How to project a rectangle onto a Mesh/Terrain object, for use as a select marquee? (in three.js)

Question

I have a terrain which was generated using the THREE.Terrain library. I\'d like to be able to click and drag out a marquee and select objects that are on the surface of the

Answer 1

Right after I posted my comment, I had a thought exactly like Don McCurdy (cheers, Don :) ). Quick search on https://www.shadertoy.com gave me that shader https://www.shadertoy.com/view/XlsBRB (look at the awesome comments from FabriceNeyret2 there). So I just adapted that fragment shader for this very rough concept.

var scene = new THREE.Scene();
var camera = new THREE.PerspectiveCamera(60, window.innerWidth / window.innerHeight, 1, 1000);
camera.position.set(0, 5, 10);
var renderer = new THREE.WebGLRenderer({
  antialias: true
});
renderer.setSize(window.innerWidth, window.innerHeight);
document.body.appendChild(renderer.domElement);

var controls = new THREE.OrbitControls(camera, renderer.domElement);

var geom = new THREE.PlaneGeometry(20, 20, 10, 10);
geom.vertices.forEach(v => {
  v.z = THREE.Math.randFloat(-1, 1);
});
geom.rotateX(-Math.PI * .5);
geom.computeFaceNormals();
geom.computeVertexNormals();

var uniforms = {
  center: {
    value: new THREE.Vector3()
  },
  size: {
    value: new THREE.Vector2(1, 1)
  },
  lineHalfWidth: {
    value: 0.1
  }
}

var matShader = new THREE.ShaderMaterial({
  uniforms: uniforms,
  vertexShader: vertShader,
  fragmentShader: fragShader
});

var matWire = new THREE.MeshBasicMaterial({
  color: "gray",
  wireframe: true
});

var obj = THREE.SceneUtils.createMultiMaterialObject(geom, [matShader, matWire]);

scene.add(obj);

var gui = new dat.GUI();
gui.add(uniforms.size.value, "x", .5, 5.0).name("size.x");
gui.add(uniforms.size.value, "y", .5, 5.0).name("size.y");
gui.add(uniforms.lineHalfWidth, "value", .05, 2.0).name("line half-width");

var raycaster = new THREE.Raycaster();
var mouse = new THREE.Vector2();
var intersects = [];
var point = new THREE.Vector3();

window.addEventListener("mousemove", function(event) {
  mouse.x = (event.clientX / window.innerWidth) * 2 - 1;
  mouse.y = -(event.clientY / window.innerHeight) * 2 + 1;
  raycaster.setFromCamera(mouse, camera);
  intersects = raycaster.intersectObject(obj, true);
  if (intersects.length === 0) return;
  obj.worldToLocal(point.copy(intersects[0].point));
  uniforms.center.value.copy(point);

}, false);


render();

function render() {
  requestAnimationFrame(render);
  renderer.render(scene, camera);
}

body {
  overflow: hidden;
  margin: 0;
}

<script src="https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/three.js/94/three.min.js"></script>
<script src="https://cdn.rawgit.com/mrdoob/three.js/0949e59f/examples/js/controls/OrbitControls.js"></script>
<script src="https://cdn.rawgit.com/mrdoob/three.js/0949e59f/examples/js/utils/SceneUtils.js"></script>
<script src="https://cdn.rawgit.com/mrdoob/three.js/0949e59f/examples/js/libs/dat.gui.min.js"></script>
<script>
  var vertShader = `
    varying vec2 vPos;
    void main() {
      vPos = position.xz;
      gl_Position = projectionMatrix *
                    modelViewMatrix *
                    vec4(position,1.0);
    }
  `;

  var fragShader = `
    uniform vec3 center;
    uniform vec2 size;
    uniform float lineHalfWidth;
    
    varying vec2 vPos;
    
    void main() {
      vec2 Ro = size * .5;
      vec2 Uo = abs( vPos - center.xz ) - Ro;
      
      vec3 c = mix(vec3(1.), vec3(1.,0.,0.), float(abs(max(Uo.x,Uo.y)) < lineHalfWidth));
      
      gl_FragColor = vec4(c, 1.  );
    }
    
  `;
</script>