NZFF

Posted: **Tue Jun 02, 2009 5:30 pm**

Some great news for NZ FSX users.
ORBX, who do the brilliant FTX landclass scenery for Australia, appear to be on track to developing the same thing for NZ.
This post from ORBX boss John Venema appeared today on their forum.
"Well the good news is that over the past week we have found an excellent source of aerial imagery for NZ, so we're a step closer to making this happen. Can't announce anything yet at this stage, but it's looking promising."
Go to http://orbxsystems.com/forums/index.php?topic=11432.0 to pick up the thread.

Frank

Posted: **Tue Jun 02, 2009 5:58 pm**

thanks for the heads up, will definatly have to get this!

Posted: **Tue Jun 02, 2009 6:20 pm**

Wonder what source they have for mapping that we dont ,,money ??
Mite aswell quit the design stuff for NZ now as the ozzy are coming to make a better job at it ...
Thanks John V

Posted: **Tue Jun 02, 2009 6:44 pm**

creator2003 wrote:
QUOTE (creator2003 @ Jun 2 2009, 06:20 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>
Wonder what source they have for mapping that we dont ,,money ??
Mite aswell quit the design stuff for NZ now as the ozzy are coming to make a better job at it ...
Thanks John V

Bear in mind that Orbx don't do large scale photo scenery -- they use the same landclass-->ground texture that the default FSX uses, they just supply more accurate landclass, more realistic 'localised' textures and redo the autogen. In Australia, they've also committed to supplying airports, and these generally have a small aerial photo surrounding.

The Orbx thread also mentions 'including some quite spectacular photoreal areas on both Islands' but this may be a test only, to define the 'NZ-ness' of the area.

I would actually love to see an Orbx NZ, simply because a photoreal NZ will not be possible in the near future, and trying to blend a photoreal airport into the default FSX textures is not all that effective. Blending to a more accurately textured 'default' would be a lot easier.

As far as the cost is concerned, they really only need a tiny cross-section of aerial images, which they'll use to build a texture set.

Posted: **Tue Jun 02, 2009 8:54 pm**

Yay!

Cant wait for Orbx NZ North and/or South (yet).

Posted: **Tue Jun 02, 2009 10:43 pm**

Creator, I wouldn't get too upset yet, it may promote a NZx (similar to OZx), and there is no reason why people couldn't work together towards getting some of the other airports up to the payware ones.

I think it would be great for the likes of Godzone working with them on the high definition airports - I could see NZAA, NZWN, and NZCH being done ala YMML, and I'm pretty sure they do have contractors working on some of the airports, I don't they are all done by the core group.

I would personally buy it, more than I would for a US one.

Posted: **Tue Jun 02, 2009 11:43 pm**

Im not to upset really ?? and knew it would happen from early discussions ive had , im just alittle sadden that alot of work ive been doing over the past year almost will not match or fit in with 30cm landclass tiles they are going on about,, this only leaves airports to make as the 2.5 meter photoreal im using is just not going to cut it ....

I really cant see orbx or ozX not making airports around NZ if they do the landclass , john has alot of guys slogging it for free and trying to earn a name for themselfs through the forums john runs ,and there are more of them than little old me,Robin /Ian and Timmo ..

This sim design thing hasent ever made me any money and have had to go back to real work"I HATE" to recover the money ive lived off ,so im already down 2 months work on the projects ive been doing ,not sure really how i feel about it all with the stick from the misses all these years etc ..

the FTX thing to me is just another wall to over come ,and there are always citys /ships /and aircraft to build i suppose ...

Yes FTX will be good for simming here ,i just kinda wished that a NZer would have done it before these guys come bowling through..

Ill see what happens ,i just dont think ill have the same passion for it ....

Posted: **Wed Jun 03, 2009 12:58 am**

creator2003 wrote:
QUOTE (creator2003 @ Jun 2 2009, 11:43 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>
Im not to upset really ?? and knew it would happen from early discussions ive had , im just alittle sadden that alot of work ive been doing over the past year almost will not match or fit in with 30cm landclass tiles they are going on about,, this only leaves airports to make as the 2.5 meter photoreal im using is just not going to cut it ....

Photo scenery is always going to have its place, but is generally of most value to those who know the area. It isn't for everyone -- some people see the realism as a huge leap forward, others see the lack of fine-tuned texture detail as a real lack. Although I see the improvement that Orbx makes to the areas it covers, I also see that it isn't the one and only solution. You still get mis-matched/cut textures, and absolutely no link between 'real' roads and photo textures with roads. They do a much better job of blending and matching colours than the default, but for some of us it'll never match the stark realism of a photographic scenery, even if it doesn't match the resolution and quality.

