0

I'm trying to rotate an object around only one axis (any arbitrary unit vector, not necessarily x, y or z), based on the quaternion rotation component along the same axis of a specified quaternion rotation.

public void Rotate(Quaternion rotation, Vector3 axis, Vector3 pointToRotateAround)
{
     float angle = ?
     gameObject.transform.RotateAround(pointToRotateAround, axis, angle);
}

I don't know how to obtain the angle of my quaternion's rotation that is only along the specified axis. I could do it when the axis is y, for example:

public void Rotate(Quaternion rotation, Vector3 pointToRotateAround)
{
     gameObject.transform.RotateAround(pointToRotateAround, Vector3.up, rotation.eulerAngles.y);
}

I want to replicate the results of the above, but for any given axis.

I've dug into google trying to find the answer to this but I haven't found a solution. Any help is appreciated.

Improve this question
1
  • Please provide a bit more information about how exactly you want to use this and what for. This currently sounds a bit like an XY problem. Why do you explicitly need a Quaternion as input? Commented Apr 18, 2019 at 6:30

3 Answers 3

Reset to default
1

The way I am interpreting your question is that if you have a set of rotating points, by what angle would they move around some other axis.

The only issue with this is that the angle from a different axis actually depends on which point you are looking at.

Rotation

However, something you could try is to represent your rotation as an axis angle (ω, θ), then take the dot product with your axis v to get a new angle of θ scaled by w.v. This might not be what you want , but if you add details with more details on what you are trying to achieve, we might be able to help you better.

Improve this answer
Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

1 Comment

This is exactly what I needed, thank you! It seems so obvious now.
0

Here is the code I wanted:

public void Rotate(Quaternion rotation, Vector3 axis, Vector3 pointToRotateAround)
{
     float angle;
     Vector3 rotAxis;

     rotation.ToAngleAxis(out angle, out rotAxis);

     float angleAroundAxis = Vector3.Dot(rotAxis, axis);

     gameObject.transform.RotateAround(pointToRotateAround, axis, angleAroundAxis);
}
Improve this answer

Comments

0

Then angle of rotation from a unit-quaternion (w,x,y,z) also written w+xi+yj+zk is arccos(w)*2.

If the angle is > 0, the direction is (x,y,z)/sin( arccos(w)/2 ) otherwise there is no specific direction, and the rotation is identity around any axis; 0 angle is no rotation

Improve this answer

Comments

Start asking to get answers

Find the answer to your question by asking.

Ask question

Explore related questions

See similar questions with these tags.