Exterior Camera?

[Vendrium]

Hi Guys,

quick question - apart from the secret exterior camera shortcut that you can use to enable an exterior camera, I'm wondering if a fully fledged exterior camera mode is in the works or has been requested by the community already.

The existing one feels rather clunky in terms of - used more for debug / trailer purposes.

Any thoughts?

 

[Conch]

i think we should get a nice theather mode, but i dont think we should get third person view for playing. it wont fit the game (at least for me..)

 

[MarcusReed]

Hi Guys,

quick question - apart from the secret exterior camera shortcut that you can use to enable an exterior camera, I'm wondering if a fully fledged exterior camera mode is in the works or has been requested by the community already.

The existing one feels rather clunky in terms of - used more for debug / trailer purposes.

Any thoughts?

I believe the original discussion about a 3rd person camera is that a true 3rd person view would give an unfair advantage in a dogfight, so the debug camera is a good solution for CMDRs that want to see their pretty ships, like myself

 

[Colonel Kenney]

Hi Guys,

quick question - apart from the secret exterior camera shortcut that you can use to enable an exterior camera, I'm wondering if a fully fledged exterior camera mode is in the works or has been requested by the community already.

The existing one feels rather clunky in terms of - used more for debug / trailer purposes.

Any thoughts?

Its really bad.. in fact its useless.

I actually want to get a petition going to allow people who are solo (offline) to have legit external views allowed. I understand the reasoning behind online play to prevent expanded situational awareness in fights etc but I think we are beyond that now. Most people couldn't operate their ships properly from an external point of view and be more accurate than being in cockpit with all the visual cues.

 

[ErichZann]

Its really bad.. in fact its useless.

I actually want to get a petition going to allow people who are solo (offline) to have legit external views allowed. I understand the reasoning behind online play to prevent expanded situational awareness in fights etc but I think we are beyond that now. Most people couldn't operate their ships properly from an external point of view and be more accurate than being in cockpit with all the visual cues.

I agree 100%.. would be soooo nice to see your ship while cruising around.... And this unfair advantage.. I dont really see that used in a fight so much actually... Just dont give people any crosshairs to aim, or do not allow that camera mode when hardpoints are deployed or whatever... But to cruise into a station and land from 3rd person, or just while cruising around in SC or an asteroid field...

Sure its not 100% realistic, but no one forces you to use it, and it would make my ships feel so much more dinstinct... And as many people mentioned, the debug camera in its current state is just a pain, already starting from the default view when you activate it...

 

[Vendrium]

I guess where I'm coming from its just that you see all these beautiful crafted ships in all the marketing footage of the game, and trailers, etc. - yet you don't really get to see much of that in-game, it's a bit of a shame I think

 

[Gody]

3rd person mode is terrible idea and it will never happen. Everything in ED is supposed to be based on reality. How would you explain such thing? some small camera on the rope attached to your ship? What we have now is good enough and you can't realy exploit that.

 

[Cynaqq]

3rd person mode is terrible idea and it will never happen. Everything in ED is supposed to be based on reality. How would you explain such thing? some small camera on the rope attached to your ship? What we have now is good enough and you can't realy exploit that.

.

Actually Sandro said somewhere they are thinking of some way to knead it into the lore so you can have some external view. He mentioned some drones with cameras following you. They also think these would be vanity items and unusable in combat too.

We'll see if they will pull it off or not. I'm more in the 'shelf it, nothing more ridiculous than watching yourself from camera drones' boat

 

[ATF-Ghoul]

I would be pretty happy with an external camera that is the same as the current one, doesn't allow movement/weapons/whatever, but is just easier to move around. Say, a hold LMB and rotate to rotate ship, mouse wheel to zoom etc etc.

As it is, there are opportunities for screenshots but activating the camera and positioning it right is a pain. Not saying it doesn't work, but just awkward to operate.

 

[Vendrium]

How would you explain such thing?

Selfie-Stick

 

[Gody]

.

Actually Sandro said somewhere they are thinking of some way to knead it into the lore so you can have some external view. He mentioned some drones with cameras following you. They also think these would be vanity items and unusable in combat too.

We'll see if they will pull it off or not. I'm more in the 'shelf it, nothing more ridiculous than watching yourself from camera drones' boat

Ok, but only if you, as an enemy player will be able to destroy my flying camera. It can't be indestructible

 

[ErichZann]

Please, the realism argument again... There are sooo many unrealistic things in the game, I cant even begin to list them, but on this one point half of the people go crazy...

Ok, one example: An evil pirate kills traders at hutton during the CG (yes, you know that I mean you!). Finally he gets destroyed by a Python outside of the station, which is almost an hours flight from the system entry point.

Ignoring the fact that you never die, but always seem to come back in your escape pod, which might be ok... The pirate just spawns directly at the station where he was killed, in exactly the same ship he was killed in. The insurance company might have been lightning-fast in transferring the credits, but the station has neither a shipyard nor outfitting.. so where does the shiny new, perfectly fitted FDL come from? 2 Minutes after his ship destruction he kills the next trader.

So, realism anyone? This was just one example. But external view? noooo horrible. Even if I dont have to use it, I also dont want other players to have it, even if they dont have any advantage from it instead of more fun...

 

[Edith_The_Hutt]

When we get ship-launched fighters I'd love to see the option to load them up with camera equipment and use them as external camera ships, this game is too damn pretty to not have external camera options.

 

[PenguinActual]

Selfie-Stick

Oh gees... A mono-pod duct taped to the hull of my ship... No thanks.

 

[Watcher]

I don't mind the external camera as is to be honest, I guess it depends very much what you want to do with it really.

I would like to see some sort of in ship camera thing though so you can have things like a rear view, bottom view and so on.
Steerable would be nice but fixed view point would be fine.
Can pop it in below the radar or in a corner of the display.

I think an in ship external view would be fun too.
This could be put up the same as the Galnet display in a big full screen window but still properly in game. Can call this a 'sensor reconstruction' or something, add a bit of graininess maybe. Be dangerous for combat so useless there a bit like the existing external camera but more 'realistic' whatever that means.

 

[magillag]

One of the more disappointing part of the game is finally saving up to buy that sweet XL Ship (Python, conda, etc.) and sitting in the same chair with the same controls as all other ships, and the same boring/amazing views of space.

This is where the 3rd person camera really makes a difference. You can actually SEE that you are flying a different ship.

It's a shame that FD has put sooo much time into minute detailing of each ship and has 'locked' us into the cockpit chair.

So, what's the new 3rd person cam? the SRV in Horizons!

Will there ever be a 3rd person cam WITH a flyable ship? Probably not... IMO

 

[Munial]

For multi-crew a human-operated camera drone that flies around the ship as you pilot would be pretty sweet - but yes it should be destructible and you only get to keep the footage if you retrieve it successfully..

 

[Surly_Badger]

I'm wondering if a fully fledged exterior camera mode is in the works or has been requested by the community already.

Since about a day after the game came out, there have been constant requests for an exterior camera mode. The tethered "debug camera" was a compromise (I gather it was already in the game, judging by its name) and there was talk of a camera drone.

 

[ErichZann]

One of the more disappointing part of the game is finally saving up to buy that sweet XL Ship (Python, conda, etc.) and sitting in the same chair with the same controls as all other ships, and the same boring/amazing views of space.

This is where the 3rd person camera really makes a difference. You can actually SEE that you are flying a different ship.

exactly this! Thanks to the unified control panels etc, the ships dont feel that unique from the inside...

 

[cluelessforumuser65578]

unless fd want us to rely on ai controlled turrets forever, external view points in some form or another are pretty much a given from a game and ship design point of view