I want to detect when the user in my ThreeJS is looking at one of the animation models. Currently I am using this code:
ourRaycaster.setFromCamera(g_Mouse, g_ThreeJsCamera);
g_AryObjectsLookedAt = ourRaycaster.intersectObjects(g_ThreeJsScene.children, true);
The problem is that although the raycaster will detect any collisions between the current camera line of sight and a child object in the animation models group, it will not intersect with any empty spaces in the group. Although this makes sense from a technical point of view, it doesn't match what we do as humans when looking at an object. When we look at an object, we mentally draw a shape around the overall object and if we are looking inside that pseudo-shape we feel that we are looking at the object.
For example, if you have a big head and wide shoulders, but a very thin neck, if I focus momentarily at the space alongside your neck I still feel that I am looking at "you".
What I need is a raycaster that when it passes through an animation model's group of children, does approximately the same thing.
Here is a concrete example. I am using the sample robot animation model from the ThreeJS examples. It has a really big head. When I do the raycast from this distance, no part of the robot is in the intersecting objects list:
But if I get right up "in its face", it is detected (it's "face" is detected):
This is technically accurate but I need something a lot more forgiving so I can create proper logic for interactions between animation model and the user. How can I do this without having to iterate manually with every animation model in the virtual scene?