates.

So how can I fire this ball based on the drag direction on screen, without the ball jumping to all directions other than left. How do I correctly translate the mouse input vectors to firing the ball in the right direction?

Thank you kindly in advance,
JM

2

What you’ve done looks fine, assuming your camera is always the same orientation. I suspect your ball might be slightly embedded in the surface, so when your force is applied it tries to unembed and pings upwards. Try raising the ball so it drops slightly onto the floor.

If you do want to convert properly from screenspace to worldspace, try this:

Matrix4x4 m = Camera.main.cameraToWorldMatrix;
m.SetRow( 3, Vector3.zero );  // Clear pos, leave orientation only
direction.y *= -1.0f;  // Invert Y...screen Y goes down, world Y goes up
Vector3 shootDirection = m.MultiplyPoint( direction );

That will give you an accurate vector in true 3D. But you probably still want your force to be in the horizontal plane, which would mean using a customised matrix:

Matrix4x4 m = Camera.main.cameraToWorldMatrix;
m.SetRow( 3, Vector3.zero );  // Clear pos, leave orientation only
m.SetRow( 2, Vector3.down );  // Force local Z to look down (as if cam is overhead)
m.SetRow( 1, Vector3.Cross( m.GetRow(0), m.GetRow(2)).normalized ); // Fix local Y
direction.y *= -1.0f;  // Invert Y...screen Y goes down, world Y goes up
Vector3 shootDirection = m.MultiplyPoint( direction );

Code not tested but should get you most of the way there :wink: