FOV Opinions Please

[Ian Cameron]

Have played around with FOV settings since the beginning. Have used the calculators, one suggests 31, one says 35 and another says 59 according to my monitor size and position from me.
Width 19" Height 10.5" Distance to eyes 30". None have felt right.
So I decided to try and go for a more natural look as you would see behind the wheel. Set FOV to 65
set seat position to how I think it would look. Have uploaded a video for some feedback on this, apologies for quality it was recorded using frapps, and forgive the spin off. Also used is FaceTrackNOIR.
Not my best lap but I go more for realism than breaking records, although any feedback on this would be appreciated.

 

[Pär Öqvist]

The calculator for Pcars with a 50 inch screen and 170 cm away give an Horizontal angle of 37 degree for Pcar, for Assetto Corsa, Vertical angle would be 21 degree
You are correct in your impression, 19 is not a viable FOV to enjoy a fulfilling SIM experience. 40 or 35 are excellent vertical FOV values, 40 vertical is equivalent to 63 for Horizontal degree value for Pcars.
What you could do, at some point, just for the fun of it, is to drive your sim at the distance that would give you 64 FOV for PCars with a 50 inch screen ( 90 cm)
Yes you are also correct if it is a 720P screen, the pixels are not optimum, but it will give you a good taste of what kind of SIM driving experience is obtainable using the proper calculated FOV.
If after a while you do not think it is better, then you can always go back to further away from the screen and enjoy your SIM the same as today.
There is no cost involved and it is just a question of preference at the end of the day. one certitude, it will put you in a position to make a choice based on your own experience. I have found out that the screen right behind the wheel base is a very good spot for the screen.

Well I have already done that. This distance is the minimum I can accept as I care for image quality. I can still sense pixel grid if I look for it with such a large screen estate and maybe because it´s flat and not true 3D I find it harder to focus on a monitor up close then looking out a real windshield up close. A 50" tv is like 4 24" tv:s so 1080p is not really a plenty. I need 4K but there is no tvs with acceptable input lag that can run 4K resolutions at 60 hz

Anyway I am certainly getting an Occulus Rift but I have kind of the same worries about that one in term of sense of pixel grid and overall image quality. What I look forward to is the true black levels if they decide to go for OLED and of course the wider fov.

 

[Betta Lines]

Anyway I am certainly getting an Occulus Rift but I have kind of the same worries about that one in term of sense of pixel grid and overall image quality. What I look forward to is the true black levels if they decide to go for OLED and of course the wider fov.

OLED is guaranteed. You can be sure that VR will make you more forgiving of image quality. It is worth the trade-off for most people, as everything else about the experience is so much more compelling.

 

[Kjell Eilertsen]

Kjell, what are you referring to with "the relative black box" in this post? I've been racking my brain with it.

It's an iRacing feature, a box that show you cars in front and behind you with the relative time between you and them, color coded by whether you are on the same lap (white), a lap down (red) or lapped (blue).

Uh....a number of my posts in this very thread.....

I asked you to point me to them,I'm not gonna go about looking for posts that you might have felt offended by.

 

[Brandon Wright]

I asked you to point me to them,I'm not gonna go about looking for posts that you might have felt offended by.

This accomplishes nothing, it's irrelevant. Let's just move on and all enjoy the game the way we want to enjoy it, regardless of what others think about it. More racing, less arguing.

 

[Pär Öqvist]

OLED is guaranteed. You can be sure that VR will make you more forgiving of image quality. It is worth the trade-off for most people, as everything else about the experience is so much more compelling.

Yes would hope so. I know some that sold their triple monitor setups already in favour of the DK 2.

In the meanwhile I have experimented a bit. 50" monitor a meter away graphics from crita age but it works quite well driving the Shelby Cobra at Solitude. Now the monitor do fill up most of my peripheral vision and I hear Rift don´t do a complete either so maybe I won´t get much more viewing area with the Rift then this?

 

[J_SAMa]

I run correct FOV for added immersion, not performance, if I was looking for performance I would run every car with paddle shifters instead of a H-shifter and use auto blip etc, I use these peripherals because they add fun factor and immersion, as FOV does.
I did however become much more consistent once I got used to the correct FOV, and improved my driving. I find it easier to place my car on the track, making it easier to get close to the perfect line, but also easier to make room for other cars even though I can't see them due to limited peripheral vision, compromise...
Wow, I meant to post a single line comment and as usual I keep on rambling...

Agreed. Bottom line is, "correct" FOV is a luxury only fully enjoyed and appreciated by people with triple-screen setups or at least a single large screen. As I said. I tried the correct angle (45) but even after about 2 hours of driving I still couldn't bring myself to like it. Upped it by 10 and it was perfect. It's all about compromise.
I forgot to mention that not being able to see the dashboard bothers me even more than not being able to see a car next to me. I guess its my own fault for hating virtual HUDs.

 

[Brandon Wright]

but even after about 2 hours of driving I still couldn't bring myself to like it.

To be fair, it took me several days of playing before I started to fully adapt to the "correct" FOV. It felt strange and awkward and claustrophobic at first, but eventually I adapted to it and now the zoomed FOV feels very strange and awkward and makes it difficult for me to drive. It takes time for the brain to adapt to these things. An example, my right hand is hurt and using a computer mouse for any period of time causes great discomfort. Seeing as I work on a computer for a living, this quickly became a problem so I had to move the mouse to the left side of my keyboard and start using my left hand for mousing. At first it was horribly awkward and slow and I kept left clicking when I meant to right click, a total cluster feck. But now that I've been doing it for several days I'm almost as smooth and quick with it as I am with my right hand. At the beginning of the week I never would have thought that was possible, but here we are. Eventually, my brain/muscles figured it out.

Again, "correct" FOV isn't for everyone and I'm not saying everyone should use it. But I do think if people gave it a go for at least a few days, more people would end up deciding they preferred it to the zoomed FOV that you get in console games (but not everyone).

 

[Cote Dazur]

Agreed. Bottom line is, "correct" FOV is a luxury only fully enjoyed and appreciated by people with triple-screen setups or at least a single large screen. As I said. I tried the correct angle (45) but even after about 2 hours of driving I still couldn't bring myself to like it. Upped it by 10 and it was perfect. It's all about compromise.
I forgot to mention that not being able to see the dashboard bothers me even more than not being able to see a car next to me. I guess its my own fault for hating virtual HUDs.

All I have is a 32 inch TV and I totally enjoy my 37 degree FOV, no need of any special set up or multi screen to rip the advantages of driving with a proper FOV.
I agree with you the it depends of what you priorities are, like in your case, if a key aspect of enjoying your SIM is to have a panoramic view of the dashboard of the car you are driving more important than the right perspective and distortion free environment, then I agree a compromise will probably have to be made. At the end of the day we all do it for fun, so whatever bring us fun is fine by me .

 

[Brandon Wright]

And just to comment, technically those of us with triple screens can't adjust the FOV in Assetto Corsa for some reason (it's grayed out). All we can do is scoot the seat backwards/forwards which I don't feel is the ideal situation but that's the only option we have.

FWIW, here's what my "FOV" generally looks like, though it's probably changed slightly since this video was recorded (as has my wheel). You can see how it looks like I'm literally right where the driver's seat would be and the car wraps around me, which makes for a wonderful sense of immersion and lets you actually "feel" where each corner of the car is.


Assetto Corsa: Lotus 2 Eleven at Lake Louise 1.6 by Brandon Wright on RaceDepartment

 

[Kjell Eilertsen]

Now the monitor do fill up most of my peripheral vision and I hear Rift don´t do a complete either so maybe I won´t get much more viewing area with the Rift then this?

The DK2 has a limited FOV yes, the consumer version might (and probably will) have a slightly higher FOV but it won't approach filling the entire 180 degrees of human view (without eye movement). That having been said, you need to remember the 1:1 head tracking in the Rift, which means that you effectively have a 360 degree view. Your vision in the Rift is pretty much limited to what you'd see out of a racing helmet, works pretty well for us simracers don't you think?

