While it might not be a bug per say, I was annoyed by the camera constantly switching to first person for kill animations while I prefer playing in third person. Up until I encountered this issue, I played 3rd person and all kill animations were third person.

So, I decided to play around and find out what was causing it and how to fix it.

What I found was this:

So far, it seems that the cause is holding the toggle view button during a kill animation (R3 on the ps3). I was able to fix the 3rd --> 1st person switching by doing exactly what I think was causing the issue in the first place: find a bandit or someone with low health (where you are pretty much garaunteed a kill animation), HOLD the R3 button, THEN attack for the kill animation. This fixed the issue for me (at least for now).

Hopefully this helps. It might be useful for toggling between kill animations, if you desire one or the other type.

Disclaimer: this worked on the ps3, so I'm not sure of the viability for other platforms.

Might have to give this a try. I, like you, prefer playing in 3rd person on my melee type characters and the first person kill animations are a bit silly to me.

As an update, it seems that the type of animation is also based on the race or animal type you are fighting. So you can set it to do 3rd person animations on nords for example and still do 1st person animations on wood elves. Same for animals, i.e. wolves vs. bears vs. sabre cats.

If you don't mind, post here whether or not it works for you. Be good to know if this actually works or if it was just a fluke for me.

I play 1st person and my kill moves are in 3rd person and i don't hold down toggle or any buttons so your suggested cause is wrong but your fix might work.

it seems to me that kill moves are done in the opposite camera view that your playing which might be a bug...it doesn't bother me though as i like to watch my guy run his sword thru someone

I play in 3rd person (on PC, if it matters) and every one of my finishers so far have also been in 3rd person. 1st person finishing moves sounds like a bug to me.

My finishers are still disorienting to me, though, The 3rd person finisher camera angle and distance is always different than the 3rd-person camera angle and distance I use when playing.

This is my experience as well. I just want some way to turn them off entirely though....