Again about an optical zoom in SH3.

[Anvart]

At a forum many people wrote about an optical zoom in SH3 and about zoom mods.
I wish to write my opinion on it.
In file cameras.dat we have parameters Optical --> MinZoom = 1, Optical --> MaxZoom = 10 and ZoomLevels.
1) MinZoom and MaxZoom parameters declare an opportunity of change optical Zoom in game from 1 up to 10.
2) ZoomLevels declares fixed zoom values for different optical objects (it's switched by key "Tab"),
for example, Periscope has ZoomLevels: 1-st = 1.5 and 2-d = 6.0, but you can change these values, for example, 1.5 - 6.0 - 10.0, and it will be mod.
But I recommend to apply a method, which I use very much for a long time (~1.5 years). It is a simple native method not demanding application any mods. You need to appoint mouse wheel to the certain command in Commands_xx.cfg file:

[Cmd70]
Name=Cam_zoom_in
Ctxt=1
Key0=0x05,cR,"CTRL+M.wheel"

Now you can to change zoom from 1 up to 10 by "Mouse Wheel + Ctrl key" for all optical objects.
I do not want to release the mod for this change... therefore copy the highlighted text to your Commands_xx.cfg file.
Dev team has not made the interface for control keys changing,
therefore we are compelled to edit a key file (Commands_xx.cfg).

Best regards.
Anvart
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My mod page:
http://hosted.filefront.com/Anvart/

[panthercules]

Anvart - let me see if I understand what you're saying - right now (without my having changed anything), my mouse wheel will switch/zoom back and forth between the standard settings (usually two) at various stations -e.g., 1x or 4x at the obs scope, 1.5x or 6x at the attack scope, bridge view or binoculars on the bridge, and the various set zoom levels at the deck gun.

If you make the change you note above, does this mean that if you press CTRL while rolling your mouse wheel you can do some sort of variable zoom in smaller increments between these standard zoom settings? (e.g., 1x, 2x, 3x and 4x at the obs scope, instead of just either 1x or 4x?) If so, while it sounds neat, why would you do that? Except perhaps for the deck gun (where I'm not really sure what the differing zoom levels are supposed to represent), weren't the zoom levels of these other positions/instruments fixed at specific magnifications IRL, rather than variable?

One thing I am curious about - in GWX I believe that they have increased the attack scope magnification to 10x to try to compensate for the difficulty in seeing the flags or something. I was OK with the regular 6x image, but I don't have any huge problem with changing the image to actually be bigger than it was before, because I have no idea how big either the 1x or the 6x image through the scope really was IRL. However, seeing the number "10x" where it's "supposed" to be 6x is an immersion spoiler to me - is there some way to either return this zoom level (and the associated number displayed in game) to the original 6x or, in the alternative, leave the image at the new 10x size but make the number read 6x in game like it used to?

[Boris]

Cool, I'm going to try this. How realistic is it though?