FOV meaningin gaming

Whether you’re a photographer, a video game designer, a filmmaker, or work with VR, thoroughly understanding field of view or (FOV) is your foundation for success. It’s basic optics, and while you likely can assume what it is, let’s quickly go over it and see its importance in photography and the gaming world. So, what is field of view and why does it matter?

Light from any point in object space emerges from the rear ele­ment of a lens as a cone. When a sub­ject point is in focus, the apex of its light cone coin­cides with the focal plane, which forms an image point in the pho­to­graph. If the sub­ject point does­n’t come into per­fect focus on the image sen­sor, it cre­ates a small blurred cir­cle called a cir­cle of con­fu­sion. The three fac­tors that con­trol the depth of field—the aper­ture, focal length, and sub­ject distance—do so by vary­ing the size of the blur cir­cles. The diam­e­ter of the cir­cle of con­fu­sion with the res­o­lu­tion of the image sen­sor is used to cal­cu­late the depth of field.

As we mentioned above, humans FOV is about 170-180 degrees. Video game consoles’ field of view is typically around 60-70 degrees, which is a third of what you’d see in real life. And a PC sits at about 90 degrees. That makes a huge difference. Games that don’t adjust or allow for an FOV adjustment, really changes the whole game, literally. Many gamers find it very frustrating to play without that option.

Anyway, a larger field of view makes gaming more natural. If you can barely see your enemy before they get to you, it doesn’t really make for an enjoyable time.

In photography, the question is not just about “what” you’re seeing in the image, “how much” you're seeing also matters. To understand the amount of image your camera can capture, you need to understand field of view.

FOV meaningSlang

Some lens­es have a depth of field scale print­ed direct­ly on their bar­rels or under a trans­par­ent plas­tic win­dow. The depth of field scale con­sists of sev­er­al pairs of num­bers on either side of the dis­tance index, with each pair rep­re­sent­ing an f‑stop of cor­re­spond­ing val­ue. When the aper­ture is set to one of the f‑stops indi­cat­ed on the scale, the range on the dis­tance scale that lies between this pair is con­sid­ered the depth of field. The f‑stop lines on the far side of the focus index rep­re­sent the far lim­its of accept­able focus and the lines on the near side of the focus index rep­re­sent the near lim­its of accept­able focus.

Whether you’re a photographer, videographer, or gamer, getting comfortable with field of view is essential to capture and experience the world around you.

Field of viewmeaning

In pho­tog­ra­phy, space ahead of a lens is known as object space, while space behind is called the image space. In the­o­ry, rays of light from any point in object space should con­verge, or focus, at some point behind the lens. As the dis­tance between the lens and sub­ject changes, the dis­tance behind the lens at which the sub­ject is focused also changes. A sub­ject far­ther from the cam­era will focus clos­er behind the lens than a near­by sub­ject. [This is why macro lens­es are capa­ble of such a long exten­sion: to bring very close objects into focus.]

The main issues with VR technology is the balancing act between needing thicker and heavier lenses that demand less focal distance to increase the field of view with lighter headsets and equipment that don’t cause color aberration and distortion quite like the heavier tech does.

It’s impor­tant to under­stand that the depth of field is a the­o­ret­i­cal cal­cu­la­tion that does­n’t take into account lens aber­ra­tions, light dif­frac­tion, and post-cap­ture manip­u­la­tions such as sharp­en­ing and crop­ping.

In photography, changing the field of view is possible simply by changing the lens. In order to capture more of a scene for instance, a wide angle lens might be used. While decreasing the field of view can be done by using a zoom lens or simply moving the camera, depending on what you’re trying to achieve. The smaller the focal length of the lens, the wider the angle or the wider the field of view. So when you change out lenses with varying focal lengths, your field of view will either widen or narrow.

FOV meaningFortnite

Other issues like motion sickness can even come into play, with a really low FOV. Although, I would argue if you’re getting motion sickness from video games, maybe you should get outside a bit.

FOVcamera

In humans, the average field of view is about 170-180 degrees. This is often hard to accomplish through gaming or optical devices. The wider the field of view, the more one can see of that observable world.

Field of view human eye

The hyper­fo­cal dis­tance is the clos­est focus dis­tance at which the depth of  field’s far lim­it of accept­able sharp­ness aligns with infin­i­ty. When a lens is focused to the hyper­fo­cal dis­tance, its near lim­it of accept­able sharp­ness will reside at half that dis­tance to the cam­era. If your lens has the depth of field scale, the sim­plest method for focus­ing to the hyper­fo­cal dis­tance is by rotat­ing the focus ring until the line cor­re­spond­ing to your f‑stop’s far lim­it of accept­able sharp­ness aligns with the infin­i­ty mark.

To go deeper into lens perspective, know the ins and outs of focal length. The next post explores wide-angle lenses, long-focus lenses, standard angle lenses, and creative uses of manipulating focal length. From compressing space to exaggerating movement, keep reading for more.

Crit­i­cal focus may only be achieved at pre­cise­ly one plane of focus. All sub­ject points that align with this plane will also be in sharp focus (assum­ing your lens does­n’t exhib­it cur­va­ture of field); any devi­a­tion from this plane results in pro­gres­sive defo­cus­ing since the light rays no longer con­verge at the focal plane. Nev­er­the­less, in prac­tice, there’s an area just ahead of and behind the plane of focus that will be ren­dered as accept­ably sharp in the pho­to­graph because the devi­a­tions from absolute con­ver­gence are too small to notice. The depth of field describes the total region sur­round­ing the plane of focus in which objects are ren­dered as accept­ably sharp accord­ing to the sub­jec­tive stan­dards estab­lished for a par­tic­u­lar pho­to­graph.

