How to make 3D Pilot Head visible? | Slow Panning Rotational Camera Shot

[CommandT]

Hi all,

Sorry if this is the wrong place to ask. Could someone tell me how to make the 3D virtual pilot head visible when you are inside the cockpit and move the camera off-center? For a sort-of "GoPro" view of the pilot sitting in the cockpit for example... I see some videos make this happen somehow but I'm not sure how to do it.

And a separate camera question - how would one create the sort of constantly rotating camera shot like Matt Wagner sometimes has in his videos? Example below: 
 

Cheers!

[speed-of-heat]

 

may have what you need

Edited June 27, 2024 by speed-of-heat

[CommandT]

19 hours ago, speed-of-heat said:

 

may have what you need

 

Thanks though unfortunately those are not what I am after. That's just using the external camera to get into the cockpit but that method results in using the external model of the cockpit, not the 1st person F1 view that has all the detail. I know there's a way of getting that to work somehow without the pilot's head disappearing. I just don't know how   

[Ironhand]

Never tried to do what you’re attempting but, in F1 view, holding down the CTRL and SHIFT shift keys, while pressing the NumPad direction keys will allow you to move the camera position within the cockpit. Then, maybe, CTRL and NumPad “/“ to pull back?

EDIT: Forgot to mention that, what you see will depend on what’s in the F1 cockpit. Not all pits have the body modeled. And some have the body but no head.

Edited June 28, 2024 by Ironhand

[Art-J]

I believe In F1 view 3D model of player's head itself is always disabled by default, otherwise it would start occasionally blocking your view depending on TrackIR/VR movement as body animations don't quite follow camera movement. Models of AI crew members are different thing.

I might be mistaken of course, but can you show us any video where you saw full F1 cockpit model shown together with player's full body model?

[CommandT]

13 hours ago, Art-J said:

I believe In F1 view 3D model of player's head itself is always disabled by default, otherwise it would start occasionally blocking your view depending on TrackIR/VR movement as body animations don't quite follow camera movement. Models of AI crew members are different thing.

I might be mistaken of course, but can you show us any video where you saw full F1 cockpit model shown together with player's full body model?

There definitely is a way of enabling the F1 view pilot head somehow, I just don't know how.

Here for example - camera facing pilot is using F1 view (you can tell but the level of details of the rivets ect): 

 

[buceador]

Is this what you mean?

 

[Ironhand]

2 hours ago, buceador said:

Is this what you mean?

 

That was very cool.

[CommandT]

5 hours ago, buceador said:

Is this what you mean?

 

Exactly! How did he get the pilot head to not disappear with the in-cockpit view? 

[razo+r]

If you move the camera far away enough the head will appear. So I guess if you tinker with the camera bounding box you'll be able to make the head appear more consistently.

[buceador]

17 hours ago, CommandT said:

Exactly! How did he get the pilot head to not disappear with the in-cockpit view? 

The "he" in this case is me! That is my video.

Make changes to \DCS World\Mods\aircraft\F-16C\view.lua file:

Allow360rotation  = true,  (if was false before)
limits_6DOF = {x = {-0.50,0.50},y ={-0.5,0.16},z = {-0.40,0.40},roll = 90.000000},  (these numbers change the POV)
 

Then it is simply a question in the  F1 view of using the numpad keys in conjunction with R-SHIFT and R-CTRL until you get the angle that you want.

[CommandT]

1 hour ago, buceador said:

The "he" in this case is me! That is my video.

Make changes to \DCS World\Mods\aircraft\F-16C\view.lua file:

Allow360rotation  = true,  (if was false before)
limits_6DOF = {x = {-0.50,0.50},y ={-0.5,0.16},z = {-0.40,0.40},roll = 90.000000},  (these numbers change the POV)
 

Then it is simply a question in the  F1 view of using the numpad keys in conjunction with R-SHIFT and R-CTRL until you get the angle that you want.

AMAZING!!! Thanks a million!!   Works s advertised! Will start to implement in future videos of mine! Huge thanks again! 

