claudes_game/docs/session_summaries/2026-01-30-camera-zoom-and-ui-cleanup.md

2026-01-30 Camera Zoom and UI Cleanup

Changes Made

Camera System Improvements

• Extracted hardcoded camera control values to #define constants (CAMERA_ORBIT_ANGLE_SPEED, CAMERA_ZOOM_DELTA, CAMERA_MIN_DISTANCE, etc.)
• Implemented dynamic camera zoom with percentage-based speed (7% of current distance per keypress)
• Added delta clamping (ZOOM_MIN_DELTA 0.05, ZOOM_MAX_DELTA 5.0f) to prevent too-slow or too-fast zooming
• Fixed camera culling by accounting for raylib's near cull plane (0.05) in minimum distance calculation
• Camera minimum distance now uses max(average_children_distance, body_radius * 100) when children exist
• Camera minimum distance uses body_radius * 100 when no children exist (prevents clipping for bodies like Sun)

Camera Targeting Simplification

• Removed selected_craft_index from RenderState struct - camera now only tracks bodies
• Moved spacecraft selection tracking to UIState struct (selected_craft_index field)
• Camera now always focuses on bodies (directly selected or parent of selected spacecraft)
• Eliminated ~30 lines of duplicate/special-case code from renderer module
• All renderer functions now use single body-focused code path

Bug Fixes

• Fixed camera distance when switching from Sun (large radius) to Earth (small radius) - camera no longer clips inside Earth
• Fixed spacecraft panel showing for 1 frame then disappearing - ui_state.selected_craft_index now persists across frames instead of being reset

Commits

1. Extract camera control constants to #define macros
2. Implement dynamic camera zoom with percentage-based speed and distance clamping
3. Fix camera culling by accounting for near cull plane in minimum distance calculation
4. Simplify camera targeting by removing spacecraft selection from renderer
5. Fix camera distance to account for body size when switching targets
6. Fix spacecraft panel showing for 1 frame then disappearing

Results

• Net line count: -56 lines (44 insertions, 100 deletions)
• Files modified: 5 (src/renderer.cpp, src/renderer.h, src/ui_renderer.cpp, src/ui_renderer.h, src/main.cpp)
• Build status: Successful, no errors
• Test status: Camera zoom and minimum distance verified, spacecraft panel persistence confirmed

Next Steps

• Consider extracting remaining hardcoded rendering constants (grid parameters, spacecraft rendering, maneuver markers, orbit rendering, child indicators)
• Consider using parent's SOI radius instead of radius for more physically meaningful minimum distances