Day 3 - A Stolen Moment

Hmm, a 45 spare mins so I thought I'd do a little Vectrexing. It's never a good idea to spend a short period on the Vectrex IMHO, it takes a while to remember where I'm at and if I rush it, then I tend to go in the wrong direction. I'd say lesson learnt, but maybe this blog will record otherwise! Anyway at least it was fun. My pics tonight simply show some bugs, (one rather spectacular) resulting from tonight's dabbling. I have the concept of a Beam, having many segments, and many child beams. Segments in turn have many invisible test segments, but that's not important here (yet). Tonight I got a little carried away and created a new child for each reflection. I think on reflection (no pun intended, honest) that this might be unnecessary. I need to keep track of by absolute and relative positions, and my local origin. I think this might be better achieved using temporary variables and keeping the number of child beams to a minimum. If I use too many child beams, then it kinda defeats the object and it will both increase the memory I use and reduce the drawing speed when I choose to render the segments of each beam.

This pic is why I Vectrex.

So my next step will be to revisit my code between Day 2 and Day 3, and replicate the functionality whilst keeping my child beams to a minimum. I figure with the nature of my plots, I can aim for about 10 segments (possibly including 4 reflections before I need consider a beam will be "full" and a new child will be forced. This permits Vectrex Beam recalibration and will reduce wobble. Check out this second pic. I grabbed the camera as quick as I could as the screen was frying! You never get bugs so beautifully illustrated on any other games console! (and this is with a very low brightness setting and beam insensity set to $3F; about 25%.)

Not sure when the next session will be, as there may be an interlude as I try a new idea I've (just) had. I'll document that as I do it too, although I am sure I'll be back to continue this project within 7 days.