Field of view definition microscope

Field of view is the extent of the observable world that is seen at a given time either through someone's eyes, on a display screen, or through the viewfinder on a camera. Field of view (FOV) also describes the angle through which one can see that observable world. It refers to the coverage of an entire area, rather than a fixed focal point.

Fov meaningmedical

We’ll get into the specifics of FOV, including some examples and how it’s not the same as depth of field. Let’s start by answering the question, “What does FOV mean?”

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The depth of field is com­mon­ly expressed using units of length. The sub­ject dis­tance is mea­sured from the focal plane of the cam­era (whose posi­tion is indi­cat­ed on top of your cam­era with the focal plane indi­ca­tor, ɸ) to the point in object space on which the lens is focused. The total depth of field is the entire range of accept­able focus. it’s mea­sured from the near lim­it of accept­able focus, which lies between the cam­era and sub­ject, and the far lim­it of accept­able focus, which lies between the sub­ject and infin­i­ty.

Focal length. Lens focal length is a sig­nif­i­cant fac­tor in man­ag­ing the depth of field. Short focal length lens­es pro­duce greater depth of field, while long focal length lens­es pro­duce shal­low depth of field.

Sub­ject dis­tance. As the sub­ject (on which you’re focused) moves pro­gres­sive­ly clos­er to the cam­era, the depth of field decreas­es.

Aper­ture. An essen­tial prop­er­ty of all lens­es is that chang­ing the aperture’s diam­e­ter when adjust­ing expo­sure also affects the depth of field. Increas­ing the aper­ture diam­e­ter results in less depth of field and decreas­ing the aper­ture diam­e­ter results in more depth of field. Keep in mind that effects of dif­frac­tion still apply, and it may not be prac­ti­cal to use the small­est aper­ture diam­e­ter pos­si­ble in all sit­u­a­tions (see Reci­procity Law).

For any giv­en cam­era, the fac­tors in deter­min­ing hyper­fo­cal dis­tance are the lens focal length and aper­ture size. Adjust­ments to the aper­ture will change the hyper­fo­cal dis­tance: a larg­er aper­ture diam­e­ter will pro­duce a hyper­fo­cal dis­tance that is far­ther out and a small­er aper­ture diam­e­ter will move the hyper­fo­cal dis­tance clos­er to the cam­era. Sim­i­lar­ly, a longer focal length will increase your hyper­fo­cal dis­tance while a short­er focal length will bring it clos­er. Since the hyper­fo­cal dis­tance describes the dis­tance to which your lens must be focused, sub­ject dis­tance isn’t a fac­tor.

Focal length is measured in millimeters and it’s the given name of the lens. It’s the distance from the lens to the sensor. So if you’re shooting with an 8 mm lens, that means your sensor is 8 mm away from your lens. A short focal length like this, means a wider field of view. For more on the relationship between focal length and field of view, see below.

Nothing will ever be as immersive as our own eyesight. When we look through a camera, each lens gives us a different angle that is always smaller than our field of vision.

Pho­tog­ra­phers exploit the depth of field all of the time to achieve effects such as deep or shal­low focus. Deep focus pho­tog­ra­phy relies on a con­sid­er­able depth of field to achieve accept­able sharp­ness in the fore­ground, mid­dle-ground, and back­ground of the pic­ture. This effect is often asso­ci­at­ed with land­scape pho­tog­ra­phy (where much of the image appears in sharp focus) and some forms of street pho­tog­ra­phy. Shal­low focus pho­tog­ra­phy fea­tures a nar­row or small depth of field, which is char­ac­ter­ized by a sharply focused sub­ject and an out of focus, or blurred, back­ground and fore­ground. This tech­nique is fre­quent­ly used by por­trait photographers—especially those work­ing on loca­tion as opposed to in studio—because it visu­al­ly sep­a­rates the sub­ject from the scene. Bokeh describes the aes­thet­ic qual­i­ty and char­ac­ter of how lens­es ren­der the out of focus ele­ments in a pic­ture.

In fact, technology like virtual reality uses a ton of camera equipment to give us a full immersive experience. The wider the field of view, the more realistic the experience.

In prac­tice, pho­tog­ra­phy is a two-dimen­sion­al medi­um that projects light onto a flat image sen­sor for record­ing. The posi­tion of the image sensor’s sur­face deter­mines the focal plane. When rays of light from a sub­ject point con­verge to a point on the focal plane, they’re con­sid­ered in focus. A sub­ject point that’s in focus is sit­u­at­ed along an imag­i­nary two-dimen­sion­al plane, known as the plane of focus, which rep­re­sents the the­o­ret­i­cal plane of crit­i­cal focus. [The plane of focus is par­al­lel to the image sen­sor and per­pen­dic­u­lar to the opti­cal axis.] Focus­ing the lens adjusts its dis­tance to the image sen­sor and shifts the plane of focus either toward or away from the cam­era in object space.

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But we can change lenses and get as close to the real thing as possible. Technology has become so advanced, we’re getting closer to the real thing.

There’s no tru­ly objec­tive mea­sure for what qual­i­fies as an accept­able degree of sharp­ness con­cern­ing the depth of field. A pho­to­graph that looks ade­quate­ly sharp when enlarged to fit a 15-inch note­book dis­play may appear slight­ly unsharp when expand­ed to a 30-inch desk­top dis­play. A 24×36 inch print may look sharp from across the room, less sharp from a com­fort­able read­ing dis­tance, and down­right blur­ry from the tip of your nose.