What is the best and most efficient way to move the camera around in the cockpit and outside?
Iām using TrackIR. As soon u get ur own perfekt settings , itās just so perfect. Outside I still u mouse movements combined with TrackIR.
Still using the basic version with the 3 reflectors mounted on a basecap.
But itās so cool, with all the movements up, down, frontward, backward, sideward, nick , pitch , roll .
For me, itās essential to get the maximum immersion out of msfs without VR.
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Track IR
This in combination with the next update for FLOW (from //42) where you can adjust the and drone camera speeds on your fingertips is the future way to go.
Then map the camera movement to a POV on the stick or the throttle and goodbye mouse.
For me, I set custom views and assign them to my number keys on the keyboard. 10 views and they are the same in all my planes. As an example 1-normal flight 2-approach 3-flight settings like alt and hdg 4- FMS and so on. I also set 1 and 2 on a hat switch on my yoke. 7 and 9 are passenger views also assigned to hat switch. I use a button on the yoke to switch fron inside and outside and use the 8way for freeview for both of those. Whatever you do make it the same for all your planes. It keeps it simple that way.
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I just use my mouse by holding down the right button.
I also use track ir with open source software opentrack
For different stage of flight, you can make different profiles which you can easilly switch
But secondary to that i find that xbox controller is also very good
Very similar setup here, and indeed I find this as the most useful for quick and hands-on-controls changes.
Luckily my yoke (TM Boeing) has two hats.
One hat is controlling freeview inside and outside the plane.
The other hat is quick direction of view (left, right etc) and up/down looks at the overhead/instruments.
Iāve setup my Elgato Streamdeck with a bunch of standard and custom views, so I can quickly jump around the cockpit, to focus on specific things. This is my Fenix A320 setupā¦
Top Row, from left to right
- Reset Baro,
- Zoom in on the PFD directly in front of me
- Pilot - Resets back to my cockpit view
- Dashboard View - Sort of an angled view of the auto-pilot area and MFDās.
- Overhead View - Angled view up, looking at the overhead panel, so I can access everything there in one view.
- MCDU View. Both MCDUās in view, so I can access both.
Second Row
- Tablet View - A zoomed in view of the tablet
- Passenger Views - The yellow buttons are my passenger views, in front of and behind wing views from the cabin
- Single MCDU view - This just focuses on the left MCDU
- GSX button for toggling GSX open and closed.
Third Row
- ATC - Toggling the in-game ATC window open and closed.
- Passenger Views
- Pedestal View - This is an angled down view of the entire pedestal, so I can access radios, and other stuff down there.
Having setup all these, I can quicky jump around and access stuff, faster than using a mouse to pan around, zoom in, etc.
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TrackIR for looking around while in the pilotās seat. But when I want to actually move around the cockpit or use external and drone views, I use an Xbox controller I have attached to my yoke and use the analog sticks.
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I have the camera translate buttons and the mini-joystick for actually looking around both mapped to my throttle. not good, but not great.
And itās only because I canāt really keep my VR headset on for more than 30-45 minutes for this game without getting nauseous. Thatās truly the best way to look around the cockpit. Itās a shame too i donāt normally get motion sickness but itās mostly for whirlybirds
Lucky you. 10 mins in VR with MSFS and I want to hurl my guts out. Yet, I can play all kinds of other fast paced and even flight games without issue. Iām just terribly sensitive to the latency and low frame rates of MSFS in VR.
yeah but 30-45 minutes goes quick and itās not as impressive visually as 2D. I am waiting for the day i can complete a 2 hour full flight in sim without needing needing some sort of workaround or 3rd party app to help complete the journey (yknow to get charts in my head and stuff).
Itās why i consider TrackIR/Tobii Eyetrack from time to time but i just canāt get over the immersion that VR provides.
Iāve got my yokeās hat switch set up to pan and, with a āshiftā button, translate up/down/left/right. Itās not graceful (in that itās a fixed speed on/off and itās hard to make very fine adjustments) but it works for now. 
I ordered myself a TrackIR 5 as many people swear by them for looking around the cockpit without going full VR, so when that gets here Iāll see how I like it.
Hence why I have Air Manager on touch screens + TrackIR for control of my planes. I can do entire flights from cold and dark to shut down at destination mouse and keyboard-free. VR is visually immersive, but until hand tracking and haptic feedback become a thing, using a mouse or VR controller to control my plane smashes any immersion VR brings to the table.
In any case, back on topic, I think that for moving the camera round (outside of panning main seat view), a controller with analog sticks is the best option.
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I use AITrack and Opentrack freeware along with my webcam to look around - both inside and outside of the plane. Works great, there is no hardware to attach to your head, and is totally free if you have a webcam.
If you are handy it is very easy and simple to make your own headtracking device
I have attached my headtracker to a bluetooth headphone with some tywraps
This and a modified ps3 cam with old floppydisk as filter can get you there
How to do this you can see in this video which i used to fix mine with no experience at all but one of the most satisfactive project ive done so far
how did you get this translate functionality to work? I tried Translate Cockpit View (mapped to trigger+thumbstick on my flight stick), and also Slide Cockpit View. Not sure if this is an issue with the rear triggerās ability to be used as a āshiftā type button? Iām using Turtle Beachās stick. I looked at the Xbox Controller mappings to try and recreate how it can be done there, but Iām not having any luck. On the controller, itās LB+right stick and you can move forward, backward, left and right.
On keyboard i believe it is left shift + numpad 2 4 6 and 8 keys should be translate 2 backward, 4 left, 6 right and 8 forward
Cool. Iāve been trying to mimic this āslideā or ātranslateā behavior by using two buttons simultaneously on my Flight Stick, but have been unable to get it to work.