Implementation of a virtual fishing system

A virtual fishing system, which incorporates a boat simulator, an interactive fishing rod, and virtual reality fishing scenes, is presented. This system creates a spontaneous and interactive environment, and offers the thrill and fun of sea fishing at home or at the amusement park. The fishing boat is simulated by a three-axis manipulator which consists of three pneumatic cylinders serving as extensive linkage. This fishing boat is equipped with a steering wheel and an acceleration pedal and controlled via the platform controller. Through the shunt combinations of the cylinders, the gesture of the fishing boat can be arbitrarily adjusted. The pneumatic actuators of the parallel manipulator are controlled by a fuzzy controller. The interactive fishing rod is composed of a fishing rod with line rolling mechanism and force feedback hardware, which is constituted by a permanent magnet synchronous motor (PMSM) and its drive, a FPGA chip, a 16-bit microprocessor, and a 12-bit D/A conversion circuit. During the process of construction scenes in the VR system, 3D studio MAX software package is first used to construct three-dimensional models, which are then animated by EON studio software. The escape path of the hooked fish is simulated by a three-dimensional random walk.