The State of the AI Art - 2008

[Charl]

I'm posting this here because I can't think of anywhere else - and it is a review, in a sense.
I stripped out all my AI and have been re-installing it worldwide over the last week or so.
Of course one does have to check it all out, so I called in at a couple of dozen random airports to see.
Actually, all are AES-equipped, which is essentially a must-have.
Did you know these are viewable on a Google Earth plug-in?
Makes life much easier...

370 airlines
1,900 aircraft
10.000 Flight Plans
72,000 voicepack files

Having taken 1,000 screenshots, as you do, I thought I'd string a few of them together to show the state of the art.
It's all a bit slow, and if you don't like Carol King, skip this...
But if you do look, keep in mind, everything here has been made by somebody.
Amazing.
Check out the Previous State of the Art at 2:45 - wow we've come a long way.
And the Gold Banana to the person who identifies the airport at 4:00



Still here? OK in the next clip, what airport at 0:50?



And last, a quickie closer to home, with a bit of appropriate Cat Stevens music:



You can understand my infatuation with FS9 can't you?
It just keeps getting better in this department...

So, hats off to all the many people who put in their time and enormous collective talent to create moving scenery for the pleasure of the flightsim community.

[NZ255]

Nice, must have taken a while


Lol at the last one, 30 seconds....nice parking

[Njbb1995]

WOW is that all from your computer!!! must have taken you a while

[Ian Warren]

Enjoyable watch
Carol King on flight no. 0:50 at Heathrow , and i'll take a shot at flight no. 4:00 LAX
See you 'poking your nose' in at Ben Gurion TEL AVIV .. no cameras

Great effort by all the who make AI real for both FS9/FSX

[Charl]

Thanks all, a lightning-fast whip around the planet, even in FS it does take a little time, yes.

QUOTE (NZ255 @ Aug 1 2008, 06:27 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Lol at the last one, 30 seconds....nice parking

Good spotting! I have a stray NZAA AFCAD...actually it might be nice to have PB drop you straight in the arrivals lounge if you think about it...

QUOTE (Ian Warren @ Aug 2 2008, 01:50 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

...i'll take a shot at flight no. 4:00 LAX

Feeling generous, have a whole bunch...

QUOTE

See you 'poking your nose' in at Ben Gurion TEL AVIV .. no cameras [/quote] Too right! Wonder how that dude managed to make the scenery so accurately?
I think they may have had to kill him, afterward.

Interesting YouTube picked up on the Cat Stevens music in #3 and sent me a copyright notification - Carol, & Mike Oldfield obviously don't have such astute royalty managers...

Last edited by Charl on Sat Aug 02, 2008 5:45 pm, edited 1 time in total.

[Charl]

I mentioned above that my airport choices were centred on those which are AES-equipped.
Of course AES is another form of AI too...
I can't think of any addon that has given me such ongoing use and pleasure when flying tubes.
Here's a shot I pulled from the heap, at Budapest



The animated vehicles work so well with the statics of the scenery, and all Oliver Pabst's jetways are beautifully crafted and animated.

[NZ255]

QUOTE (Charl @ Aug 2 2008, 05:47 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

and all Oliver Pabst's jetways are beautifully crafted and animated.

Is that for AI? Airbridge goes to them?

[Charl]

QUOTE (NZ255 @ Aug 2 2008, 05:58 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Is that for AI? Airbridge goes to them?

No...I was classing AES as AI - animations only come to the flyable aircraft.
Here's another gratuitous AES shot.
I really like the Delta paint on this Overland MD11 too.

[Florian_S]

Thats fantastic stuff Charl!!

I love my AI too, I always try to keep it all up to date, the only thing is that once you have updated everything you can start over because of livery changes, mergers, bankrupcies etc etc....never ending battle

[Charl]

QUOTE (Florian_S @ Aug 2 2008, 07:18 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

....never ending battle

Quite right. Many people keep a strictly accurate AI set updated with latest flightplans (winter/summer) etc
I am far too lazy for that, and only update when there are nicer-looking models available!
You may have noticed a Concorde at Heathrow for example, and there is always one at Toulouse, doing flight testing...just in case.
ANZ has flown 7E7's ever since there was a model available.
And A380's abound in all launch customer liveries.
In FS, you can truly tailor your world

[signmanbob]

QUOTE (Charl @ Aug 2 2008, 12:47 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I mentioned above that my airport choices were centred on those which are AES-equipped.
Of course AES is another form of AI too...
I can't think of any addon that has given me such ongoing use and pleasure when flying tubes.
Here's a shot I pulled from the heap, at Budapest
The animated vehicles work so well with the statics of the scenery, and all Oliver Pabst's jetways are beautifully crafted and animated.

I agree, AES is an outstanding addon to any airport that is a candidate for it. I have been flying a lot in FSX lately, but really miss my AES (and FS Passengers). mmmm...Might need to get back to FS9 for a while.
Bob

[benwynn]

Charl, ever thought of combining us a package?

Thats the thing with AI. I hate doing it myself

I use this really old package, Adobe AI, and starting from scratch like you have is just too overwhelming for me

[Charl]

Haha Ben this from the WOAI readme:
...THE FILES FOUND IN THIS ARCHIVE MAY
NOT BE DISTRIBUTED ON CD OR ANY MEDIUM FOR ANY KIND OF FEE, INCLUDING THE COST
OF PRODUCTION, MATERIALS OR POSTAGE.
I actually wouldn't mind if someone handed me a DVD with a few dozen GB of already-extracted planes and flightplans, all for nothing

[benwynn]

So its possible then

[Charl]