QUOTE

I really cant see orbx or ozX not making airports around NZ if they do the landclass , john has alot of guys slogging it for free and trying to earn a name for themselfs through the forums john runs ,and there are more of them than little old me,Robin /Ian and Timmo ..[/quote]

Hmm, I don't see that at all -- Australia was not well-represented before VOZ, so it makes perfect sense to work with the group which was put together -- albeit over time -- for VOZ, and push them to FSX/Orbx collaboration. However I can't see too many Australians jumping the ditch to produce NZ airports, and even the autogen becomes an entirely different matter here -- there are some default Australian trees, for instance, which MS developed to give a distinctive Australian look, but there are no default New Zealand trees.

QUOTE

This sim design thing hasent ever made me any money and have had to go back to real work"I HATE" to recover the money ive lived off ,so im already down 2 months work on the projects ive been doing ,not sure really how i feel about it all with the stick from the misses all these years etc ..

the FTX thing to me is just another wall to over come ,and there are always citys /ships /and aircraft to build i suppose ...

Yes FTX will be good for simming here ,i just kinda wished that a NZer would have done it before these guys come bowling through..

Ill see what happens ,i just dont think ill have the same passion for it ....[/quote]

My own belief is that beyond Australia, Orbx will stick to landclass/textures/autogen. The extras such as the airports, both freeware and payware, arose from the already existing VOZ project, which is Australians working on Australia. The airports happen anyway, even if it is a bit more hap-hazard without someone organising a project such as VOZ. The improved texture sets and landclass were always a necessity, for FS2004 and even more so with FSX. Just because Orbx do that work for the US, and maybe NZ, doesn't mean that they take over the scenery development for those areas.

There have always been payware texture improvements for Europe and the US, it's just that Orbx have done it a little differently, and their success in Australia has ensured their commitment to this for the rest of the world. It certainly doesn't mean that they take ownership of all scenery design world-wide.

I think it is easy to feel over-awed by the Orbx promotional machine, but you really need to see what they do as a small, but very welcome, part of improving our sim. Their early promotional material was a bit over-zealous, in that they concentrated on the fizz rather than much in the way of real detail of what they were trying to do -- in other words they used promotional techniques which simmers were not used to seeing applied to sim products, although they are used with most other product advertising, such as Coke. In FS, we grew up expecting a feature list, stating exactly what the product does, something like Coke being advertised as a carbonated, caffeine-based, sugar-laden beverage. The 'features' of Coke are the very things which their advertising is designed to obscure.

Orbx tend to shy away from actual features, which leads to a lot of confusion over what it actually does. I still think that a lot of people still believe that Orbx is photo scenery. Orbx isn't Coke, its feature-set can stand on it's own amongst the best FSX addons in the world. Hopefully they'll discover that before they release a NZ product, otherwise we'll have a lot of confused kiwis in the forums...

Posted: Wed Jun 03, 2009 1:19 am

by creator2003

Yup you do make alot of sence and this is my way of digging through my stressing of it all i suppose ,i even went to bed at 7pm because i was just over it for the day ..
You and Ian are right Photoreal cover really does have its place and ive gotta remember that what we do is as real as it gets within our limits ...

I will plod on as Fs is something i really cant see myself giving up designing for ,the big company thing of Orbx is still a little scary to myself when it takes months and even a year to build a good scenery and it takes Orbx a couple of months or so to build 3-4-5 high detail airports/citys/and cover the size of OZ with Land class and market it pretty well ..

Posted: Wed Jun 03, 2009 1:34 am

by bluebird79

Creator I am an Aussie , well Tasmanian anyway... we call Aussies "The Mainlanders" :-)

Anyway I tend to agree with you Creator as I sat here and watched as many as 5 VERY popular Aussie Flightsim website slowy die, the likes of Aussim.com.au, Simzdownunder, VirtualVFR, etc, etc . Why did they close ? They just couldn't keep up with VOZ and ORBX and most Independent Designers in Australia have all but given up.

To the best of my knowledge the only Independent Websites in Australia are my own websites http://ozsimdev.com.au & http://gjsmith.net which is a total shame and I sure hope the same thing never happens to NZ as this would be such a great shame to have happen !!!

Cheers
Ian

Posted: Wed Jun 03, 2009 1:48 am

by Ian Warren

Since i have all the orbx scenery , im probally best to show examples ... they place photoreal areas into the four regions of the main orbx project so i dont think we going to loose anything in fact will enchance , .... the best example Mike is the placing of a more recent Motueka airport , yours into the older Robins Godzone scenery ! ... that worked a treat ! and will make people want the photo real scenery even more !

