Quaternion Camera

I’m writing a particle system for my final year project at University and to verify that my particles are being processed correctly I’m wanting to use a quaternion camera to rotate around the particle system.

The thing is, as I’m making my particle system a library for others to use the camera is only for my own demonstration purposes and, as such, I don’t want to spend a lot of research time on quaternion cameras when my dissertation is largely based on other things =o)

My question is; Is there a decent book or tutorial which has a quick guide to making a quaternion camera?

Currently, I have an OpenGL and SDL app which implements my particle system library and, ideally, all I want is to be able to move the mouse and have it rotate around a point at a specified distance.

I have found various articles that mention quaternion cameras but they all use the mathematical functions of DirectX and as I’m writing my particle system to be cross-platform this isn’t exactly ideal.

I used article (www.gamasutra.com) as the basis for writing my quaternion code. It tells you how to put quaternions into a matrix and convert them to Axis/Angle.

before u rush off and implement the quaternion code
i reckon the only time u wanna use quaternion is if u wanna perform heaps (more than youll ever use with a camera) or rotations etc
ild just stick to matrixs for a camera