View Distance

I did a search and found some tangential posts regarding ArmA 2's view distance. I however was wondering if BI plans to release ArmA 2 with a lower range of visibility than its predecessor. I know we probably wont find out until release, but I can't see the reason for it, unless it has something to do with some sort of anomaly occurring with the distant "mountains".

Enlightenment would be appreciated, and if there is an existing discussion taking place redirection will also be appreciated.

Recording to this German Review max view distance is again 10km.

However they saw the game in 4km view distance.

Die Sichtweite betrug meistens 4000m, das Maximum liegt nach wie vor bei 10 Kilometer.

Thanks for clarification, would have been a shame to support a lower field of range, not that its entirely necessary.

With DR's supposed 35 km, I wonder what it is that people will be looking for 35 kilometers from their location, on such a small island? Perhaps naval craft?!

50k is possible in A1 via scripting or configuration file modification. Most likely not different for A2.

10k is the max slider in options.

PS: DR has not 35km. It is nonsense what they said. Just recently changed their statement.

That is encouraging, even if completely unnecessary. Could you provide a link of the revised statement regarding DR's view distance?

in RL when standing on flat land, perfect conditions you can see about 16km i think. 35km would be useless most of the time...except the game feature a high mountain with perfect viewing condition....

And even then, on a given mountain, beyond the stretch of land (considerable or mild) you'd only be viewing a most likely empty body of water.

Are there any practical uses for such feats?

I think it would be cool (maybe in ArmA 3) to have satellites orbiting the area of conflict, I dont even want to think about the technological monster this would prove to code in. It would be cool to have real time orbital surveillance though!

Well since we live on an orb you can't see any longer than around 10km. But if you're flying it's another story.

Well since we live on an orb you can't see any longer than around 10km. But if you're flying it's another story.

maybe if the earth is a perfect ball. but there are hills and so on^^

out of my window i can see to mountains which are over 10km away.

In Arma1 its realy surprising. If you set view distance very high you can see the hills from north-sahrani from the usmc airbase. This is a realy huge feeling.

(But my pc cant perform it long and definitely not while action is going on :/ )

It really is staggering setting the view distance up all the way, with maxed settings (I guess I'm spoiled, since I refuse to play arma any other way). And even if you look closely (usually with assistance of scope) you can see units from a great distance, though less detailed. Which is fine since they're so far away.

I've flown in jets often, and if I have window seat, I'm pretty much glued to the window. Its something to be able to see so far, and I know there is an equation for it, which incorporates height and gives you a maximum possible distance of visibility.

maybe if the earth is a perfect ball. but there are hills and so on^^

out of my window i can see to mountains which are over 10km away.

In Arma1 its realy surprising. If you set view distance very high you can see the hills from north-sahrani from the usmc airbase. This is a realy huge feeling.

(But my pc cant perform it long and definitely not while action is going on :/ )

Yea im stunned everytime when i start the editor, shame that its not possible to have a viewdistance like that in multi or singleplayer.

Yeah, a multiplayer solution would be swell. But it would be bittersweet as well, seeing that far is almost an exploit by being able to see for instance, an enemy base far before any confrontation takes place. And besides, a suitable VD for multi games is fine since it adds to the tactical immersion. Forcing the players to probe the area and discover what is to be discovered!

P.S. I was just thinking about how cool it would be to see the light being reflected from a scope, or pair of binoculars from afar. Such things make me jittery with anticipation, and I know these scenario's may be likely since so many direct x 9 features are being implemented.

Something I loved about the CGI trailer for DR, the one where artillery was called in onto the small town, were the atmospheric effects in addition to the view distance. It was an amazing render, to see snow reflecting sunlight off on a distant mountain.

There were even distinguishable clouds which gave it a very cold feeling, and this served as an organic method of cutting off view distance.

IronPyramid, that is most certainly, not an exploit. If you can see the enemy base, chances are they can see you too, if they look hard enough. A large VD would help improve tactical gameplay, as the player would know what they would be dealing with at that base, and could plan accordingly. :smile:

Not an exploit so much as a means to elongate play sessions I suppose. But it is not necessarily true that if you can see them they can see you, for instance: If you were to spot the enemy base while standing on a heighty mountain, or hill, from a great distance. The chances of being spotted are slim, but this I suppose is what the terrain provides, natural cover within which to hide your base so that it may only be discovered later with upgraded reconnaissance.

yeah no one should place the base on a open slope directed to the enemy^^ Better in a valey between trees :)

BI must make the player able to lower the graphics and to increase the viewdistance when going into aircrafts. The least realistic thing in Arma1 were the flying. Planes were used at distances WW1 fighters usually flyed at. The Ka-50s vikhr's are capable of hiting targets at least 8km away. Same goes for the tunguska surface to air missile.

The aim-9x has a range up to 18km. Please set the viewdistance accordingly. I don't want to see aircrafts engaging in a "Hollywood less than 500 meters" style.

you can change settings ingame. i often change view distance ingame.

thanks bis for this possibility :)

just keeps looking better.....

The LODs take care of a lot of this already. I find that when I'm flying, ArmA's performance improves quite a lot given I'm not seeing anything close up.