 

[J_SAMa]

All I have is a 32 inch TV and I totally enjoy my 37 degree FOV...

32 is plenty mate 23 inch here... I put it on a desk so it's pretty much directly above my wheel base and right in front of my face.
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And while we're on the topic of FOV, anyone uses trackIR here? I'm seriously thinking of getting one. Or am I better off waiting for Oculus rift?

 

[Metla]

I asked you to point me to them,I'm not gonna go about looking for posts that you might have felt offended by.

1.I don't get offended by posts, I get offended by child abuse, animal cruelty and politicians, A post on a forum doesn't come within 20 trillion miles of causing offense.

2.The posts in question, where mocking was taking place are mine, How could I be offended by my own posts? Why would I care to trawl through a thread finding my own posts to point them out to you? Madness.

3. Happy racing. No reason for anyone to get their panties in a twist.

 

[Pär Öqvist]

I would expect TrackIR to give a bit less latency and work as good if not better Then Rifts tracking. But it´s maybe hard to combine Rift with TrackIR instead of using it´s own tracking. 360 is not really important for simracing. I can hardly move my neck more then 180 degrees easilly and we have mirrors .

Can´t have to large of a monitor. I started off with 14" CRT and it works. But CRT has real advantages as in unsurpassed resolution for moving pictures way better then what LCD can achieve, better contrast, better better better then these awful LCDs we run today.

But size does matter too

 

[Cote Dazur]

And just to comment, technically those of us with triple screens can't adjust the FOV in Assetto Corsa for some reason (it's grayed out). All we can do is scoot the seat backwards/forwards which I don't feel is the ideal situation but that's the only option we have.

FWIW, here's what my "FOV" generally looks like, though it's probably changed slightly since this video was recorded (as has my wheel). You can see how it looks like I'm literally right where the driver's seat would be and the car wraps around me, which makes for a wonderful sense of immersion and lets you actually "feel" where each corner of the car is.


Assetto Corsa: Lotus 2 Eleven at Lake Louise 1.6 by Brandon Wright on RaceDepartment

Brandon, when using the triple screen in AC, the adjustment for FOV is an app that you can access on the right side of the screen once you are in the pits, like the other apps, it is called 3 screen, and you need to enter the value specific to you set up to get the proper FOV. Works like a FOV calculator, would be great to have it for single screen as well instead of having to calculate it ourself.

 

[Brandon Wright]

Brandon, when using the triple screen in AC, the adjustment for FOV is an app that you can access on the right side of the screen once you are in the pits, like the other apps, it is called 3 screen, and you need to enter the value specific to you set up to get the proper FOV. Works like a FOV calculator, would be great to have it for single screen as well instead of having to calculate it ourself.

Yeah, but it's not called FOV. The FOV is locked out for us. Guess it does the same thing though, I tinker with it some but usually use the Onboard Adjustments for fine tuning.

 

[Kjell Eilertsen]

I would expect TrackIR to give a bit less latency and work as good if not better Then Rifts tracking.

As good, perhaps, better? I'm quite confident it's not even without having tried TrackIR, but having tried the Rift I can tell you that when the headtracking is implemented well in a game it's spot on, feel 100% natural to me.
TrackIR use 3 IR leds on it's clip, or 3 reflexes on it's cap clip to track your head position.
DK2 use a camera + no less than 40 LEDs to track your head movement, the latest development version has improved on that even.

 

[Pär Öqvist]

Is it an IR camera Rift uses?

 

[Kjell Eilertsen]

Is it an IR camera Rift uses?

Yes, one they have developed themselves.

 

[Robert Bachmayer]

hey brandon, the triple screen app is the only way to get your image right..you need to tinker with it some more, i think its the best way i've ever seen to set up a triple screen game, ever.

 

[Brandon Wright]

I tinker with it plenty, I probably spend as much time adjusting my POV in this game as I do racing.