Edited June 30, 2024 by CommandT

[buceador]

25 minutes ago, CommandT said:

AMAZING!!! Thanks a million!!   Works s advertised! Will start to implement in future videos of mine! Huge thanks again! 

You are very welcome, I look forward to seeing the results!

[CommandT]

8 hours ago, buceador said:

You are very welcome, I look forward to seeing the results!

Can't seem to get the pilot head to appear on the Heatblur F-4. The views.lua is in DCS World\Mods\aircraft\F-4E\Entry

 Changed to the values you have but the pilot's head is still not visible. Any ideas?

Works ok in the Hornet though. 

Edit: doesn't work in the F-15E either... hmmm. 

Edited June 30, 2024 by CommandT

[CommandT]

On 6/29/2024 at 12:03 PM, buceador said:

Is this what you mean?

 

Actually realised there's another problem I don't understand how you got round. I don't have the F-16 but I did get the pilot head to appear in the F-18. However - it appears that the pilot's head is pointing in the direction that you are viewing during a replay... I mean the pilot's head is not mimicking what happened during the actual mission but rather your current view direction during the replay. So what happens is if I look back towards the pilot from the HUD lets say, the pilot twists his head as far back as he can... how did you get round this anomaly? 

Thanks again for the help! 

[buceador]

I load the track file, start Shadowplay, the perform the head movements (TrackIr) that I want to see in the video, for me this works because sometimes I am too fixed on my opponent and I want the best cinematic end product, this would (for me) also apply to twisting my head to see behind me and momentarily losing my head! I also have to remember to switch off the HMCS at times during the flight so it doesn't appear in the F1 cockpit shot!

[CommandT]

13 hours ago, buceador said:

I load the track file, start Shadowplay, the perform the head movements (TrackIr) that I want to see in the video, for me this works because sometimes I am too fixed on my opponent and I want the best cinematic end product, this would (for me) also apply to twisting my head to see behind me and momentarily losing my head! I also have to remember to switch off the HMCS at times during the flight so it doesn't appear in the F1 cockpit shot!

What I'm confused about is how your pilot's head movement is independent of the camera angle. So in your track file, you go to F1 view, used the  R-SHIFT + R-CTRL and numpad keys to move the camera to the desired position and then use your trackIR to angle it the way you want, yeah? 

Because in my case if I move the camera angle with trackir, the pilot will move his head in the same direction as the camera angle because even during the replay the trackir position/ angle is linked to the pilot's head. At least in F1 view. So I still don't really understand how you got round that in your video, where you clearly see the pilot move his head irrispective of your fixed camera position. Maybe it's not a thing with F-16 replays but is with F-18? No idea.

[Ironhand]

On 7/1/2024 at 6:40 PM, CommandT said:

...So I still don't really understand how you got round that in your video, where you clearly see the pilot move his head irrispective of your fixed camera position...

It's an F-16 thing. Just installed the F-16 to check and it works in that pit. But not in any other that I've tried, as soon as you hit those view keys in F1 view, you have taken control of the view and the pilot responds to your inputs. In the F-16, that doesn't happen.

Edited July 3, 2024 by Ironhand

[buceador]

Weird but good to know!

[Ironhand]

1 hour ago, buceador said:

Weird but good to know!

Like CommandT, I was trying to understand what was different in your example because it’s never worked that way in any other pit I’ve sat in. After trying several variations on a theme, I concluded that it had to be the aircraft itself. So I installed it and voilà. Gotta love “free to try”.

Edited July 3, 2024 by Ironhand

[CommandT]

48 minutes ago, Ironhand said:

Like CommandT, I was trying to understand what was different in your example because it’s never worked that way in any other pit I’ve sat in. After trying several variations on a theme, I concluded that it had to be the aircraft itself. So I installed it and voilà. Gotta love “free to try”.

 

Ah thanks for letting us know. That's quite frustrating. I remember Heatblur said they wanted to implement a similar "GoPro view" feature in the F-4, I guess via actual DCS view settings but I cannot find any info in it at all, anywhere! 

[Ironhand]

2 hours ago, CommandT said:

Ah thanks for letting us know. That's quite frustrating…

Yes. It’s quite elegant being able to get those views in F1 rather than having to rely on F4, etc.

