There are two different types of cameras in Rocket League: the car camera, and the ball camera.

The car camera is pointed in your car’s direction of travel, and will rigidly stay straight as long as your car is on the ground. When you fly into the air, the camera continues to face the direction of the most recent time the car was touching a surface. There will be small arrow around your car indicating where the ball is at the time.

The ball camera focuses solely on the ball, keeping it close to the center of your screen at all times. This is the easiest way to keep track of the ball, as well as the majority of the field at the same time.

It is important to know the benefits and disadvantages each camera offers, and to learn when to switch onto one and off of the other.

Pros and Cons of Car Cam

Solely based on the function of the car cam versus that of ball cam, car cam seems to be inferior. However, it does offer certain advantages that ball cam lacks.

The first and most helpful benefit of car cam is that it helps with understanding the orientation of your car. With ball cam on, it is easy to forget which direction your car is facing, and it can be confusing because of the way your mind typically thinks. For example, say there is a ball about to bounce near the front of your net, a nice boomer ready to be taken. However, you are oriented sideways in the net, nearly parallel to the goal line. In this situation, ball cam can confuse your mind because it feels like the ball should be in front of your car, when in reality it is on the side.

The disorientation of ball cam is a main problem that lower level players deal with, and it often results in a dodge in the wrong direction. Car cam, however, always faces in the direction your car faces (while on the ground). This makes it a lot easier to decide which direction to dodge in to get the most power out of the ball.

This brings us to our next-and possibly most important-point: accuracy. Using car cam correctly is the most important step in improving your accuracy. This is seen when watching gameplay from the majority of professional players, especially Mariano ‘SquishyMuffinz' Arruda. If you watch his camera transitions closely during his matches, you will notice that he rarely comes into contact with the ball without car camera on.

<iframe src="https://clips.twitch.tv/embed?autoplay=false&clip=LongRelatedDinosaurCoolStoryBro&autoplay=false&tt_content=embed&tt_medium=clips_embed" width="600" height="360" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe>

Watch closely and notice how he turns off ball cam right before he touches the ball.

This is because car cam offers much greater precision when hitting the ball rather than with ball cam. Squishy has also spent time in Free Play programming this transition from ball cam to car cam into his muscle memory so he will be able perform without even thinking about the change.

Another incredibly useful part of car cam is during a dribbling play (when the ball is on the hood of your car). If you hop into free play and attempt to dribble the ball on top of your car with ball camera on, you are in for a wildly disorienting and near impossible experience. This is because ball camera is always tracking the ball relative to your car. If the ball is behind your car, the camera flips around, and vice versa when the ball is in front of your car. This mechanic is great when the ball is at a distance away, but when the ball is constantly shifting back and forth on top of your car, the camera will be flipping around 180º over and over.

The last main benefit of car cam is the most obvious one: it lets you see exactly where you are going. It is always helpful to know where you’re going, especially when driving in the opposite direction of the ball (ex: going back for boost). Just remember to flick the car camera on for a second, then back off to reorient yourself and see where you’re going.

Despite the technical benefits of car cam, it can be detravating to your play if overused. First of all, car camera only lets you see the space in front of you, therefore giving you less information on what is going on in the important parts of the field. For example, say you are driving back for boost in your corner, and the ball was in your opponent’s end. Knowing Rocket League, it is always possible that a random pinch or clear can happen, sending the ball flying downfield. If you have car camera on constantly, the only way you could know that this happened is if you notice the shifting of the tiny indicator arrow, or if you are in comms with a teammate. It is easy to realize this too late and concede a goal due to this simple mistake.

Having only car camera on also makes it harder to know where other players are. Ball camera can have this issue too in certain situations. By keeping car camera on, it is very easy to miss an opponent’s challenge and give up a bad 50/50 play.

The Pros and Cons of Ball Cam

Ball camera is arguably the most important part of Rocket League. It allows players to track the ball constantly by automatically adjusting the camera view so the ball is always around the center of your screen. Ball cam is the key in all heads-up reaction plays as well as giving you the most information of what is going on at all times.

The most obvious advantage of ball camera is that you can see where the ball is at all times. This is clearly an important part of Rocket League, mostly because if you can’t find/hit the ball, you can’t score or win. This is also very valuable during heads-up plays, as mentioned earlier. There is no better way to know what is going on in the game than ball cam.

Ball camera is also very helpful when reading the ball’s bounces off of the wall and backboard. You watch where it is going to go, and then once you know where it is bouncing to, switch back to car cam to time your hit correctly.

Another beneficial aspect of ball camera is how it allows you to see the majority of the field most of the time. Unlike car cam, ball cam lets you see almost all of the field, as long as you are a decent distance from the ball itself. As a result of this vision, you can usually see the other players’ positions relative to the ball’s position, giving you more information to make your decisions with.

However, even though ball cam makes most things generally easier, it is not very applicable for a lot of frequently occurring situations, such as when the ball is directly overhead. Just like dribbling with ball cam on, this can cause a lot of confusion regarding your car’s orientation relative to the ball, and it limits your vision to only directly overhead, adding a layer of unknownness to the other team’s positions.

Another issue with ball cam is its increased chance for error when dodging into the ball. As I mentioned when talking about the car cam’s advantages, ball cam can be detrimental to your shot precision. This is because of the way ball cam functions. Ball camera is constantly adjusting based on the ball’s position, even on incredibly minuscule levels. These adjustments are occurring even when you are in the process of hitting the ball, and they will cause your dodges to be inaccurate because of the perspective shifts.

Ball camera also lacks in letting you know about actions that don’t involve the ball, such as bumps and boost pickups. Unless you have perfect knowledge of where every boost canister and pad is, leaving ball cam on will make consistently picking up boost difficult, and can cause you to miss boosts unnecessarily.

Camera Adjustments

Knowing the positions of other players is important information to have, as it is the main determining variable for each of your decisions. However, both car camera and ball camera lack consistency in that area.

The best way to get this information is through quick camera adjustments. By camera adjustments, I primarily mean utilizing your right analog stick to check your surroundings outside of your car or ball. This allows you to look in directions that would have previously been impossible to see. It is especially important when you are about to take ball control, or if you already have ball control (i.e. dribbling). You can use these adjustments to check if an opponent is challenging or not, giving you more knowledge to base your final decision of what to do with the ball off of.

Final Thoughts

When it comes to the camera, it all really depends on how you feel while using it. These advantages and disadvantages are just what I have personally experienced and heard regarding ball cam vs. car cam, but try them out. Experiment by using both cameras with different situations, and see what feels better. It is important to know when to switch between car and ball cam, and that knowledge will come with experience, as most skills do in Rocket League.

In the meantime, practice switching between the two cameras quickly, especially when taking a shot. As discussed in the car camera section, it really helps you dodge in the right direction at the right time in order to hit a solid shot. To practice, just hop into free play and take off ball cam every time you are about to hit the ball. The goal is to program that action into your muscle memory so you will be going to car cam every time you hit the ball. In the long run, it should benefit your overall accuracy and power.