Posted: Wed Jun 03, 2009 8:14 am

by Njbb1995

Who says we need to buy it anyway?? We could always just keep using Robins Real NZ Scenery or Tims upcoming NZ Land class. Those Auzzys don't scare me....

Posted: Wed Jun 03, 2009 12:41 pm

by toprob

Njbb1995 wrote:
QUOTE (Njbb1995 @ Jun 3 2009, 08:14 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>
Who says we need to buy it anyway?? We could always just keep using Robins Real NZ Scenery or Tims upcoming NZ Land class. Those Auzzys don't scare me....

Really, Real NZ scenery does not conflict with Orbx-type scenery. One is a photographic scenic area, the other is a NZ-wide improvement of the land textures -- two entirely different things. Anyone who has complained about desert-like NZ textures will appreciate the improvement of Orbx textures, but can still take advantage of photo scenic areas. Tim's scenery, however, may be a better answer for us, as I assume it won't need the 'VOZ/unVOZ' utility which rules out seamless flying between different parts of the world without switching texture sets.

Posted: Wed Jun 03, 2009 4:08 pm

by NZ255

Maybe Orbx could buy Timmo's landclass data....would save them a lot of time and sounds very accurate

Posted: Wed Jun 03, 2009 5:36 pm

by Njbb1995

I'm not saying it wont work I'm saying why use the Australians work when we can use ours??

Posted: Wed Jun 03, 2009 6:12 pm

by victor_alpha_charlie

Njbb1995 wrote:
QUOTE (Njbb1995 @ Jun 3 2009, 05:36 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>
I'm not saying it wont work I'm saying why use the Australians work when we can use ours??

Robin is meaning there isn't a NZ equivalent off what FTX are offering. I think?..

Posted: Wed Jun 03, 2009 11:41 pm

by LMerraine

I'm a big supporter of Orbx, I have all their "colours" as well as a couple of airports, but due to having problems with their only download site I haven't bought all their packs.

I would love to see something like this developed by Kiwis, more so than Orbx, but although it's been talked about a fair amount (remember the NZ scenery project that was even talked about here) it has amounted to very little.

Even if they decided to make some airports to their high quality, there are tons of the little fields that will never be done by the big developers.

As I mentioned, a NZx would be perfect, to develop the smaller airports - very similar to what is being done here already! I agree that the Aussies as a whole won't want to work on all the small airports in NZ, unless they are interested in them.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but there hasn't been a free high quality large airport (NZAA, NZWN, NZCH) done in the last year or so, and with Orbx that will remain - those would be the main airports that would either benefit from the likes of godzone, and wouldn't surprise me if they didn't try and contact you for possible designing it.

So if a NZx was made, and promoted along the same way with the smaller airport you're likely to get more exposure than what you are currently getting (not sure).

AussieX isn't part of the official forum, and if here became the defacto NZx you would see more people start coming here.

I think instead of thinking of the negatives, try and find a way to use it to your advantage. To AussieX's credit, I would love to design airport sceneries and have looked into it, but I still suck.

I won't be purchasing any of their American stuff, as it doesn't interest me, and really, I think the American area will be the make or break of orbx though. If it does well, they will have a secure future as America is a lot bigger audience than Aussie, or NZ. Europe then beckons, and really with FSX being the last sim for a while (apart from X-Plane) they have the luxury of time to build the packages without being superceeded.

I really hope that I will get to fly all of your sceneries in FSX, as there is a lot of talent in NZ, but I think now is the time to make it shine, so that the boys from Aussie don't take all the cookies.

Sounds weird coming from a kiwi in Aussie

Posted: Fri Jul 03, 2009 12:58 pm

by VH-MAL

I don't know what you are all quabbling about, ORBX are not Hitler and trying to take over the world, they are trying to fix what Microsoft refused to in our part of the world.

FTX is landclass and over on their forums they have been begged by the Kiwis to fix the land, which they have done a tremendous job in Australia.

No one is asking you to buy any FTX product, but once you see N.Z with the FTX treatment you probably will, I will I'm married to one of you.

This is the time you developers should be helping each other not whinging about Aussies fixing FSX, anyone would think we are at war with each other.

Anyway I think an NZx would be a great idea.

Just my 2 cents worth.

Posted: Fri Jul 03, 2009 1:13 pm

by Ian Warren

VH-MAL wrote:
QUOTE (VH-MAL @ Jul 3 2009, 01:58 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>
ORBX
FTX is landclass , which they have done a tremendous job in Australia.
Anyway I think an NZx would be a great idea.

I'm with you Mal , bring it on

Posted: Thu Jul 16, 2009 5:19 pm

by ceejay77

Awsome I can't wait there is nothing better than flying over the home turf I do that with google earth simulator.

NZFF

NZ may soon get FTX treatment