[Vee.A]

5 hours ago, CommandT said:

Ah thanks for letting us know. That's quite frustrating. I remember Heatblur said they wanted to implement a similar "GoPro view" feature in the F-4, I guess via actual DCS view settings but I cannot find any info in it at all, anywhere! 

To settle any confusion, the F-18, F-16, AH-64, Hind, and in the future A-10C, and Ka-50 all have the same pilot model fidelity. As was mentioned the head automatically appears when you more the camera away (in the F-4 it doesn't normally, but if you press a button the head appears all the time no matter where the camera is. Honestly a slightly better system). What I didn't see mentioned is that for some views you may need to extend the camera limits to stay outside of the head removal area, and there's also a "freeze button" (Lshift P) that locks the pilot in whatever direction and position it's at when you press it. This allows you to get shots looking back while the pilot is looking forward without the replay functionality, for example.

About the replays, I talked to GlowingAmraam (the guy that makes the official DCS cinematics) and he was using the replay functionality you're talking about in the Hornet (you can see that in the Kola trailer) in his build, but from my testing only his body moves in the replay and the head does not track, so it appears to be a bug. I have not tested it in the Hind, but it should work the exact same way as the Viper if it's not bugged. If they're not fixed with the update tomorrow I'll post a bug report.

I will say despite a couple issues I really like all the new pilot model features. Great for cinematics and overall immersion. The Hornet pilot even salutes for the carrier launch too, and you can get the Hind pilot to look at his fully functional wrist watch with a keybind. Raising and lowering visors/NVG's is also fully animated. Not to mention how accurate the 3D models themselves are

[Vee.A]

I believe I found an image of the bind to turn the selfie mode in the Phantom on/off. I believe it also has a whole section in the controls menu, but I don't know because I don't own the module.

null

[CommandT]

On 7/3/2024 at 7:54 PM, Vee.A said:

To settle any confusion, the F-18, F-16, AH-64, Hind, and in the future A-10C, and Ka-50 all have the same pilot model fidelity. As was mentioned the head automatically appears when you more the camera away (in the F-4 it doesn't normally, but if you press a button the head appears all the time no matter where the camera is. Honestly a slightly better system). What I didn't see mentioned is that for some views you may need to extend the camera limits to stay outside of the head removal area, and there's also a "freeze button" (Lshift P) that locks the pilot in whatever direction and position it's at when you press it. This allows you to get shots looking back while the pilot is looking forward without the replay functionality, for example.

About the replays, I talked to GlowingAmraam (the guy that makes the official DCS cinematics) and he was using the replay functionality you're talking about in the Hornet (you can see that in the Kola trailer) in his build, but from my testing only his body moves in the replay and the head does not track, so it appears to be a bug. I have not tested it in the Hind, but it should work the exact same way as the Viper if it's not bugged. If they're not fixed with the update tomorrow I'll post a bug report.

I will say despite a couple issues I really like all the new pilot model features. Great for cinematics and overall immersion. The Hornet pilot even salutes for the carrier launch too, and you can get the Hind pilot to look at his fully functional wrist watch with a keybind. Raising and lowering visors/NVG's is also fully animated. Not to mention how accurate the 3D models themselves are

Unfortunately that "Freeze" button doesn't work for replays from what I can tell. So basically it means you'd have to fly the plane whilst looking backwards to get your pilot shot! Gah!  

Thanks for clarifying all of that though! 

And regarding the Heatblur F-4. Currently there's a bug in the replay - the pilot doesn't hold the stick during the replay, he holds thin air and the stick itself moves freely in and around his hands! So totally ruins that shot.

Also it would be so much more useful to have the pilot head either on or off like the F-4 for other modules. I've been trying to get an angle that works in the F-18 but the problem is that after rotating your angle even by a bit sometimes using your trackir the pilot's head disappears. Basically it needs more margin for when the head is visible as getting good shots can be almost impossible with how far away from the pilot's head you need to be to have it not disappear... but then you end up cutting through the canopy glass and that's the shot ruined!