Sensors

Sensor assets represent mounted observation geometry. They inherit the mounted asset pose model and add field-of-view parameters used by visualization and access-style analyses.

Supported FoV Types

FoV type	Parameter interpretation	Notes
Conical	fov_angle_deg as half-angle in degrees.	Boundary is sampled as circular rays around boresight.
Rectangular	fov_angle_deg as [half_width, half_height] or one value for both.	Boundary is sampled along four FoV edges.

Sensor Parameters

Field	Meaning
asset_id	Sensor name.
parent_guid	Parent spacecraft, facility, or vehicle.
mounting	Nominal orientation relative to parent body.
attitude_mode	Body-fixed, scan, conical scan, or targeted pointing.
fov_type	Conical or rectangular.
fov_angle_deg	Angular FoV definition in degrees.
color	Visualization color for footprint or sensor graphics.
constraints	Optional access/environment constraints.

Footprint Computation

Sensor footprints are computed using a fast geometric ray-sphere intersection rather than per-sample Orekit calls. This makes sensor footprints suitable for real-time viewer layers.

flowchart TD
    P["Sensor pose"] --> R["Build FoV boundary rays"]
    R --> I["Intersect rays with Earth sphere"]
    I --> G["Convert intersections to lat/lon"]
    G --> F["Footprint polygon"]

Interpretation Notes

• The sensor boresight is the local +Z axis.
• Rectangular FoV uses yaw/pitch-like boundary rays around the boresight.
• The footprint helper is a visualization approximation, not a replacement for high-fidelity terrain or ellipsoid intersection.
• Access analysis uses endpoint geometry and FoV masks separately from the visualization footprint.

Typical Uses

Use case	Sensor configuration
Earth observation	Spacecraft parent, body-fixed or targeted pointing, conical/rectangular FoV.
Survey mode	Spacecraft parent, scan or conical scan pointing.
Ground tracking validation	Facility/vehicle parent with narrow FoV or targeted pointing.