Problems with camera control

Happy New year everyone

A friend told me recently about his problems with controlling the camera. He said since he updated the SL client, he hasn't been able to zoom close to objects thus he can no longer look at things clearly. I couldn't think of anything so just told him to try with the Advanced client (Ctrl+Alt+D ) and uncheck Disable Camera Constraints but it wouldn't help at all.

This is what he said:

- when i click left it turns right, when i click right it turns left
- when i click up it turns down
- the right one cant just go straight

Any suggestions?

The reversal of directions sounds like he's in mouselook, if that helps at all. So he might try hitting the escape key, as he may have zoomed in too far.

Thank for the quick response Yngwie

Hmm...I haven't thought of that but he's been here for over a year so I think he should know if that's the case, but I'll ask him to check anyway.

Isn't there a setting somewhere in Edit -> Preferences that allows you to reverse the camera orientation? I'm not in-world to check right now, but it might be worth a look to see if that somehow got checked.

Ah, that could be it! I'll go check that out then ask him to try when he logs on later. Thanks Nic

So, after few days, my friend logged on again and tried adjust the settings, no luck still

I also told him about my settings on the preference tab, his are pretty much the same as mine.

Hmmm... what is he using to control the cam? By the "click" actions, it sounds as if he's using the little cam controls window, which is a fairly desperate way to make the cam do anything. Or is he using the keyboard alt- arrow and PgUp/PgDown keys? Has he tried mouse Alt-Drag to zoom and Control-Alt-Drag to swivel? (I suppose, if he's never used that, he might not be able to tell if things are backwards.)

What version, including version number, of SL are they using?

Can they post directly instead of using a middleman?

What video card do they have and what version video driver?

We use the little cam controls window mostly.
I didn't know about the monse Alt-Drag zooming / Ctrl-Alt-Drag swivel funtion, might ask him to try that

@ SuezanneC : We are using the most recent version I think. We update everytime when there is a new one coming out. I haven't ask him about the video card, will try ask him later.

Thanks for the replies guys

I've had this behavior for the last several viewers...but it seems to only happen sometimes, and I haven't figured out what the common factor is.

You're right, it's annoying not to be able to zoom in really tight on something, especially if it is a very small something.

Yesterday I had to reboot as my camera went out of control and just started spinning on me.. MOST annoying... used escape nothing helped but a relog...

Also, avatars appearing and disapearing at random even if they do not move... zooming in tight results in the object going away... loosing hair in specific poses... making snapshots useless...

Oh! Okay, this is a whole different thing. For the disappearing hair problem, try the RC viewer (anything in the 1.22 series), which seems to have fixed that problem. And if the cam reversal thing is really *just* with close-in work, I'd try that RC viewer and see if it helps or hurts. In RC4, I've been having problems selecting the correct side of things for texturing, but they kind of warned us that selection would be imprecise in 1.22 while they tune the new algorithm.

(Avatars disappearing: new one on me. Gremlins?)

Mine has a tendency when I'm close to something, it pans back and forth at a rapid pace. I have to move to get it to stop or relog. Sometimes, it pans so far back that I can't get it back to normal and have to relog. Both can be most annoying. Any suggestions are welcomed.