With the advent of sim-racing titles and the proliferation of quality simulation peripherals, it’s become pretty easy to set up a racing setup, whether on PC or consoles. If you’re a sim-racing fan, you’re probably familiar with names like Logitech, Thrustmaster, Fanatec or Simagic. These are the most popular brands in the mainstream segment for everything between beginners and more seasoned racers.
As far as titles are concerned, we have the tenors of iRacing, Assetto Corsa, Assetto Corsa Competizione, rFactor and many others on PC, as well as Forza Motorsport and Gran Turismo on consoles as exclusives.
Sim-racing is all very well. But doing them properly is better. For the average gamer, certain settings may seem superfluous, particularly those concerning Direct Drive bases, pedals, etc., but the most important thing in Forza Horizon is to have fun. The most important thing in Forza Horizon is to have fun. But for a driver who knows a thing or two about sim-racing, and above all wants to push simulation immersion to the limit, it’s essential to have the right settings to really believe you’re there.
One of the settings available in virtual racing is the FOV (Field Of View). This is a parameter that lets you adjust what you see in front of you, whether in terms of cars, tracks, cockpits, etc. More often than not, and I think mainly because of Need For Speed, the FOV is incorrectly set on sim-racing titles, for the simple reason that our brains first want to admire the rear of the car we’re driving before thinking about immersion. And also to get the feeling of speed when you’re driving at over 250 km/h on a track or open road.
Except that for a seasoned racer, the most important thing is the degree of immersion you get in sim-racing, and that’s why FOV is such an important setting on your racing title. And lucky for you, we’re going to take a look at that today.
What is FOV?
Let’s start by defining FOV. According to Wikipedia, FOV is “the measure of the observable world as seen at a given time. In the case of optical instruments or sensors, it is the solid angle through which a detector is sensitive to electromagnetic radiation”.
Basically, the FOV is a value in degrees of a scene in front of you or in your field of vision. The smaller the value, the more concentrated your vision will be on one part of the scene. And the larger the value, the more objects will be visible in the scene.
Since the subject is sim-racing, here’s an example of the differences between two FOVs in a racing title I found on a search engine.
You can see that, depending on the FOV value (100° or 45°), the number of elements, as well as the viewing distance, are different from one image to another. If, for example, with an FOV of 45° (the image on the right), a car could be in front of the one being piloted, but positioned on the right, it would be hidden from view, making it virtually invisible (in the blind spot).
The importance of FOV adjustment
The importance of a good FOV setting goes hand in hand with a good sim-racing experience, or viewing experience at all. A poorly set FOV will not only impact your field of vision and your ability to distinguish objects and distances, but can also induce brain discomfort and headaches in some cases.
What’s more, the notion of distances will also be affected, as I’ve just said. The lower the FOV, the more your appreciation of distances is affected, making you believe that objects or points are much closer to you, when in reality this is not the case at all.
Another point to mention about the importance of a good FOV setting is the comfort of your eyes and brain. You’ll be able to see much more of the track, and drifts will be “easier” to perform with a wider and, above all, farther field of vision. And last but not least, your brain will be calmer, so to speak, and won’t have to compensate much for what’s going on in front of it.
How to set your FOV
First of all, you should know that the field of vision of a person with good eyes is about 200° horizontally. In other words, your eyes can see an angle about 200° wide in front of you. That’s when you have good vision. If you wear glasses, for example, this value will be negatively impacted (blind spot on certain sides of the field of vision, glasses frame obstructing images in front of you, etc.).
Then, the FOV of a person is really a question of the ratio between what you have in front of you, i.e. your screen, the distance of your eyes from it, the appearance of the screen and your vision. There are calculators on the Internet that will help you find your “good” FOV, but this is theoretical, as your eyes and brain are not identical to those of your colleague or friend, in addition to your environment.
However, these calculators are an excellent starting point for setting your FOV in sim-racing, and you’ll need 4 elements: the distance between your eyes and your screen, your screen size, your screen ratio (16: 9, 21: 9, etc.) and your screen configuration (single monitor, triple screen, etc.). Once you’ve got a theoretical standard FOV, you can build on it to find what suits you best.
After that, all you have to do is test with the different FOVs available in the game you have. For example, on a single-screen setup with a 32-inch diagonal, and a monitor distance of 70 cm, you’ll have a “standard” horizontal FOV of around 50°.
Don’t take this value as gospel, because it’s purely theoretical. So here’s a little tip I’d like to share with you: always try to maintain a good ratio of car proportions. Most sim-racing titles offer FOV settings directly in the game menus.
On the track, and on any sim-racing title, put yourself in the vehicle’s exterior camera, but the one that’s rather close up: i.e., you should be able to see the rear bumper clearly. Then start setting your FOV based on the theoretical value obtained from an online calculator, which is around 50° if we take the parameters of our setup mentioned above.
So, as I was saying, the car needs to have the right proportions: wide enough to cover a good part of the screen, and low enough too, as in real life. If the car looks “squashed”, with a minimal width and an inordinate height, it means that your FOV is too large. And you’ll get the opposite effect with a FOV that’s too low: that is, a car with a rear end that’s too wide and too high, literally overhanging the screen.
The right FOV is just the right balance between width and height of the vehicle in front of you, with much more detailed information about what’s happening on the track. Some drivers prefer to see the cockpit and dashboard in its entirety, while others prefer a camera on the hood. In most cases, this is a purely personal matter, but it’s still important to be aware of what’s going on around your car.
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