Depth of field in Naval Action. Yes or no?

[LeBoiteux]

I'm not sure what Henry was getting at.

I guess it was just a misunderstanding   :

- Henry d'Esterre Darby and I thought that this thread was about "Depth of field", that is a real optical phenomenon related to zoom lens that occurs in real life in movies and photography,

(I think DOF is purposeless in NA, except for the telescope view)

- while Wind was talking about "Tilt-Shift", an artistic effect for photography and some games (such as Game Labs' Ultimate General Gettysburg) that artistically twists the concept of 'Depth of field'.

I don't like that effect but it's just a matter of taste... So why not as an option ?

Edited April 23, 2015 by LeBoiteux

[Henry d'Esterre Darby]

Not a fan of tilt-shift either, especially in this game. The reasons I applied against DoF all apply to tilt-shift with minor wording changes. I'll add that tilt-shift makes things look extremely fake and like a model - if you see Wind's examples above, a couple of those images look like paintings or miniatures, when they are really photographs. Tilt-shift makes things look like they are plastic toys in my opinion.

[B24LIBERATOR]

I guess it was just a misunderstanding   :

- Henry d'Esterre Darby and I thought that this thread was about "Depth of field", that is a real optical phenomenon related to zoom lens that occurs in real life in movies and photography,

(I think DOF is purposeless in NA, except for the telescope view)

- while Wind was talking about "Tilt-Shift", an artistic effect for photography and some games (such as Game Labs' Ultimate General Gettysburg) that artistically twists the concept of 'Depth of field'.

I don't like that effect but it's just a matter of taste... So why not as an option ?

 

I meant the parking lot thing that (I think) was directed at me. 

[Henry d'Esterre Darby]

Oh! Yes, what I meant was that the eye does have significant depth of field, you often don't notice it because the items that are blurred at a different distance are in your peripheral vision, where you can't easily discern that they're out of focus. The parking lot exercise was a good way to have a large number of different objects at different distances that are in close enough proximity to each other so that you can more easily discern the different in focus between the different distances.

[LeBoiteux]

I meant the parking lot thing that (I think) was directed at me. 

Sorry for my misunderstanding .

[B24LIBERATOR]

Oh! Yes, what I meant was that the eye does have significant depth of field, you often don't notice it because the items that are blurred at a different distance are in your peripheral vision, where you can't easily discern that they're out of focus. The parking lot exercise was a good way to have a large number of different objects at different distances that are in close enough proximity to each other so that you can more easily discern the different in focus between the different distances.

That's true, but the ships in Naval action are usually quite a distance off so it wouldn't make too much of a difference.

not like it matters much though since you don't seem to be on the band wagon for adding DoF either.

If we end up getting a first person view then depth of field might come into play with the masts & rigging being blurred & the distant ships being crisp (or whatever you're looking at being crisp), not as much as an "artsy" photograph would be... Maybe just a slight touch of blurriness.

[Henry d'Esterre Darby]

That still doesn't work though - think of the mouse movement being your head, and your eyes being, well, your eyes.  My eyes are going to flick around the screen without moving the mouse.  Everything on the screen should be crisp and in focus (maybe not highly detailed if it's off in the distance, but the edges should still be distinct).  Making me move the mouse because the center of the screen happens to be on my own mast and the rest of the area outside of my ship is out of focus isn't good game design.