Is there a difference between Field of View and Camera distance?

itgiawa

If I point the camera at an object and then move the camera away from the object, then the object gets smaller and I can see more stuff around it. If I increase my Field of view then the object gets smaller and I can see more stuff. Is there a difference? or are both actions visualy identical?

Megalomaniak

field of view is effectively in degrees, how wide the camera can see. Camera distance, do you literally just mean camera's position with regards to things in it's view/focus? Or are you referring to the far clipping plane?

For the position, it's an actual difference in position, the camera is physically in a different place. Clip distance defines how far the camera can see before things get clipped and are not rendered anymore. If you are paying attention you'll also understand that it's because of the clipping distance that you don't want to use camera positioning to emulate the field of view.

itgiawa

Thanks. Yeah by distance I mean literally how far away the camera is form the object.

Aside from clipping, are there any other differences in what you actually see on screen? I suppose a better question is when should I use one or the other to zoom in? Will one method preserve my pixel art fidelity better than the other? I.e. will one method distort textures more than another? Will the methods produce differently shaped objects? and if so why?

Megalomaniak

For zooming position is probably better, since field of view might cause distortion. But this is all assuming perspective projection rather than say isometric.