BI must make the player able to lower the graphics and to increase the viewdistance when going into aircrafts. The least realistic thing in Arma1 were the flying. Planes were used at distances WW1 fighters usually flyed at. The Ka-50s vikhr's are capable of hiting targets at least 8km away. Same goes for the tunguska surface to air missile.

The aim-9x has a range up to 18km. Please set the viewdistance accordingly. I don't want to see aircrafts engaging in a "Hollywood less than 500 meters" style.

If the game doesn't increase view distance when flying, I'd say it's fairly easy to implement it into individual missions with a script. It's even possible to script it so that the view distance grows the higher you fly.

Hi all

The Horizon how far can we see?

Curvature of the earth means that a human view distance on flat surface such as a still lake or salt pan is 6 km or 3.3 miles but the human eye can see stars and galaxies millions of miles into space.

As a very rough approximation, distance to the horizon for different eye height use this formulae that works for imperial measures:

Distance to the horizon in nautical miles is equal to the 1.17 x square route of your height of eye. To get normal statute miles multiply by 1.15.

The formulae breaks down as you get higher. There is a more complex formulae but I will not bother you with it here.

If you are on higher ground you see further, and high objects like say the top of a lighthouse or ships mast appear over the horizon long before the base of the object does. So if you are 60ft above see level on say a cliff you can see about 12 nautical or 13.8 statute miles.

Those stars are millions of times the size of a human.

All this is wonderful but it not really very relevant.

Relevance

What we deal with in human experience is what is relevant though.

What can the Naked Eye resolve?

Angular resolution of a human eye is about 0.02°–0.03°, which is about 30–60 cm at a 1 km distance. What does that mean?

It depends on what your wanting to look at! So let us consider what we want to look at in ArmA. Go outside somewhere where you can see a long way on a sunny day.

1) How far can you see a person?

For me it is just under 2 kilometres, degree of camouflage and movement and light all alter this but it corresponds to that angular resolution formulae we see above. Ether way they are just a spec.

2) How far can you see a group of say 10 people moving together?

For me it is just under 2.5 kilometres

3) How far can you see a standard saloon car?

About 3 km

4) How far can you see a truck?

Perhaps 4 km

5) How far can you discern individual houses.

Perhaps 5 km

Big jets fly at between 10,000 and 12,000 Meters except for a glint of their wings or their contrail you will not be able to see them but correspondingly they cannot see you, though their cameras can!

Beyond the naked Eye

Standard Military issue Optical Binoculars magnify by about 6 to 8 times 6X30, 7X50, 8X25 etc. You do get 10X50 but few troops use them as their field of view is too small and they are hard to hold steady, they are also harder to make and so expensive and heavy, the image is not as bright an issue at dusk and dawn when military activity often takes place. Anything that big or bigger is better on a tripod and really come under the classification of observation or Naval binoculars.

Electronic binoculars with digital zoom and stabilization are whole different kettle of fish.

So you can resolve a person as a speck with the standard military binoculars at about 4 km. More importantly at one or two kilometers you will be able to tell which way they are facing and that they are carrying something and maybe even what they are carrying etc.

I like looking at pretty views and how far my horizon is becomes very important then.

All this then leads us back to the real questions of view distance, what is its relevance? What are you looking at? How are you looking at it? What is it you want to see?

Kind regards walker

On a clear day with clean air, visibility can be up to 70 km. Visibility is defined as the distance at which a jet black object of some certain dimensions can be distinguished, or the distance at which a light with the power of 1,000 candelas can be seen against an unlit background. Distant mountains and such can be seen much further away than 70 or 80 km, and seeing those in a game can help 'ground' the scene that you're in. Ergo, I think, BIS's mountainous backdrop for ArmA 2. For an island-scape, it certainly does not make much sense to see much more distant than the extents of the island. Large view distances, up to 10k say, can add a lot to the experience of the sim, especially while in flight. After a certain distance, though, you get to a point of increasingly diminishing returns on your processing overheard. I find that 10k doesn't look THAT much different than 8, but the difference between 6 and 8 is more noticible. For more extensive landscapes, like Chernarus, seeing into the distance can help lend credibility to the world. I'm just hoping for a visual simulation that doesn't have objects unexpectedly popping into existance a stone's throw away from my character.

I made a <1kb script to test view distance increase the higher you fly and it works quite nicely, although it was very demanding for my poor old rig.

Here's the unaltered code I made for anyone who wants to modify it for their own purposes:

setviewdistance 2000

_plane=vehicle player

_limit=50

#loop

~0.1

_alt=getpos _plane select 2

?_alt>_limit:setviewdistance (2000+((_alt-_limit)*3))

goto "loop"

If the game doesn't increase view distance when flying, I'd say it's fairly easy to implement it into individual missions with a script. It's even possible to script it so that the view distance grows the higher you fly.

But if BI don't implement it, you can't run that on servers that only uses signed files. But that not the biggest promblem.

I have Instant viewdistance mod for arma, and it works pretty good. My issue though is that not many players have it and therefore go CQB with aircrafts. I honestly can't fly without at least 6km of view.

"But if BI don't implement it, you can't run that on servers that only uses signed files."

Ofcourse you can. Make the addon - sign it - add the key to the server - done. ;)